I have a love/hate relationship with my new Samsung Note. A lot of its features are utterly fantastic, and it has so much more functionality than my iPad, which is an attractive but pretty useless toy by comparison. After about 8 weeks ownership of the Note I'm still learning how to use it, but here in no particular order, are some of my pet annoyances that I've been unable to solve thus far. ...
1. When I click on a .pdf download (and many other file types), I get a flash warning (believe these are called "toast"), saying "not a supported file type". Yet if I open up Polaris Office, hunt for the download then click on it, it opens just fine, so it IS a supported file type. This I think merely indicates the OS simply doesn't know Polaris or other apps capable of opening given file types, exist.... ie *in Windows speak, the file type associations aren't set.
2. The Toast warnings don't stay on screen for long enough. I generally only notice them just as they are vanishing. They are too quick to read at that stage and as far as I can see, the display time isn't configurable.
3. The keyboard size options are either too large or too small.
4. The keyboard has no left/right arrow cursor. (Few do, but would be a nice feature, and some of the wasted keyboard real estate could be better utilised I'm sure).
5. The stock android email app keeps deleting my emails. (The iPad doesn't). Tried lots of settings, but couldn't cure this. (However now sorted by using the wonderful Aqua Mail Pro app).
6. Multi window has a rather limited range of associated apps, eg, Polaris isn't on the list, and my new email client Aqua Mail, doesn't show, only the stock android email client, which I no longer use. (Can you add or delete apps on the multiwindow bar? )
7. The keyboard letters change to lower case when lower case is selected. You might think this is to be expected,*but this behaviour makes key selection/recognition less easy as it is constantly changing.
8. When dictating text using the microphone, I can't use voice commands for punctuation and formatting. eg full stop, new line, exclamation mark, brackets etc. *Using Siri on iOs, and Dragon Naturally Speaking on Windows OS, you can!
9. Although there are a few text-to-speech options, there are none for speech-to-text.
10. Using the S pen, highlighting text accurately for cut or copy, is just about impossible. In Polaris it's pretty appalling, but on Web pages or email, it is so bad, it's unusable. *This feature on my iPad, by comparison is a delight.
11. The cut/copy/paste/etc. toolbar often vanishes before I have completed the required selection, because I generally need several attempts at this... toast display time interval again I guess.
12. The S pen is way too skinny and the button is nearly invisible.
13. The S pen plastic is very soft and after a couple of months of daily use, the finely textured button bars have become polished to the extent that I can barely feel them now with my index finger.
14. Depending on the screen I'm in, cut, copy and paste options appear in different ways or menus, making for a confusing, inconsistent and often awkward interface.
15. Can't rename a document directly in Polaris. *
16. The Smart screen options (stay, pause and scroll) simply don't work reliably. ... *unless the screen is about 8 inches from my face, at which distance I can't focus!
17. Scrolling Web pages with the S pen hover technique, the scroll speed is too fast and is not configurable. It works on some pages but not all, eg Polaris, so is additionally inconsistent and confusing. I know there is a scroll bar and slider in Polaris, but the latter doesn't always appear.
18. Although I've stopped apps auto updating, they are continually checking for, and advising me of available updates. This is even true for apps I've uninstalled!
19. The dreaded time lag when opening Web pages etc. *I improved this somewhat by stopping as many background processes as possible and by a hack in developer options, but still not great. *(I like my current layout and interface look, so am loathe to ditch Touchwiz in favour of Nova launcher, as I don't think I can revert if I don't like it).
20. Screen mirroring to my Samsung 3d Smart (allegedly) TV doesn't work reliably, and only in part. Some videos eg from U tube will show, but in appallingly poor vision and sound quality. *
21. Wireless streaming of purchased videos from Samsung video hub is impossible.
22. Although the TV finds my tablet, along with music and pictures, on the Note screen after scanning it says "no devices found"?
23. It seems to be impossible to mirror the tablet screen for email or Web etc. without using an HDMI cable.
24. Screen mirroring, Allshare play, Connect and share, Wi-fi direct, Multi share, Multi-connect, Samsung link, Media play, permitted devices, nearby devices, ...why so many names and so complicated for what should ostensibly be a simple feature?
25.The User Manual is badly written, not detailed enough, and the search feature difficult to use.
26. The search feature on the Samsung Manual.pdf, just plain doesn't work..
27. *Screen capture degrades and re-sizes the image.
There are a lot of quite complex interactive features on this tablet, and Samsung is to be commended for doing a pretty OK job of putting all this together, but they really should document and support this better.
These are just my views and experience, others may disagree.
This is not intended to be a rant, I really love this tablet, but it's disappointing to have all these minor annoyances, *and it's somewhat cathartic to get it off my chest. I'm sure a lot of other owners will identify with some of the points I've raised. Here's hoping Samsung takes in constructive criticism from these forums, and in the meantime, *I look forward to any comments/solutions proffered by the members of this great community.
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1. When I click on a .pdf download (and many other file types), I get a flash warning (believe these are called "toast"), saying "not a supported file type". Yet if I open up Polaris Office, hunt for the download then click on it, it opens just fine, so it IS a supported file type. This I think merely indicates the OS simply doesn't know Polaris or other apps capable of opening given file types, exist.... ie *in Windows speak, the file type associations aren't set.
2. The Toast warnings don't stay on screen for long enough. I generally only notice them just as they are vanishing. They are too quick to read at that stage and as far as I can see, the display time isn't configurable.
3. The keyboard size options are either too large or too small.
4. The keyboard has no left/right arrow cursor. (Few do, but would be a nice feature, and some of the wasted keyboard real estate could be better utilised I'm sure).
5. The stock android email app keeps deleting my emails. (The iPad doesn't). Tried lots of settings, but couldn't cure this. (However now sorted by using the wonderful Aqua Mail Pro app).
6. Multi window has a rather limited range of associated apps, eg, Polaris isn't on the list, and my new email client Aqua Mail, doesn't show, only the stock android email client, which I no longer use. (Can you add or delete apps on the multiwindow bar? )
7. The keyboard letters change to lower case when lower case is selected. You might think this is to be expected,*but this behaviour makes key selection/recognition less easy as it is constantly changing.
8. When dictating text using the microphone, I can't use voice commands for punctuation and formatting. eg full stop, new line, exclamation mark, brackets etc. *Using Siri on iOs, and Dragon Naturally Speaking on Windows OS, you can!
9. Although there are a few text-to-speech options, there are none for speech-to-text.
10. Using the S pen, highlighting text accurately for cut or copy, is just about impossible. In Polaris it's pretty appalling, but on Web pages or email, it is so bad, it's unusable. *This feature on my iPad, by comparison is a delight.
11. The cut/copy/paste/etc. toolbar often vanishes before I have completed the required selection, because I generally need several attempts at this... toast display time interval again I guess.
12. The S pen is way too skinny and the button is nearly invisible.
13. The S pen plastic is very soft and after a couple of months of daily use, the finely textured button bars have become polished to the extent that I can barely feel them now with my index finger.
14. Depending on the screen I'm in, cut, copy and paste options appear in different ways or menus, making for a confusing, inconsistent and often awkward interface.
15. Can't rename a document directly in Polaris. *
16. The Smart screen options (stay, pause and scroll) simply don't work reliably. ... *unless the screen is about 8 inches from my face, at which distance I can't focus!
17. Scrolling Web pages with the S pen hover technique, the scroll speed is too fast and is not configurable. It works on some pages but not all, eg Polaris, so is additionally inconsistent and confusing. I know there is a scroll bar and slider in Polaris, but the latter doesn't always appear.
18. Although I've stopped apps auto updating, they are continually checking for, and advising me of available updates. This is even true for apps I've uninstalled!
19. The dreaded time lag when opening Web pages etc. *I improved this somewhat by stopping as many background processes as possible and by a hack in developer options, but still not great. *(I like my current layout and interface look, so am loathe to ditch Touchwiz in favour of Nova launcher, as I don't think I can revert if I don't like it).
20. Screen mirroring to my Samsung 3d Smart (allegedly) TV doesn't work reliably, and only in part. Some videos eg from U tube will show, but in appallingly poor vision and sound quality. *
21. Wireless streaming of purchased videos from Samsung video hub is impossible.
22. Although the TV finds my tablet, along with music and pictures, on the Note screen after scanning it says "no devices found"?
23. It seems to be impossible to mirror the tablet screen for email or Web etc. without using an HDMI cable.
24. Screen mirroring, Allshare play, Connect and share, Wi-fi direct, Multi share, Multi-connect, Samsung link, Media play, permitted devices, nearby devices, ...why so many names and so complicated for what should ostensibly be a simple feature?
25.The User Manual is badly written, not detailed enough, and the search feature difficult to use.
26. The search feature on the Samsung Manual.pdf, just plain doesn't work..
27. *Screen capture degrades and re-sizes the image.
There are a lot of quite complex interactive features on this tablet, and Samsung is to be commended for doing a pretty OK job of putting all this together, but they really should document and support this better.
These are just my views and experience, others may disagree.
This is not intended to be a rant, I really love this tablet, but it's disappointing to have all these minor annoyances, *and it's somewhat cathartic to get it off my chest. I'm sure a lot of other owners will identify with some of the points I've raised. Here's hoping Samsung takes in constructive criticism from these forums, and in the meantime, *I look forward to any comments/solutions proffered by the members of this great community.
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