All Things Android - Apps, Phones, Tablets - Discussion

I have just buy a new Samsung Galaxy S6,and i think it is very good to use...

 

Google made a mess of Lollipop. My Nexus 6 used to take like 5 minutes to boot, no joke. Graphics performance wasn't a huge issue but 5.1 still stutters, most likely it is the resolution that's my problem though.

Adreno was ATi's Imageon tech before Qualcomm bought it so it is no surprise they are such capable GPUs. I can't wait for the Tegra M1 though. The question is will anyone use it, however...

The S6 would be a no brainer for me if it had front facing speakers. Apparently the Note 5 is rumored to have them though so if that pans out, I'll likely switch to the Note 5 especially if Qualcomm hasn't sorted their silicon.

 

Hence one of the big reasons I chose an M8 over an S5 (other than KNOX and TouchWiz). I can't see any benefit in having such high rez screen on these devices. Stuffing 2560x1440 into a 5" screen means it will always take a big portion of the SoC to drive it. I really can't tell the difference between my sister's LG G3 screen and my M8 other than the G3's screen is wider.

I wish Nvidia would put out another Shield Tablet with their new M1. The Shield with the K1 I got to play on was awesome. I came very close to buying one just to see how well it could run FPse.

 

A lot of journalists prematurely reported it to have a big.LITTLE architecture, most likely shrugging 'true octa-core' off as HMP capability. In their defense, MediaTek hides the core type on their own site to distance their high-performance part from the rest of their portfolio.

2K doesn't increase performance, and although the MT6795 has a few more tricks up its sleeves than the MT6752, I'm left looking at clock speeds and how it's usually paired with better memory once again.

http://www.cnx-software.com/2014/07...cortex-a57a53-processor-to-launch-in-q4-2014/

 

Are you sure it wasn't because of that encryption in 5.0 that were on devices that shipped out with Lollipop? Also I noticed that with my Nexus 7 (which REALLY annoyed me because I turn it off every night), Lollipop makes it take FOREVER to boot. Samsung's boot is actually quite fast with the stock 4.4.4 image.

 

http://www.trustedreviews.com/huawei-p8-max-review

John.

 

I spent hours removing the forced encryption from it (such a pain, had to manually backup everything to my desktop with adb which took literally hours and to even get that started I had to flash an insecure boot image with fastboot then I had to flash the factory image to get the new radio and bootloader then I had to wipe the device again to remove the encryption and finally load the custom recovery and push a stock rooted rom that had force encrypt turned off, really ticked me off) and it made a negligible difference in boot time. 5.1 fixed the boot issues. My Nexus 7 on 5.0.2 still boots faster than the Nexus 6 did before 5.1 despite its ancient hardware.

Well that's what I had thought as well which is why it got confusing digging for info. I wonder if there aren't two versions though, one using big.LITTLE that was scrapped in favor of the true octacore? Either way, A53 cores are too weak for a high performance chip, Android doesn't exactly have perfect SMP.

That is officially way too big. Google got it perfect for me with the Nexus 6.

 

Holy moly that sounds like a pain to do. Will Google be doing encryption on for all Lollipop devices going forward (like in Nexus devices)? What about other OEMs?

 

As of now it's OEM choice. It wouldn't be a big deal if they made a way to decrypt the device without having to wipe it. It has its benefits though. Like now when someone steals your phone, as long as the bootloader isn't unlocked if the person does a factory reset, it keeps the device locked until you log in with your Google account rendering mobile theft useless. Of course without root, I can't keep transferring all my apps and data from phone to phone so that's a big no go for me since I've been transferring apps since my HTC Hero which was the second android phone lol.

 

Fat chance of that happening. I remember an article on Phone Scoop detailing how Google's making internal NAND encryption active by default starting with lollipop.

 

I poked around the Nexus 6 at the T-Mobile store when it had 5.0.2 and 5.1, I don't see a massive increase in performance, but I didn't have too long to poke around with it. A very meh thing is the battery life, it seems Google does not seem to care about battery life as much (but now the Nexus 6 has top tier specs as well as a top tier price tag to go along). I'm still rather irked by Motorola not rolling out Lollipop on 1st gen Moto devices as promised (Moto X, G, E, my fiance has the Moto G 4G LTE variant). I hope Sony does the soak tests for the Z3V too.

 

Yes they do indeed do that on their stock devices but manufacturers are not doing it.

You have to spend a while with it to notice the performance increase. That or fire up AnTuTu. Google changed the way the CPU operates after a custom kernel maker implemented the change in his kernel that fired all four cores up at once instead of letting them sleep and thus using more CPU cycles (and draining battery faster). Boot time is the other obvious difference.

Battery life doesn't bother me. It is better than the S3, S4, One M7, and One M8 before it. I'm at 19% right now with 5 hours of screen on time and a total of 12 hours off the charger. That's more than enough. Most don't use their phones like I use mine. That's the stock kernel too. If I put francokernel on here, I'd get a good 20% more plus an overclock. Its no Droid Turbo but it does the job. Sony is off limits for me because root breaks the camera.

 

Hi.

A word of warning the Samsung Galaxy S 8.4" seems to be having problems with quality of the display, basically like clouding, light patchy area`s on back screens, while the 10.5 inch version seems to be unaffected, the 8.4" seems to use an pentile pixel panel while the 10.5" uses an rgb pixel panel.

The screen problems only seem to show when viewing the display in the dark environment, and cannot be seen with normal light levels, so how many people will be bothered is a personal choice.

Check the link below for more information

http://forum.xda-developers.com/galaxy-tab-s/help/tab-s-8-4-screen-homogeneity-issues-t2826661/page1

John.

 

I was not aware of the thing going on with DRM keys on an unlocked bootloader until you wrote this. Thankfully, it's possible to root without unlocking the bootloader, thus maintaining the DRM keys needed for better low-light performance, noise reduction, and some other Sony Mobile apps. This way of rooting may not work on all models and firmwares, but at least there's light at the end of the tunnel.

http://www.android.gs/root-for-locked-bootloader-sony-xperia-z3-z3-compact-finally-made-available/

 

Haha well I guess you are apart from the norm. I think flagship phones these days being ~5" or slightly larger, and having 3000+ mAH battery, 1.5-2 days of moderate usage should not be out of the question. Maybe I obsess with getting good battery life, but my job also puts me in front of a computer all day long, so I will say I use my phone less than your average person.

For me, staying with Verizon was easier than jumping back to T-Mobile. Verizon also doesn't have a great Android phone selection IMO, having only flagship phones (G3, M9, S5/6/Edge, Note 3/4, Droid Turbo, Moto X, Nexus 6, iPhone 6/6+, Z3V). I'm still not a huge fan of the G3 button placement, the M9 overheats and I'm still wary of HTC build quality. I didn't really want a Note, S5 was too plain and meh phone components. I wanted to get away from Apple, Moto X has a craptastic battery and I'm already annoyed with Motorola. Nexus 6 I had seriously considered but a couple things worried me; Verizon is likely to shaft Nexus users again with promised OTA updates (Galaxy Nexus much), the Lollipop encryption thing, the sheer size, QHD screen and the battery size choice relative to the phone. I don't particularly care for the turbocharging, a phone should last you at least 1 day, and the Nexus 6 isn't doing that. Don't get me wrong, I love Nexus devices, but I feel the 6 is such a polarizing device compared the older 4/5/Gnex. I don't plan on rooting or doing any more custom rom flashing, I'm kind of sick of it. And that's what I did on my Nexus 4, I kept stock Android. There's no need to do all those sort of crazy things, even though you can. My Sony phone has been still fast despite all the Verizon bullcrap put on it, has the performance and the battery life and overall I'm extremely happy with my purchase.

 

But see, I always root and run a custom ROM stripped of any bloat. Plus T-Mobile versions shipped with a secure bootloader too (despite the fact that T-Mobile has no issue with rooting and modding, in fact when I buy a new phone at the store we almost always get into a discussion about rooting) making it hard to free my phone.

I agree with most of your points but the Nexus 4 and 5 didn't have great battery life either.



But yes, Sony has excellent battery life. If it wasn't for the DRM and encrypted bootloader mess, I'd have gotten a Z3.

By the way as someone who owned the M7 and the M8, they were incredibly well built. I had a ton of HTC phones going all the way back to the HTC Mogul (PPC-6800) and the build quality of the M7 and M8 were out of this world. Horrendous batteries though

 

When I got my Nexus 4 (early 2012), I had 4.1 shipped out on it, and it OTA updated to 4.2. The battery life wasn't great, and 4.2.1 made it even worse (it barely lasted like 3/4 of a day). 4.2.2 came out and I could go through a 8 hour work day and I would still have 50-60% battery life left. I guess software updates can potentially make the battery life better, but having an appropriate sized battery also helps. Yeah the 5 wasn't great, but Google put alot of hardware into the 5 as they did the 4, and compromised on the battery. At least on the 1st gen Moto series, it was average, not great, not awful. But then look at the 2nd gen Moto X. Just bleh on Google for putting compromises on the Nexus 6, despite its 600 dollar price tag.

There was a guy on here who bought like 2 HTC One M7's and they all had build quality issues (screen bezel, phone chassis not put together well). It was mostly early production models. But the Nexus 9 had the same sort of QC issues (the back of the tablet flexes, white light bleed towards the top of the screen, poorly made volume rocker/power button). Apparently the newer Nexus 9s had improved build quality. I feel HTC is like the ASUS of the phone world, great ideas, average reliability, and build quality that can vary. I found the M9 build quality was good, but I could have cooked an egg on the frame because it was so hot.

 

I don't really feel like Google compromised much. I mean the battery is around an hour less than the Note 4 but it has a larger screen. I kind of feel like it should be expected. I don't know, I guess I got used to phones with poor battery life. My Nexus 6 will last two days if I actually use my laptop instead of spending all day browsing on it. The phone is more convenient for me which is why it gets so much use. Another battery life factor in my case is that I don't have WiFi calling and the LTE signal fluctuates up and down in my building. T-Mobile turned on Band 12 and now my phone switches between 4 and 12 all day. With the phone on HSPA, I got 6h54m of screen on time. I don't really mind the plastic construction of the Nexus because it doesn't flex and creak like my S3 did. The speakers are a huge selling point for me and while they don't have the bass of HTC Boomsound, they produce some rather clear tones and don't lose the mids like the HTC did. I got the 64GB so no storage expansion complaints. They could have put a better camera in but to be honest it takes some pretty decent pics even in low light, the shutter lag is just crazy long.

My speaker grill on my M7 wasn't perfectly aligned but if the OCD people on XDA never pointed it out, I never would have noticed. I can say that I left my phone case at home one day when I was drunk and decided to go walk to the wall and this girl ran into me while I was talking on the phone and it fell from my ear and I watched it roll on its sides and come to rest on its back. Left a dent in the bottom but because of how HTC weighted the phone, no busted screen. I'm 6'1 and it went straight down on the concrete and I expected it to shatter. To me that's great build quality. I got mad and tossed my M8 across the room one time (I have an Irish temper lol) and it didn't damage it either.

The M9 heat was crazy. Before HTC released a patch that cut 400MHz off the A57 cores, it was reaching a scorching 134F! I know when my M7 was charging and I played Brave Frontier it hit 118F and throttled itself but I couldn't hold the phone at that point so I could not imagine 134F.

With Sony exiting the US market (again), I guess I'll be waiting to see what the Note 5 offers. I have two Jump credits available too.

 

So I picked up a new keyboard today. Dare I say that I like it more than SwiftKey!

It's called Minuum. It has a full sized QWERTY keyboard that is blazing fast and incredibly accurate but also this really unique stacked QWERTY mode that takes up a single line on the screen.

Spoiler

Cool idea. Typing in the small mode just takes a muscle memory change but the regular mode is fastest keyboard that i have ever used. The sloppy typing mode is cool too. Definitely worth checking It out on the Play store.

 

Two Roommates Stab Each Other Over Android & iPhone Argument


http://www.androidtablets.net/threa...ach-other-over-android-iphone-argument.71868/

John.

 

Trying it out now. I like how much of the screen I can see with it minimized, and the autocorrect is good, though it goes nuts if I try to replace just part of a word, and I miss Swype typing a bit.

 

I never got the hang of Swype typing. One big thing for me though is that in full mode it is smaller on the screen making it easier for me to hit the right keys. Nexus 6 screen is too big for SwiftKey IMO. I like the emoji predictions too.

One annoying thing is having to turn off sloppy typing mode when I am putting in a web address but that's minor. The speed of it is so worth the little issues.

 

source

 

Looks very interesting. I will have to try it. I am a BIG Swype user. I can type extremely fast on Swype, and fairly accurate. Its just the occasional auto correct fail on occasion which annoy me.

 

Have been aware of the Chrome Android App Runtime for sometime but never tried it. Now I'm thinking about running it due to some of my needed apps not having proper desktop counterparts. Has the correct way to use this runtime on non-ChromeOS desktops changed since half a year ago? Should I still follow those old tutorials?

 

Ugh. Just did a factory reset and Verizon updated my phone from Jelly Bean to Lollipop. Not a fan so far. They changed everything. I should have just left it alone.

 

What phone do you have again?

 

LG G2. And great, I don't have any signal at all. It won't connect to anything. Not happy. I guess I need to make a trip to the Verizon store tomorrow so they can get it working. I can't go without a working phone.

 

>> CyanogenMod

 

Thanks for letting me know, I've got an LG G2 as well, on Verizon. Like the phone, hate verizon.

Its Verizon, once you let it push that update then it locks the bootloader I'm sure. They did that with my S3. Seriously, it should be illegal to lock a bootloader.. I blame Apple.

 

You considered loading a custom Rom until you get in to big red?

 

Same here. Love the phone, Verizon irritates me as much as Comcast. Unfortunately both have the best network setups, so they have you by the balls really. Plus on my family plan and work discount it's relatively affordable (unlike Comcast).

Going to Verizon this morning. What a load of hoohaa.

 

Well, good thing is a SIM card swap and hard reset fixed it. Shouldn't have happened in the first place though.

 

Did anyone see the recent rumour about the supposed Xperia Z4 we've seen leaks of actually being a less major upgrade to the Xperia Z3, dubbed Z3 Neo? Turns out the phone in question is called the Xperia Z4, but GSMArena has it that it's not even an international model; far less this year's flagship phone. I guess we may expect something more refreshing from Sony this time around.

http://www.gsmarena.com/sony_xperia_z4_is_not_the_2015_flagship_stay_tuned_this_may-news-11970.php

 

Hard reset as in they wiped the data partition? Did you at least back up everything before Idiota, the salesman who thinks he's a phone repair tech, did the factory reset?

 

He's on NBR. He probably did.

 

I don't expect Sony to bring anything to the table, especially in the US.

http://www.technobuffalo.com/2015/02/20/why-sony-is-considering-exiting-the-smartphone-business/

T-Mobile already ended their partnership with Sony (again - it was the same story with Sony Ericsson - they just don't sell) http://www.cnet.com/news/t-mobile-stops-selling-xperia-z3-in-latest-sony-setback/

Competition is always good but Sony just can't get their act together.

 

I just don't understand WHY they can't compete in the US market. Their recent products got very good reviews (especially the Z3 Compact) and they have good name recognition. Doesn't seem like a recipe for disaster to me.

 

They don't advertise. If I didn't keep up on tech blogs, I wouldn't have known about the new Xperia line and my carrier has had them longer than anyone. Sony has nobody to blame but themselves. Even when they had the first color screen phones that should have flown off the shelves like hot cakes, they flopped because they didn't advertise them and Nokia green backlights adorned our pockets awhile longer...

 

It just seems to me that running some ads would probably be easier than spinning off or shutting down an entire division. Since they've got a well-established and well-recognized and well-respected name on the US market from their other products, it shouldn't be THAT hard to create some knowledge that there are these things call "Xperia phones" and they're pretty sexy. And "class-leading battery life," "waterproof," and "superb cameras" are all buzzwords that should translate well to print or TV ads.

I mean, they could even just use their ads from the UK market; it's not like they don't have ads already made and ready to air:

 

I had everything backed up... I had already done a hard reset myself before I took it in, so phone was like new. But the SIM card change fixed it.

 

Good to hear.

The drunkard had a battery failure in her LG G3. I did a nandroid backup to her microSD card and told her to take her phone to T-Mobile and tell them the battery went bad.

I should've taken the microSD card out of the phone. Cause the effing effing EFFING moron at T-Mobile wiped her phone and microSD card. Said it was a virus causing get battery to get hot and making her phone shut off a few seconds after power on.

Let's just say...I was right, and I'm now banned from the T-Mobile store near our house.

 

Samsung Plans to Launch a Mid-Range Galaxy Tab A in May 1

http://www.androidtablets.net/threa...unch-a-mid-range-galaxy-tab-a-in-may-1.71892/

John.

 

I would be pissered. That sucks.

I'm looking at getting the G3. I am up for renewal end of June, but my G2 seems to suffice just fine. Would be nice to have an SD card though.

And FoxFi works great with my G2. So dumb how/why Verizon forces $30/mo to set up your phone as a wi-fi hotspot when you already have limited data to begin with. Who cares if it's used by the phone or by another device. Go over your GB limit and you're hosed anyhow.

 

It's a Japanese only release for that Z4, at least so far.

I have been watching for a worthy replacement for my Xperia Z Ultra for a while now.

Nothing so far is as large screen wise and higher performance. I use it alone instead of carrying a smaller screen phone with a small tablet. The XZU really does a great job doing both functions.

I am hoping for a 6"+ Snapdragon 810+ release from Sony, or anyone else, to upgrade.

I was also hoping for an Asus or other make 7"+ tablet with phone functionality to get released in the US.

Not that I don't like my Ultra Z, but the Sony CP-12 battery case is getting pretty tattered, and replacements are way too expensive - like $180+.

Eventually the XZU battery is going to go soft, and I will need to buy a replacement XZU - I would rather spend the money on a performance upgrade

 

New CPU`s for smartphones, tablets ect.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9184/arm-reveals-cortex-a72-architecture-details

John.

 

I wonder what the chances are of the Snapdragon 820 using these cores? Between using Samsung to produce them and using A72s instead of A57s maybe we could be looking at the chip the 810 should have been.

 

Please advise me a music player app with decent http mp3&aac streams playback and easy on battery life. I like AIMP in general, but it lacks streams playback. Ability to log played songs would be a major advantage.

 

Winamp?

http://winampenthusiasts.com/?smd_process_download=1&download_id=263

I can't really think of another one...

That link is legit, Winamp got bought by another company so their downloads were pulled from the play store for now.

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?t=374929

Winamp spearheaded streaming music really so yeah...

 

Ethrem, thank you, will try it.