Android stuff

This kills me. I just had to come to terms with this when my Hero died yesterday. I tried to get them to waive the fee, but they wouldn't. I was free to renew, but breaking my contract would have cost me $75. Aside from the 4G thing, I cannot complain about Sprint's service. I spend 99% of my time on the East Coast and have not run into problems.

Here is a bit of the transcript when I was chatting with a Sprint rep.

 

Yeah the $10 add on is their slight of hand maneuver to make up for the unlimited data plans which already cost plenty. But I think if you use a fair bit of data it's still a decent deal. They sure don't advertise it in the happy, happy, joy, joy commercials though do they? Overall I'm satisfied w/ Sprint and their customer service is very good these days. Just a few gripes I have.

 

YAY!!!! Finally got Gingerbread update on my Droid 2!!! W00T!!!

 

I'll soon be going to the dark side and getting an Android phone - the new Sony Ericsson Xperia Mini Pro. It's out now and it comes with 2.3 Gingerbread. Just got to save the $$ for it and stop buying razors.

1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon CPU, 512MB of RAM, 5MP camera, 720P HD video, unlocked, unbranded.

 

maybe that means I will be back to FroYo soon. I had a downgrade occur at one point in time. I could have sworn I started out with 2.2 and now I am at 2.1.

OK, I just checked. Yes, I am at 2.1. But there is a failing update going on in the background so I can't check system updates. For a smart phone, you would think it would know better than to try to download system software when the signal is less than a bar.

 

wow, that's crazy. I'd go to the store and have them try to force the update, since you know it's out, and you should have been at 2.2 all this time anyway

 

I was 2.2. And then one day a whole bunch of things updated at once including the folder program I was using and then the phone locked up hard. When it came back it said 2.1 and my camera won't work most of the time. Really, things haven't been that bad and I would have expected more problems. So far, the only problem I have had is the fact that when I take pictures, most of the time I just end up with a grey box that is saved. As far as I can tell, the only way to fix the grey box camera issue is to have verizon swap out the phone with a refurbished phone and a lot of the people who had the issue then complain about the new phone (being refurbished) acts even flakier. Seeing that everything has been running other than the camera, I half assume that the phone is really running 2.2 and is just confused. It certainly isn't worth going to verizon to be handed someone else's rejected phone which has only been minimally serviced. We had to turn in wife's last phone shortly after we got it, and the refurbished one was much worse than what she had to begin with. Nothing like turning in a brand new phone and getting something that is all scratched up and had been used/abused for probably a year.

 

You got that right. Had my original D2 for nearly a year before it messed up, I'm sure you may recall my rant against the Verizon lady who accused me of rooting my phone and putting Gingerbread on it a few months ago....yeah, besides that problem, and occasional reboot, it never gave me other problems.
This refurbished one has been a PITA.

But, I think I'll be able to upgrade soon, and the Nexus Prime is looking mighty fine....

 

Did anyone snatch up a $99 Touchpad from HP? (I know, I've strayed from Android again bringing up a WebOS product but this thread suits the question). Seems like HP is completely off the rails here. One day they're cancelling WebOS and basement pricing their new tablet and the next they're saying they'll make more touchpads because they sold out so fast and they must be popular. Yeah, of course...they sold out because you priced an internet accessible tablet for cheaper than most phones. Even if no apps are ever developed and product support falls by the wayside, folks still got a computer for under 100 bucks. I tried finding one for the wife who really wants a tablet but they were sold out by the time I heard about the sale.

 

Well.. here it is.. 11 hours since I noticed the phone was downloading an upgrade. The phone is still downloading and has reached 1%. ooohhh... yeah, I think it is about time for a three finger salute. (for those that don't know... alt-shift-delete)

 

@ Shep; yeah,I mentioned in the HYD my desire to find an HP touchpad last week, but unfortunately they were all gone before payday, or I'd gotten one or two

 

I managed to snag a couple.

 

OK Gingerbread loaded. A lot of my apps and digital files that were moved to the internal SD card are no longer readable. I will have to investigate that further; however, most apps and accounts are up and running (including the camera). It is quite a bit slower and less responsive, but that is probably due to everything running for the fist time. One of the first things I noticed... when I turned it on this morning, I had bacon in my top info bar.

Turn the ringer off and get bacon.

Why am I suddenly hungry?

 

I got the 2.3 update on my Inspire 4g (at&t) about 2 weeks ago only a couple of noticeable changes mainly when powering it on if I just push the button and release it the phone will power on without anything showing on the screen it goes right into lock mode which is ok, if I hold the power button down it will then show the entire power up process on screen as before but it does start quicker, and second main thing I noticed is the battery life is much improved as far as how long it takes for the battery to drain when just on and in standby it can now go 4 days easily where as before if I got 2 days out of it I was lucky. Time for the battery to drain when using it either on calls or surfing hasn't changed though and so far I never downloaded anymore apps then what just came with it.

 

Well... I still can't get a number of apps to run. The phone is running most apps incredibly slow and my battery which used to last 2 days lasted 5 hours yesterday. Not good.. Glad to hear that others have had success with gingerbread. However, in my experience it killed the only decently working phone that I have owned in years.

 

Well, my Evo is dead. Seriously PO'd about this. By far the best phone I've ever owned. However it is not impervious to spilled juice. My juice bottle blew up in my bag on the way to work. Soaked the phone. Now it won't boot up and the buttons are all stuck. !#$%^! Don't carry insurance because I'm generally pretty careful...first mishap I've had since using cell phones. I'm looking into the Motorola Photon now. Goofy name, but getting good reviews. This will set me back 500 bones. Great.

 

I haven't noticed any battery detriment or improvement yet, though I've only been running it a couple of days now. I usually on get a full day on it anyway, depending on how much I have to get online, and that whether or not I'm on wifi.
I definitely like the looks of it better now, though those are minor since I'm running GoLauncher.
Both my sister and mom got theirs...actually, my sister's D2 had already downloaded the update and was asking if she wanted to install it, and since she didn't know what it was she hadn't done it yet. Me and mom had to go to phone info and initiate the update, but we're all at GB, no real problems yet.
My mom was hesitant, as she knows someone at work with Droid X that got the update at beginning of summer and had a bunch of problems. I told her to tell her to try to update it again, I think the DX got another update to fix those minor issues, but I could be wrong.

@ Shep: I hadn't heard of the Photon til now, probably because it's on Sprint. Looks kinda cool

 

I've got a HTC Thunderbolt. We got the Verizon unlimited family plan just before they pulled it. My wife has an iPhone. We'll be grandfathered in for at least two years. I'll have to read the contract to see if they can cancel us after that.

Here in the DC area there plenty of 4G coverage. Verizon's LTE is about 5x faster than our DSL at home. I turned off the wifi on my phone and use the 4G. It eats batteries like crazy, but I have a spare and carry a small charger with me.

Someone may have already posted this, but for those having trouble installing apps from other sources, like Amazon, goto Setting -> Applications and check the Unknown Sources box. Some carriers remove this option so you only access their app store. I only check this when installing from a non-Market app store.

Also, you may want to read this article about the Amazon App Store and their free App of the Day offer. I use free apps as trials and pay the buck or two if I keep it. If you like an Amazon free app, please consider buying it from the Android Market to support the devs.

HTC is gradually rolling out unlocked bootloaders, which I think means one can root/reflash their ROM without voiding the warrenty. I hope so. Android does not handle bachups well, particularly user data and settings. One really needs root privledges to do proper backups. They haven't rolled it out for the Thunderbolt yet.

 

Netflix reporting their app works on all Android 2.2 and 2.3 version phones now. A few glitches here and there being reported apparently, but overall good news if you've got a newer phone and want NF.

To update my post last week, I did indeed buy the Motorola Photon. Poured over lots of reviews both professional and user and it got overall great grades. Like w/ every device it has it's glitches some of which have been repaired by updates and others still happening apparently. One of them is called the SOD (sleep of death). Sometimes the phone will inexplicably go into sleep mode and the only way to revive it is to pull and then reinstall the battery. It happened to me twice the third day I had it but hasn't happened since. Very strange. I'm still under the 30 day, no questions asked return policy so I'll be keeping a close eye on that. Plus I picked up the insurance after the whole Evo-Juice incident. So I should be covered either way. Other than that a beautiful display and great features. Maybe even surpasses the Evo which to date has been my favorite phone. I really love these smart phones!

While at the Sprint store I finally caved and bought the wife a Samsung Galaxy Tab (10.1 in. screen). I've been studying and reviewing them all for months now and wasn't sure which one we'd get or when. When she saw it on display the decision was made. She's played with it more than me but from what I can tell it's a pretty standard Android device. Beautiful screen, apps, fast internet on WiFi and so on. I'm more and more leaning towards getting one for myself once the home computer dies. I see no real reason why basic home computing requires a big desk top unit anymore. Even now we have one of those all-in-one things which while more compact than a tower is still a big piece of equipment. The only reason I can think why they are needed these days is if you are a gamer or like to burn discs. Gotta think more on this.