New Cell Phone !

[k0nkuzh0n]

Ahhhh ! No offense intended ! So...care to share what you've discovered with the S3 that gave you problems ? Anything I should or shouldn't do ???

So far, my biggest problem is having service ! Yesterday, we had no bars for most of the day, but today it's hooking up. Our old slider phone (my NEW one !) had a good connection all day long... As I understand it, NET 10 buys "blocks" of bandwidth from the Big Guys who have the infrastructure...after some research, it looks like the S3 is using the Sprint network, and their coverage out where I live is not that great. The slider appears to be using AT&T, but I haven't confirmed that. I found a neat app on-line at OpenSignal.com...tells you a lot about the various company's coverage in your location...

Stoplight...

I got the S3 the 1st day it came out for US Cellular. It would drop calls like crazy. At my house (which reception wasn't the best) it would drop calls at least every 4 minutes. It was pretty miserable trying to have conversations with people. Then Samsung took them back and replaced them with refurbished units. Which was a lot better, but I still was dropping calls a lot more than my previous phone (HTC Desire). It seemed to me that the phone would drop calls when trying to switch between 3G and 4G towers. Im in an area where there is 4G reception, but the 3G reception is a stronger signal.

Eventually I sold the phone and got an S4. S4 has been everything I was hoping to get with the S3. I've also heard that S3s are actually messing up US Cellular's towers (Not sure on the details) and that they stopped selling them because of the problems. I'd say if you aren't experiencing dropped calls issue, its probably a perfect phone.

 

[burrocrat]

words with friends has been responsible for straining many friendships so watch out. it allows things that are not really words in my opinion. tell your wife to use the word 'qi', preferably her opponent will make a word with an 'i' in it hanging out by a triple word score square. she will soon realize why that baldwin brother got kicked off a plane for not shutting off his phone while playing words on the tarmac.

also, there are a specific number of each letter, it's like counting cards in blackjack. if your wife is good at tracking details she can know with high probability what letters the opponent likely has and adjust her plays accordingly, especially near the end.

good luck. you may want to have a backup plan for a family intervention if things get out of hand.

 

[nnuut]

I think I'm going to get a Cricket.

 

[Stoplight]

Thanks, Boys and Girls, for all the app recommendations !!! I've been downloading many of them, using my home wi-fi connection, of course All y'all have similar tastes to my Wife...so the Geocaching, Suduko, various Solitaire and Majhong apps went on there first, followed by Yelp and various shopping apps. The Grand-Niece, who attends college near here, has already claimed she's undefeated in Words with Friends...the Wife will have to see about that...but it's not fair...the Kid is an English major !

Fiddling with this Android phone reminds me of the days of my first MS DOS 3.1 computer...while the Apple Macintosh people sat back and laughed, I learned how to use stuff like XTree for DOS, Procomm, etc etc. Ah, the "good old days" ! I just hope once I get everything set up and tweaked, the Wife will USE it :nuts:


Stoplight...

 

[Stoplight]

Far from an Apple fan-boy. Only Apple product I've ever bought is a refurbished Ipod Nano I got for $40. I owned an S3, and now have an S4. So I know first hand the problems the S3 had.

Ahhhh ! No offense intended ! So...care to share what you've discovered with the S3 that gave you problems ? Anything I should or shouldn't do ???

So far, my biggest problem is having service ! Yesterday, we had no bars for most of the day, but today it's hooking up. Our old slider phone (my NEW one !) had a good connection all day long... As I understand it, NET 10 buys "blocks" of bandwidth from the Big Guys who have the infrastructure...after some research, it looks like the S3 is using the Sprint network, and their coverage out where I live is not that great. The slider appears to be using AT&T, but I haven't confirmed that. I found a neat app on-line at OpenSignal.com...tells you a lot about the various company's coverage in your location...

Stoplight...

 

[jpcavin]

DropBox, 1Password, Reminders, Geocaching, Kindle, Netflix, Fandango, Youtube, ESPN ScoreCenter, Financial institutions as applicable, Credit Karma, Tapatalk, Games (Fruit Ninja, Angry Birds, Sudoku, Solitaire, Mahjong, Words with Friends, QRANK, Candy Crush), RunKeeper, Music (Shazam, Last.fm, Pandora, Opera Mini), Productivity (MetroFax, TurboScan), Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Skype, Instagram, Shopping (Amazon, Home Depot, JCP, Target, Lowes, Ebay, Craigslist, etc), Gas Buddy, Shelter View, Gate Guru, Flashlight, MyStuff,

Not all may be available on Android.

 

[weatherweenie]

You got any "Favorite Apps" you recommend ???

Stoplight...

Some of my favorite apps, Yelp!, Yahoo Fantasy football, Pulse(news feed), ESPN, RadarNow, Wikipedia.

 

[k0nkuzh0n]

Uh oh...you're not another one of those iPhone snobs, like MOST of my friends and family, are you ?

It's a "pay as you go" plan with Net 10...could've picked up an iPhone through the plan, too, but the phone price difference will buy a lot of Android apps, SD cards, replacement batteries, and generic USB chargers !

So far, we're happy with it...but our expectations are perhaps lower than the average "power user"...and the learning curve gives me something to do in my retirement ! The biggest problem so far has been convincing the Wife to let ME play with it a while (it's technically HER phone !)



Stoplight...

Far from an Apple fan-boy. Only Apple product I've ever bought is a refurbished Ipod Nano I got for $40. I owned an S3, and now have an S4. So I know first hand the problems the S3 had.

 

[burrocrat]

if you haven't realized it already, you are going to need a second smart phone if you want to save the marriage. might as well get the unlimited text and talk package with at least 5 gigs of data, that should be enough unless you spend a lot of time watching cute cat videos on youtube.

i only use free apps, and not very many of them at that. gps essentials is a good one, and c:geo if you like treasure hunting. remember to decline location-based services any time you download an app, and keep gps and wireless turned off to preserve battery usage and some modicum of privacy. make nsa triangulate your position from cell towers, don't just give it away in decimal degrees.

other than those two i only have apps from my financial institutions installed. if you turn on email notification your phone will make a little noise letting you know a transaction has been charged to your credit card before the barrista can even finish making your carmel macchiato. then you can trade etfs on schwab to your heart's content with a steaming cup of coffee knowing all is right with the world.

i don't pay for apps because not only do they cost money but the downloads use data which costs money too. and it auto-bills to your account and your phone bill can surprise you at $400 for the month. at first i got games for both me and my kid's phone so we could play together but he kicked my ass at sniper, he would wait in the trees until i poked my head out then wax me. and the 'gooooaaaalllllll' shouts he would make in soccer got annoying real fast. so i called att and said they were downloaded by a 10 year old without my permission and they eventually kindly wiped the charges. after a few times of going to that well and threatening to cancel my contract and go get a new free phone from verizon, the att gal convinced me to buy a blocking plan. i just pay $4.99/month to prevent charges without having to enter a pin# first. it's good insurance to avoid late night ron popiel shopping adventures or if your spouse likes to watch porn while you're out mowing the lawn.

i don't like the view from the mobile apps so i set it to display full websites like on a real computer. but now i think i need glasses.

that is about all i know about smartphones/mobile computing devices.

 

[Stoplight]

Good feedback, Burro ! No...it's a photoshop that my Brother sent me...don't know where he got it !

OTOH, doing a Google on rotary dial cell phones, it looks like there MAY be one that's available...or it may be a punk, or a "virtual dial"...didn't explore the links !

A phone case is a point of disagreement with the Wife...I want something a little more protective, although I don't plan on throwing it into sheet rock or dropping it in the toilet...She, OTOH, wants a sleek case that looks "cool"...

Learned some more stuff today while fooling around with the phone...adjust text size in Messages with the volume key !

You got any "Favorite Apps" you recommend ???

Stoplight...

 

[burrocrat]

Well, I'm not what you'd call an "early adopter", but I finally traded in my old cell phone on a new Samsung Galaxy S-3 ! Here's what I finally traded in :


View attachment 25970


Now all I gotta do is figure out how to use TapaTalk notifications on TSP Talk !!!


Stoplight...

too funny, that's not a real phone is it?

my s3 is great, no problems. i recommend getting a case for it like those made by ballistic. otterbox is good too i hear. the s3 is so slim and slick it almost fly's out of your hand so a good case helps with the grip and and accidental drop incidents. on a side note, no case on the market will help if you're the type that ocassionaly throws a phone through the sheetrock or leans over and it slips out of your shirt pocket into the toilet.

my kid is getting my old s3 for xmas and i'm getting an s4 or else an lg optimus pro with the huge screen. i stagger our 'new every two' upgrades and he gets the handmedown old tech. it only takes a few days to get used to the virtual keyboard then you're hooked. i hardly ever turn my computer on anymore unless i'm working on a spreadsheet. i don't care if they say the big screen phablets look dorky, 9 times out of 10 people think i'm a dork anyway and it has nothing to do with the phone. i mostly use mine to read tsptalk and news websites and browse for korean mail order brides, the better to see you with my dear.

 

[Stoplight]

What provider do you have? The S3's had a lot of problems

Uh oh...you're not another one of those iPhone snobs, like MOST of my friends and family, are you ?

It's a "pay as you go" plan with Net 10...could've picked up an iPhone through the plan, too, but the phone price difference will buy a lot of Android apps, SD cards, replacement batteries, and generic USB chargers !

So far, we're happy with it...but our expectations are perhaps lower than the average "power user"...and the learning curve gives me something to do in my retirement ! The biggest problem so far has been convincing the Wife to let ME play with it a while (it's technically HER phone !)



Stoplight...

 

[k0nkuzh0n]

What provider do you have? The S3's had a lot of problems

 

[Stoplight]

Well, I'm not what you'd call an "early adopter", but I finally traded in my old cell phone on a new Samsung Galaxy S-3 ! Here's what I finally traded in :





Now all I gotta do is figure out how to use TapaTalk notifications on TSP Talk !!!


Stoplight...