The All-Inclusive Android Thread - Page 35

Yeah, I've got the Atrix.  But it's not going to get the ICS update until sometime in Q3 ... which knowing how software updates usually go won't actually end up happening until October or so.  It's kind of crazy that it will take them almost a year from ICS getting released to being able to get it on my phone.  With devices with as short of lifespans as modern smartphones have, time is something you don't want to sacrifice.

Yeah, it is pretty ridiculous that it will take that long. Like I said though...you'll be able to get ICS months before Motorola can do it...either by CM9 or another ICS rom. It's definitely doing the bootloader unlock and roming.

Well, from what I've read, the only way we'll be able to get ICS on it is if someone can find the proprietary drivers required to make the device work. With the huge difference between Android 4.0 and 2.3 though, I've heard that it's a lot trickier than some of the earlier upgrades.

Often the source for the drivers, kernel extensions, whatever are from other devices the manufacturer released that DID get the upgrade and that share components with the one that didn't get a release yet.  Other times, developers can put a wrapper around some of the stuff to make it compatible with the newer kernels/APIs.

Unfortunately the Tegra 2 used in phones ended up having some issues so there aren't a ton of them still in the marketplace.  Motorola really had 3 'big' Tegra 2 phones: Atrix, Droid X2, and Photon.  But with the LTE problems they encountered with the Bionic they quickly gave it up and went back to the OMAP chips.  The only real hope I believe, is that the Xoom and the Atrix share some components so if the Xoom gets the ICS update sooner (and many Honeycomb tablets are), it could make porting ICS support to the Atrix a bit easier.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dontEATnachos 

Well, from what I've read, the only way we'll be able to get ICS on it is if someone can find the proprietary drivers required to make the device work. With the huge difference between Android 4.0 and 2.3 though, I've heard that it's a lot trickier than some of the earlier upgrades.

 

Often the source for the drivers, kernel extensions, whatever are from other devices the manufacturer released that DID get the upgrade and that share components with the one that didn't get a release yet.  Other times, developers can put a wrapper around some of the stuff to make it compatible with the newer kernels/APIs.

 

Unfortunately the Tegra 2 used in phones ended up having some issues so there aren't a ton of them still in the marketplace.  Motorola really had 3 'big' Tegra 2 phones: Atrix, Droid X2, and Photon.  But with the LTE problems they encountered with the Bionic they quickly gave it up and went back to the OMAP chips.  The only real hope I believe, is that the Xoom and the Atrix share some components so if the Xoom gets the ICS update sooner (and many Honeycomb tablets are), it could make porting ICS support to the Atrix a bit easier.

Yeah, CM9 for the Atrix is still definitely in Alpha stage. It's coming along slowly but surely though.

http://mobilesyrup.com/2012/03/02/an-april-launch-for-the-samsung-galaxy-s-iii-seems-likely/

I have the Samsung Galaxy S, and apart from being slow at multitasking, I adore it. The Galaxy III looks incredible if reports are to be believed.

Don't get your hopes up.

I've used a number of Android phones but the Galaxy S II was the first that gave me a tech boner. Sadly it's out of my range right now. If I ever get close to an S III I'll probably steal it, on the spot. 

This is fucking retarded.

For an advertising company Google sure is stupendously horrible at marketing.

The very first thing Google Play did to my phone was crash it. We're off to a good start, Google!

I've had a Galaxy Tab 10.1 with Android 3.1 or 3.2 for the past couple days and man this thing is week.  The only decent thing is that it runs my Amazon App Store apps so I have a decent collection of games for free for it.  Still, not regretting my pre-order of the new iPad 3 at all.  If my choice is between an iPad and this thing, I'll take the iPad.

Instagram came out for Android today. It's free in the Play Store. So over-hyped. Pixlr-o-matic does what Instagram does, but better. More filters, etc etc etc.

Took the dive last night and flashed Code Name Android, an CM9/Android 4.0.3 rom. Oh my god ICS is beautiful. Easily the best looking and best functioning Android version ever. Everything works great on this rom...except for not being able to use the camera. Hopefully that gets figured out soon, because its annoying as hell. Unfortunately, unless some dev figures out what the hell is going on with the camera not working in any CM9 rom at this point...it wont be fixed until Motorola puts ICS out for the Atrix some time after summer.

I'm still running ICS on my Touchpad, and I can't get over how amazing the experience is. It collected dust and was barely used before, and now it is competing with my phone as my second most used gadget. Nothing can replace my laptop though.

Instagram irritates the living shit out of me. It has pretty much ruined Tumblr. 

Oh I love ICS. I'm so glad I went ahead and flashed that ROM. Figured out that the camera thing only happens with the stock camera app. So, I just downloaded another camera app and it works fine now.

Yeah, on my Atrix. I forget...are you already rooted and with an unlocked bootloader?

Let me see if I can find you some step by step instructions for the bootloader unlock and everything. It's been months since I did it.

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1182871

Follow those steps. Thats how I did mine. And according to recent posts in the thread, it still works.

I have a bit of a newbie question Im hoping one of you veterans can answer. How come in the last month or so I can no longer upload pictures from my phone to Facebook at full resolution? Never used to be a problem before but now they come through small and grainy. The copy it sends to my G+ page automatically is always fine but the ones I manually send to Facebook arent. I've looked through the options on the app but havent seen anything relating to file sizes. Anyone know if Im just not looking in the right place or is it more likely to be a phone issue? It's a Droid 2 Global running standard 2.3.4.

I've Googled to no avail. Ironically most Google results are people trying to find out how to make their phones shrink images...

Getting the wife a new phone next week--her contract is over with AT&T and she's switching to Verizon and dumping her iPhone 3GS.  Think we're either getting her the Galaxy Nexus or the Droid Razor.  Any suggestions?  She uses the phone more as a phone (unthinkable!) and texting moreso than a smartphone.  She does want navigation, and to be able to download all the apps she has now (she only has about 2 dozen) like the Weather Channel, etc.  I'm leaning toward the Razor--either way, we're getting it from HHGregg, as they're giving away a $100 gift card with a new 4G LTE contract signup.  And I need a new computer monitor.  Bingo!

I'm not a fan of Motorola phones, so I would probably go with the Nexus. If you DO decide to get her the Razr, make sure it's the Razr Maxx with extended battery. 

I passed on both and got the HTC Rezound. I'm not going to lie, I had buyer's remorse for about two months, but it's gone since I "unofficially" upgraded to ICS. Overall, I think the Rezound is the best phone, but the Nexus is the "hottest" phone. 

We'll see what she likes--and man, is their website out of date.  They have the Razr Maxx for $299.  it's $199 in the store.  And the Razr isn't even on there (it's $99).  I know we won't be buying an LG--myself and too many friends & family have had horror stories with LG phones.

I have the Galaxy Nexus. It is clean, clear, and works like a dream. I have sound issues. It is no where near loud enough for me when on speaker. It is a bit of a battery hog. I am a heavy user in an area that doesn't have complete 4g coverage, so by the end of the day, say 7 pm my battery is dying. I bought a second battery when I went on a trip two months ago and that has been great. I charge one up at night when I go home and keep the other in my bag in case my day extends into the wee hours.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrTyres 

I have the Galaxy Nexus. It is clean, clear, and works like a dream. I have sound issues. It is no where near loud enough for me when on speaker. It is a bit of a battery hog. I am a heavy user in an area that doesn't have complete 4g coverage, so by the end of the day, say 7 pm my battery is dying. I bought a second battery when I went on a trip two months ago and that has been great. I charge one up at night when I go home and keep the other in my bag in case my day extends into the wee hours.

What time does that day start?  Because my Incredible can go from 7am to 3pm and be at 20% left.  If I could make it 7am-7pm on heavy use I would say that phone is no where near being a battery hog.

And my god, Android has so much awesome coming out but either Verizon has chosen not to offer any of it or the OEMs have told Verizon to get bent.  I am stuck without a One X apparently.  I am going to end up settling for the Incredible 4G because nothing looks good otherwise.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TzuDohNihm 

 

What time does that day start?  Because my Incredible can go from 7am to 3pm and be at 20% left.  If I could make it 7am-7pm on heavy use I would say that phone is no where near being a battery hog.

 

And my god, Android has so much awesome coming out but either Verizon has chosen not to offer any of it or the OEMs have told Verizon to get bent.  I am stuck without a One X apparently.  I am going to end up settling for the Incredible 4G because nothing looks good otherwise.

For me, 9am to 7pm. At 6, I am sitting at mostly dead, all dead at 7. Anytime I have a night time activity (Pub Trivia, date, hooking, whatever), I switch the battery out. I am emailing, texting, picture taking all day from mine. I photograph my class room board to keep track of notes in case a student is absent, taking roll from my phone, etc.

ETA: I say hog... but I guess I mean, in comparison to modern phones ...

Do you turn off the 4g radio unless you need it?

No, and I know that is part of my problem. I get 4g at home and in Knoxville, but I get 3g at school. It is mostly my fault because I never go through the settings to turn to just CDMA, not LTE/CDMA.
 

Quote:

Originally Posted by dontEATnachos 

But why should you have to spend so much time trying to get decent battery life out of your phone? I don't want to sit there and manually turn things on/off all the time. The nice thing about some of these is that you can schedule turning some of that stuff off and on. I don't know if you can apply it to the 4G modem or not though.

Well, that is kinda what Tzu is calling me on. 9am to 7pm with heavy use really isn't that bad. The amount of stuff I do on the phone, it really is pretty good time. I could extend my battery by paying attention to what wireless radio I am using.

Well, after getting into details with the Verizon guy this weekend, we're going to wait until I can switch as well.  The "standard" 450 minute plan plus data is $5 more than my wife pays now, but we went through her bill and figured that she would blow through that 450 pretty quickly.  And the 900 minute plan is $25 more than her current bill.  So we're going to a family plan when my contract is over and I'm ready to switch whenever the new iPhone comes out.

Actually, the family plan sharing minutes should work great, as my wife uses the most talk/text and I use the most data.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dontEATnachos 

Well, with decent reception and no Exchange email on it my Atrix went from barely making it through the work day to making it through 2 days of normal use (which is admittedly not very much). I do have it scheduled to reduce the amount of data fetching it does between midnight and 7am but besides that nothing really special.
I think spotty cell reception is really the thing that seems to kill battery life the most when the device is just in standby and cell phone providers should work on coming up with better solutions for what a phone is doing with relatively spotty reception. Constantly using more battery power to scan for better cell towers doesn't seem to be the right answer.

This is so true. My battery life is always awesome when I'm on wifi or when I'm at school, where the 4g signal is strong and consistent. It's only while I'm on the go and running errands while constantly using my phone my battery suffers terribly. 

Well, it appears I am in a bit of a pickle.  I have until Thursday to upgrade my phone(upgrade has been available since 12/28) or lose my unlimited data with Verizon.  I currently rarely go over 2GB but last month for some reason hit 2.7GB.

I really, really want the Incredible 4G but as you can see the street date on that is July 5th.

Several options have come to light for me but I don't exactly understand how one of them works.

1) I can just not upgrade from here on out and pay full retail for my phones and preserve my unlimited data stream for however long Verizon leaves them intact.

2) I can upgrade my phone and live with whatever is available right now for two years and then go about the task of option #1 starting in 2014

3) Apparently I can upgrade now and sell whatever phone I get to recoup as much of the full retail of the Incredible 4G as possible and then just swap the SIM card. However, I don't know how one goes about selling a cell phone that was tied to your account.

If I choose option #3 I believe I will be going ahead and ordering a Samsung Galaxy S III.  Any Android(Verizon obviously) people around here that can explain option #3 a bit better to me and more importantly anyone that might be interested in buying an S III for whatever the retail price of the Incredible 4G is?  I don't plan on activating the S III at all but plan on using my Incredible until the 4G drops and then activating that and when the S III ships I will never even take it out of the box.

To answer your question about option #3, you really just sell it like you would anything else. Just take your current SIM card out and put it in the new phone. Technically it's the SIM card that is tied to your account, since that is what contains all your account information, etc. Does that help any?

For anyone interested that missed the live stream of Google's keynote from day one of I/0 2012, here it is

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuC0i4xTyrI&feature=player_embedded

Also, here's a video of the CyanogenMod Meet-Up at I/0 2012.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puSdhvC0ExY&feature=player_embedded

I'm curious what people think of Jellybean (Android 4.1) and the Nexus 7 tablet.

I went for the third option.  The phone sold in less than two hours on Ebay and now the person who bought it is trying to back out of the deal after already paying me.  He is saying that VZW has told him he cannot activate the phone and keep his unlimited data.  I'm thinking he got cold feet or something.  Waiting for more information before deciding if I am refunding.

Jelly Bean seems amazing. I of course don't have a JB device yet so I can't say for sure, but I have preordered a Nexus 7 tablet. Very excited.

I will never buy another skinned Android device again, that's for sure. 

Friend of mine was at I/O and thus got a Nexus 7 for free. He let me borrow it for a day. Holy crap. I am in love with that device and with Jelly Bean. I want to have sex with that update. It is indeed just an incramental update, it takes some things began with ICS and makes them just that much better.

Quote:

Originally Posted by CocoaSugarbaker 

Jelly Bean seems amazing. I of course don't have a JB device yet so I can't say for sure, but I have preordered a Nexus 7 tablet. Very excited.

 

I will never buy another skinned Android device again, that's for sure. 

Yeah me neither. Not that it matters because I will more than likely always root and flash custom ROMs like CyanogenMod, or my current love AOKP. At this point, I would rather just have a device with an unlocked bootloader, just to make that easier.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DJ Dylan 

Friend of mine was at I/O and thus got a Nexus 7 for free. He let me borrow it for a day. Holy crap. I am in love with that device and with Jelly Bean. I want to have sex with that update. It is indeed just an incramental update, it takes some things began with ICS and makes them just that much better.

 

Wow that's amazing! I can't wait to get my hands on my Nexus, the few who've received it at I/O are positively giddy about it. Shame that it took two years to get out an Android tablet that isn't crippled and useless, but technology needed to catch up. 

Android users, what do you use to gather podcasts and move them to/from your phones?

I use Pocket Casts for all my podcasting needs. It's 2.99 in the play store.

My girlfriend used to have one and loved it.  She switched to a Droid when I did, and regretted it the whole time.  Mind you she's not a techie and hardly ever uses any apps.

My Atrix 4G is now happily running Jellybean! If you thought ICS was awesome, Jellybean is even better.