All things related to Android phones & tablets

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stupar

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I have been given the green light by the mods to create a thread that is to cover all things to do with Android phones.
If proved to be popular hopefully it will become a sticky and prevent fragmenting of threads which center around the same topic.
A like minded one has been created for Apple users so as to disuade cross platform bickering :D
 
Not sure whether it is an app separately downloadable or not, but the one thing that is on my Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge that I love is the true caller extension. It helps me ignore numerous scam callers and marketeers and just block their numbers. I'm not impressed by battery life (barely one day), or screen (impressive at first but rather over saturated and inaccurate once you eyes adapt), nor the stability of the software. I've had too many crashes and missed the start of a few conference calls as it required a reboot because the phone app crashed. Ironically perhaps due to the thing I like most of it. But as I can't trust it to work each and every time, it will be gone soon.
 
dejongj said:
Not sure whether it is an app separately downloadable or not, but the one thing that is on my Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge that I love is the true caller extension. It helps me ignore numerous scam callers and marketeers and just block their numbers. I'm not impressed by battery life (barely one day), or screen (impressive at first but rather over saturated and inaccurate once you eyes adapt), nor the stability of the software. I've had too many crashes and missed the start of a few conference calls as it required a reboot because the phone app crashed. Ironically perhaps due to the thing I like most of it. But as I can't trust it to work each and every time, it will be gone soon.
Click to expand...

That true caller is available in the playstore so I think i will download it as i get at least 1 or 2 nuisence calls a day so thanks for the tip!
Its interesting what you note re battery life and colours on your Galaxy S7 edge.
My wife has the Note 3 and she struggles to get a full day under moderate use.
Re the over saturated colours, have you tried one of the other settings within the "sisplay settings" to change the saturation levels?

Overly vibrant colours was one of the reasons i jumped ship from Samsung to LG incidentally.
 
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stupar said:
That true caller is available in the playstore so I think i will download it as i get at least 1 or 2 nuisence calls a day so thanks for the tip!
Its interesting what you note re battery life and colours on your Galaxy S7 edge.
My wife has the Note 4 and she struggles to get a full day under moderate use.
Re the over saturated colours, have you tried one of the other settings within the "sisplay settings" to change the saturation levels?

Overly vibrant colours was one of the reasons i jumped ship from Samsung to LG indicentally.
Click to expand...
It was the reason I send back the original Galaxy S, my eyes hurted with that one. The 7 Edge is not that bad, but I guess it is the way it is with the amoled display.

Brilliant tip - I've just switched to AMOLED Photo mode (didn't know it was there ...) and the screen went nice an yellow. In plain speak that means much more realistic and warmer. Looks fantastic now :)
 
Downloaded 1.2gb of Nougat on my Nexus 5x ....... Split screen is good. I like the way you can customise the menu bar at the top. Notification is slightly different. Else, not much to say about it!
 
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Meeten said:
Downloaded 1.2g of Nougat a run nine it on my Nexus 5x ....... Split screen is good. Notification is slightly different. Else, not much to say about it!
Click to expand...

Nowt much to sing and dance about then.
I already have split screen as implimented by LG which gets used a fair bit.
I will just bide my time and see if O2 role out the upgrade to my phone.
 
One of my loves with Android is custom homescreens and theming.
Below is my current homescreen theme

Screenshot_2016-09-20-11-43-04 by Stuart Pardue, on Flickr

For anyone interested in how it was created,the following apps were used -
Apex launcher
Zooper widget pro (for the date)
X CPU widgets (for the system monitoring)
Text Icon Creator (for the text icons)
Minimalistic Text (for the time)
Wallpaper courtesy of my own photo mode image within Forza 6
 
I have a Samsung Galaxy Note3. Is it possible to get the latest updates on this one too ?
The device is with Android version 5.0
Thanks
 
13DC82 said:
I have a Samsung Galaxy Note3. Is it possible to get the latest updates on this one too ?
The device is with Android version 5.0
Thanks
Click to expand...

Android 6 (aka Marshmallow) should be available as an official update for the note 3. There is no suggestion however that it will be getting Android 7 officially. If you want Android 7 you will need to go down the custom ROM route.
 
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Thanks. The phone shoud get it automaticaly ? Because so far I did not get it. If not - what can I do about it ?
 
13DC82 said:
Thanks. The phone shoud get it automaticaly ? Because so far I did not get it. If not - what can I do about it ?
Click to expand...

Scratch that, Android 5 is the last official update for the Note 3. If you want 6 and or possibly 7 then you are definitely going to have to go down the custom ROM route.
 
stupar said:
One of my loves with Android is custom homescreens and theming.
Below is my current homescreen theme

Screenshot_2016-09-20-11-43-04 by Stuart Pardue, on Flickr

For anyone interested in how it was created,the following apps were used -
Apex launcher
Zooper widget pro (for the date)
X CPU widgets (for the system monitoring)
Text Icon Creator (for the text icons)
Minimalistic Text (for the time)
Wallpaper courtesy of my own photo mode image within Forza 6
Click to expand...
Oh I do like that home screen. Very nice.
 
Customisation is definitely a major plus point for Andriod.

I like mine a bit more minimalist though..

Screenshot_20160920-124846_zpsaxzosl0p.png
Screenshot_20160920-124850_zpszefa4fbu.png


Apex Launcher and Balx icon pack. I do have Zooper installed but don't think I use it for this layout.
 
A nice simple layout there Neil....very nice!
 
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michael23 said:
I'm unsure what to do with my phone atm, my wileyfox is being sent back for repair today, crashing, optimizing of apps, restarts and freezing, and thats on a good day....
Click to expand...
Your problems sound like a software issue.
Is it still under warranty?
 
neil_g said:
Customisation is definitely a major plus point for Andriod.

I like mine a bit more minimalist though..

Screenshot_20160920-124846_zpsaxzosl0p.png
Screenshot_20160920-124850_zpszefa4fbu.png


Apex Launcher and Balx icon pack. I do have Zooper installed but don't think I use it for this layout.
Click to expand...
Not so good for fat fingers.... [emoji35]
 
I think it's coming time to replace my Motorola RAZRi - battery life is down to a couple of days now after nearly 4 years use. It's almost stock in appearance apart from using KDE wallpaper.
 
ancient_mariner said:
I think it's coming time to replace my Motorola RAZRi - battery life is down to a couple of days now after nearly 4 years use. It's almost stock in appearance apart from using KDE wallpaper.
Click to expand...

Sounds like you got good use out of though!
What are you planning as a replacement?
 
dejongj said:
Not sure whether it is an app separately downloadable or not, but the one thing that is on my Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge that I love is the true caller extension. It helps me ignore numerous scam callers and marketeers and just block their numbers. I'm not impressed by battery life (barely one day), or screen (impressive at first but rather over saturated and inaccurate once you eyes adapt), nor the stability of the software. I've had too many crashes and missed the start of a few conference calls as it required a reboot because the phone app crashed. Ironically perhaps due to the thing I like most of it. But as I can't trust it to work each and every time, it will be gone soon.
Click to expand...
I use an app called sync me. Does the same things, also hooks up to various social media accounts if you want and syncs people's current profile pictures to use as contact pictures in the phone.


Upgraded to nougat last week. Split screen has proven itself useful already, and the quicker access settings is nice.

Interested in the background data control, going to give that a go on my wife's phone as there is something there chewing through data and I just haven't had the time to look at it properly yet.
 
What kind of things do you use Split screen for? My Samsung has got it, but I never found any sensible use for it on it.
 
stupar said:
Sounds like you got good use out of though!
What are you planning as a replacement?
Click to expand...

Probably something running windows. :)

Seriously, Android has become clunky & less intuitive *to me* with the arious iterations, and poor design has led to fairly powerful devices having laggy performance and using lots of battery power, witness dejonj's experience with his S7. My wife finds the android interface almost almost meanigless and difficult to use, so when we finally move her to a smartphone from her Nokia clamshell it will probably be with a windows device.

I'm not heavily invested in Android apps - the only one I've paid for is endomondo because I never found anything that I needed that required payment - so moving won't cause any hardship.
 
dejongj said:
What kind of things do you use Split screen for? My Samsung has got it, but I never found any sensible use for it on it.
Click to expand...
Well only had the feature for a week, but my most common use is writing emails and having a pdf drawing or document open that I am commenting on or referring too, saves a lot of switching between applications and constantly having half written emails saved as drafts.
 
The difference for me between vanilla android and OEM is night and day.
I would like to see more devices being offered with vanilla android. @ancient_mariner you should try and get your hands on a device running just pure android (OPO, Nexus etc) and your viewpoint might be slightly different.

To be honest the "using lots of battery power" is now inherent to how they are used.
Years gone by phones were small and batteries were small but the battery would last an age because all you did was call, text and play snake :D now phones are big and batteries are big too, the screen consumes more power due to its size and we use mobiles to consume hoards of data/media.
I get approx 36 hours between charges, but then I use my phone to surf the net, listen to music and stream content. I never did that with my Nokia 3210i :D
 
okay, i've got a question for the experts...

I've been given a Samsung Galaxy S5 Active (SM-G870A is the model no. according to "about") by a good friend over in 'merica... it was actually brand new, unused, and completely surplus to their requirements, and my phone had just died so they kindly sent me it.

Now it's actually a AT&T specific phone model I believe (albeit completely unlocked to work with other providers). And obviously, that means in the UK, I'm not able to get the OTA firmware updates... as I say, the phone was actually a free upgrade that they never bothered to set up, sticking with their old phone, and only upgrading when the next free upgrade was sent them... So, the phone they sent me is actually running version 4.4.2. which is circa August 2014 according to the AT&T upgrade device page - https://www.att.com/esupport/article.html#!/wireless/KB425050

from the same page it appears that i'm lots of releases behind the game - 5.1.1 and 6.0.1 being available OTA in the good ol' USofA, but certainly don't appear to be anywhere else...

So - and bearing in mind I'm really REALLY not technical when it comes to phones - as in this is only my second smartphone, prior to the one that bricked itself I was still using a Nokia 8210 (readers under the age of 40 may need to google that one...) - is there any way to get hold of and install the firmware upgrades without sending the phone on a brief trip back across the pond...

I don't really want to have to do anything dodgy - I don't even understand WTF "rooting" the damned thing is, or why it might be a good thing - basically, I'd just like to get a more current version of the android firmware on the phone so it'll run a couple of specific apps that demand v5 or later...

okay - i'll sit back and be prepared to become bamboozled by all the technical stuff - please try and keep it as simple as possible though - imagine you're trying to explain it to your Grandad how it needs to be done - i'm fine with computers, I just sort of view phones as more of an appliance - plug it in and charge it then use it as and when necessary / unavoidable.
 
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TheBigYin said:
okay, i've got a question for the experts...

I've been given a Samsung Galaxy S5 Active (SM-G870A is the model no. according to "about") by a good friend over in 'merica... it was actually brand new, unused, and completely surplus to their requirements, and my phone had just died so they kindly sent me it.

Now it's actually a AT&T specific phone model I believe (albeit completely unlocked to work with other providers). And obviously, that means in the UK, I'm not able to get the OTA firmware updates... as I say, the phone was actually a free upgrade that they never bothered to set up, sticking with their old phone, and only upgrading when the next free upgrade was sent them... So, the phone they sent me is actually running version 4.4.2. which is circa August 2014 according to the AT&T upgrade device page - https://www.att.com/esupport/article.html#!/wireless/KB425050

from the same page it appears that i'm lots of releases behind the game - 5.1.1 and 6.0.1 being available OTA in the good ol' USofA, but certainly don't appear to be anywhere else...

So - and bearing in mind I'm really REALLY not technical when it comes to phones - as in this is only my second smartphone, prior to the one that bricked itself I was still using a Nokia 8210 (readers under the age of 40 may need to google that one...) - is there any way to get hold of and install the firmware upgrades without sending the phone on a brief trip back across the pond...

I don't really want to have to do anything dodgy - I don't even understand WTF "rooting" the damned thing is, or why it might be a good thing - basically, I'd just like to get a more current version of the android firmware on the phone so it'll run a couple of specific apps that demand v5 or later...

okay - i'll sit back and be prepared to become bamboozled by all the technical stuff - please try and keep it as simple as possible though - imagine you're trying to explain it to your Grandad how it needs to be done - i'm fine with computers, I just sort of view phones as more of an appliance - plug it in and charge it then use it as and when necessary / unavoidable.
Click to expand...

If you want to do official updates you will be stuck on 4.4.2 for a while.
AT&T only offered 5.1.1 as an FOTA (firmware over the air) and as you say you would have to be in america for that to happen.
Sometimes the firmware file will be hosted elsewhere on the internet but the go to place to pick up samsung firmware files still only has 4.4.2 as per below link
http://www.sammobile.com/firmwares/database/SM-G870A/

To be honest if you want Android 5.1.1 or 6.0.1 you are going to have to look at installing a custom ROM which isnt difficult but can be daunting if you have never one it before (one wrong move and you are left with a nice paperweight only)

Get yourself over to XDA forums and find search for AT&T samsung Galaxy S5 and you will get all the info you need.
In short though you are going to need to do the following -

Root the device (towelroot)
Install busybox (app)
Load safestrap recovery
backup existing OS using safestrap (good failsafe mechanism)
Flash new ROM
 
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