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Samsung Galaxy S2 - A mini review, Tips, Tricks, Q&A, etc..


Scott

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In his own lunchtime, certainly :D

 

Yip, my lunchtimes are indeed awesome (and VERY long).

 

Also just received one of these. Vodafone made me a great offer :D. Anyway just thanking you Scott, and contributors, for the tips and tricks etc. The Go SMS Pro app. is great.

 

No problemo :)

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I don't even use the apps folder. I just use the live wallpapers for everything I need. The standard icons are a bit meh though, but I've replaced most of the standard apps with the things I want to use.

 

Check out the wireless tether/hostpot feature though... that'll cure what ails you :D

 

Live wall paper is pretty good!

 

Wireless tether, come on Scott I was doing that 2 years ago on my iPhone 3GS ;)

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Live wall paper is pretty good!

 

Wireless tether, come on Scott I was doing that 2 years ago on my iPhone 3GS ;)

 

I mean properly mate, without the iPhail - iPhailaccessory restrictions ;)

 

This is what all you iPhail geeks keep missing out on. The ability to use a product with what you wish, rather than what you are told.

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This is what all you iPhail geeks keep missing out on. The ability to use a product with what you wish, rather than what you are told.

 

iConcurr.

 

Welcome to the flock Andy, Abz, Tubby Two and Noz :D

 

The force is strong among us now.

 

 

 

 

I'm not sure where I'm going with this.

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I've just ordered one of these in white.

 

All I need to do now is start training my mouth to say "Actually no, it's a Galaxy S2 in fact"

 

On a serious note, has the GPS been improved? The old SGS seemed to drop out a lot and could not be relied on

 

And yes Lbm, the force is strong - Do with it what you will, for you are the chosen one.

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I've just ordered one of these in white.

 

All I need to do now is start training my mouth to say "Actually no, it's a Galaxy S2 in fact"

 

On a serious note, has the GPS been improved? The old SGS seemed to drop out a lot and could not be relied on

 

And yes Lbm, the force is strong - Do with it what you will, for you are the chosen one.

 

I've never had an issue with the GPS & Satnav, and I've used it quite often :)

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I mean properly mate, without the iPhail - iPhailaccessory restrictions ;)

 

This is what all you iPhail geeks keep missing out on. The ability to use a product with what you wish, rather than what you are told.

 

Err mine worked fine, I still use it! You just turn it on & then pair the device, Simple :)

 

I am still struggling to find out what the S2 does that is MASSIVELY different from the other phones on the market?

 

Come on Scott, sell it me (even though I have one now) :D

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The S2 feels cheap - plastics. however I do like the resolution of the screen.

 

personally prefer the simplicity of the IOS over the android OS. seems too overly gimmicky for my liking.

 

I agree, that is one of the first things I noticed, considering the price isn't cheap.

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Err mine worked fine, I still use it! You just turn it on & then pair the device, Simple :)

 

I am still struggling to find out what the S2 does that is MASSIVELY different from the other phones on the market?

 

Come on Scott, sell it me (even though I have one now) :D

 

What were you pairing the phone to bud? I could tether to Bluetooth or wifi properly with the iphone.

 

 

Simple sale for you....

 

Tell me how you get 10 photos on an iphone, then have a look at how to do it with the s2.

 

Copy a divx mp4 avi movie to the iphone. check what it takes to do it and also what it takes to play it. next do it on the s2.

 

Simple? you're having a laugh.

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What were you pairing the phone to bud? I could tether to Bluetooth or wifi properly with the iphone.

 

 

Simple sale for you....

 

Tell me how you get 10 photos on an iphone, then have a look at how to do it with the s2.

 

Copy a divx mp4 avi movie to the iphone. check what it takes to do it and also what it takes to play it. next do it on the s2.

 

Simple? you're having a laugh.

 

With the standard iOS you can only tether either via Bluetooth or USB dude (I believe you have apps to make it a hot spot).

 

I mainly used it with my old work laptop I had which had a Bluetooth connection or if I had the cable then I'd use that.

 

General > Network > Internet Tethering.

 

Photo's I just drag & drop into iTunes, though not tried yet with the S2 but assume I treat it like a memory stick?

 

For video's I have been using Air Video App for ages, again just drag & drop or even stream so you don't have to storage huge high quality films on your phone, saves all that time to spend copying data across.

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Strange as I can tether multiple devices to my iphone by turning the iphone into a wifi hotspot. no apps required, its IOS and it was 4.2 or 4.3 that delivered that not 5.

 

its super thin it could give the illusion it feels cheap.

 

Perception is more important than reality.

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What were you pairing the phone to bud? I could tether to Bluetooth or wifi properly with the iphone.

 

 

Simple sale for you....

 

Tell me how you get 10 photos on an iphone, then have a look at how to do it with the s2.

 

Copy a divx mp4 avi movie to the iphone. check what it takes to do it and also what it takes to play it. next do it on the s2.

 

Simple? you're having a laugh.

I LOVE Kias air!!!

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With the standard iOS you can only tether either via Bluetooth or USB dude (I believe you have apps to make it a hot spot).

 

Exactly, the Galaxy has that out of the box and you can tether to anything or from anything you like. The iPad will tether to wireless but it won't tether to bluetooth unless it is an iPhone. Same goes for the iPhone, it won't allow you to tether via bluetooth to anything other than an i-something.

 

You can't send any files from any i device to a non-i device via bluetooth either. Mental IMO.

 

Photo's I just drag & drop into iTunes, though not tried yet with the S2 but assume I treat it like a memory stick?

 

Doesn't work for me with my iPad. I need to set up a "photos" folder and I need to sync it with that folder. If I delete the photos from that folder it wants to delete them from the iPad, if I delete them from the iPad it wants to delete them from the folder. The only way I have found around this is to create a folder, put the photos in it, sync it with the folder and then turn the sync off completely. If I want to change the photos on the iPad I need to create a folder again and start from scratch. If I don't have the original photos in the new folder then they will be deleted from the iPad. It's a farce.

 

How are you doing the dragging and dropping with iTunes? Are you sure it doesn't sync the photos?

 

With every other phone I have had since the dawn of usb connectivity the phones have connected as drives. The only phone to ever make this complicated is the iPhone. It doesn't make it simple, it makes it unbelievably complicated and difficult. I almost blew my top trying to get pictures of my little girl onto my iPad.

 

For video's I have been using Air Video App for ages, again just drag & drop or even stream so you don't have to storage huge high quality films on your phone, saves all that time to spend copying data across.

 

Great, now take your phone/ipad onto a bus or into work and what do you do? As I said, try doing what I just described to you. It's a bloody nightmare to get working properly. I went through 12 video apps, some apps will play certain file types but none of them play them all successfully. My phone video player plays everything, the only reason I installed another video player was so that I could stream without using Kies.

 

When I'm in the house I either use Kies Air (which is fantastic) or UPnPlay for streaming. It streams everything I have thrown at it, every file type I can find. On the iPad I need 2 seperate apps, one for streaming and one for playing files. The reason for this is the one that streams won't play local files without jittering and the one that plays local files won't stream without copying the entire film over. If I want to put a movie onto my iPad I need to make sure it's the correct format and then drag it into the apps tab on iTunes to get it to copy over. If I want to use that file with a different app I need to reconnect to iTunes and copy over the same file AGAIN as the apps don't share any resources. With every other phone and tablet you can share all files, never seen anything as ridiculous in my life.

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Exactly, the G.....................culous in my life.

 

I have all my pics in the pictures folder on my MAC and sync the albums that I want with both my ipad and iphone without any issues. The complications that you describe are ones that I have not encountered.

 

Regarding Videos - I use Handbrake to transcode Divx videos to the format & resolution that are supported by the ipad - is an additional step but then again not that complicated.

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I have all my pics in the pictures folder on my MAC and sync the albums that I want with both my ipad and iphone without any issues. The complications that you describe are ones that I have not encountered.

 

Regarding Videos - I use Handbrake to transcode Divx videos to the format & resolution that are supported by the ipad - is an additional step but then again not that complicated.

 

Yes, but you then need to keep those folders the same or it will want to sync with them.

 

I'll use the same example as I did previously with regards to photos. The folder I have for pictures of my daughter contains 50gb of pictures. Clearly I don't want to sync all of these pictures, I only want a select few (100 or so tops). On any other device bar the iPad I can select the photos I wish and copy them to my device. With the iPad I have no option to do this, I have to...

 

Create a seperate folder solely for the iPad to sync with

Copy the pictures into said folder

Sync the folder with iTunes

In turn Sync the iPad with iTunes to copy the pictures over

Leave the folder as it is or when I Sync my device it will remove them.

 

With any other device you only need 1 copy of a photo on your computer, with the iPad you need 2. One for your own storage and one for the iPad to sync with (same goes for the i-anything). For me that's ridiculous, I should be able to copy what I want to the iPad and have it left there when it is no longer on my PC without worry of it being deleted.

 

This thinking is backed up by the 1000s of users who have had their iPods/pads/phones/things wiped when syncing up to a new iTunes install, or to a new PC. If you aren't savvy with what you are selecting then everything gets "synced" to nothing.

 

The exact same thing happens with music on the devices. At least there you have the option to manually update what you have on there, again you have to be on the ball to know what you are doing there.

 

 

As for converting movies -

 

Again you need to have 2 copies of any one file for it to work. I have 100s of movies, shows etc stored on my mediacentre (2tb total). In order to actually watch anything on the iPad I have to either convert it so that it works with the built in player, which leaves me AGAIN with 2 copies of the same file or I have to use a 3rd party app. Now, for me the latter is the most obvious choice but it comes with a lot of difficulty in itself. Which app do I use? It really depends on the type of file you are watching and whether it is SD or HD as the video players I have all have their own niche. I have 2 apps on my iPad that between them can play most of what I want (I had a 3rd for HD but gave up with that). If I copy the file over to app1 and it doesn't play it, I then have to delete it and re-transfer to app2. There is no way to access the files between apps (mental).

 

The way I have gotten around this issue is by using a file explorer. The hilarious thing about this file explorer is that it only allows you to view files within the app itself, so the file explorer only explores files you have copied to it rather than files on the device. Anyway, if I copy my files to file explorer rather than the designated video player app I can then hold on the video and choose which app I want to use to open it. When I select the app it then copies the file over to the apps "inbox" directory and I can then open it from there (again 2 copies of the same file on the ipad itself). If it doesn't work I can simply go back to the file explorer, hold on the file and choose the other video player... which in turn copies the file to the other video player program (we now have 3 copies on the iPad woohoo). From there I can hopefully view the video and I can then go back and delete the unwanted copies, hoping that nothing goes wrong with the last copy as once it's in the app.... you can't get it back to another app or even file explorer. It's stuck where it is for eternity (or until you delete it). If you make any mistakes at this point you have to re-copy the file over with iTunes, which being in the house and not on the bus really sucks.

 

 

On any other device I have encountered (not bumming up Android, it has it's flaws too) in order to put pictures onto your phone you do the following...

 

Enable USB transfer (sometimes not necessary)

Plug lead into PC

Open up Phone Drive

Drag and drop pictures to where you want

Click "Remove hardware" (If required, I generally just unplug)

Job done

 

 

In order to put music onto your phone you do the following...

 

Enable USB transfer (sometimes not necessary)

Plug lead into PC

Open up Phone Drive

Drag and drop music to where you want

Click "Remove hardware" (If required, I generally just unplug)

Job done

 

 

In order to put videos onto your phone you do the following...

 

Enable USB transfer (sometimes not necessary)

Plug lead into PC

Open up Phone Drive

Drag and drop videos to where you want

Click "Remove hardware" (If required, I generally just unplug)

Job done

 

 

 

I hear lots of comments like "just works" and "Simple" where the i-anything are concerned. The above shows the meaning of the word simple for me. The above "just works". Once you have your files on your phone, again with most devices, you can then access them from any app you wish as the directories are all shared (other than protected ones). The apps don't need to have their own little space with their own little files, any video can be opened with any video app, any song can be opened by any music app and any picture can be opened with any picture app.

 

That's simplicity.

 

 

 

Edit: Oh, one small thing to add. In our house we have 2 laptops (one each for the Wife and I) and a main desktop computer which stores our media and other bits and bobs. I can only safely sync the iPad to 1 device so if I want pictures from any other PC but the one I am synced with I have to copy the files via the network to the syncing PC. That's a major PITA. It's clever though and goes to show how money focused Apple are.

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I have a question - how do I scroll back through a big clump of text - say I've written a large text or bit of text for a website, it doesn't let me scroll to the end?

 

/dunce.

 

Where are you having the issues? I'm having massive problems with the forum since yesterday, or maybe the day before, where the reply box wants to jump about non-sensically. If I scroll down it scrolls up, if I click to the bottom it jumps up etc. The only time it is stable is when I am typing but if I click out of the box I have trouble getting to the end of what I have typed. This isn't on the phone though, it's been on my laptop in the house (Win7 IE8) and computer in the work (Vista IE7).

 

The normal way to do it on the phone is to touch the area you want to type into, which will then highlight the box around it, and then you should be able to scroll up and down within the box. That's how it works on this forum anyway.... well normally lol.

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