Just got my Note 3

[Dude2]

Download Solo Launcher. It's the same as Nova and totally free for all of the exact same features. I switched to Solo and I love it. There are some issues with the latest version or the unread notification software Nova uses. Solo doesn't have the problem.

SwiftKey is a keyboard, not a launcher, but it's also a tremendous product! Get the SwiftKey Beta - it has the extra "numbers" row on top!

What FBA said about SwiftKey, it is a great keyboard application.

For some reason I had to remove the latest version of Solo. It kept starting on it's own and launching when I selected another launcher so after about a month of fighting with it I just uninstalled. I will probably try again on another version that hopefully behaves better.

 

[jpr]

I had to uninstall Solo too. It would not respect the default launcher setting and would randomly launch itself and would launch itself upon reboot even if Nova was set to default. It was also always running in the background while I was using Nova and was eating up 30% of my battery when I was not using it. Has major bugs to be worked out - would not suggest to anyone new to launchers.

 

[AlfBriggs]

Hi guys my Note3 just got a 200mb update notification actually might have been 260mb is it KitKat and should I update it I've heard it's awful.

Posted via Android Central App

 

[darkmage619]

Hi guys my Note3 just got a 200mb update notification actually might have been 260mb is it KitKat and should I update it I've heard it's awful.

Posted via Android Central App

NO! It IS awful. Do some research. I discovered you only LOSE features by taking the update. If you like your phone on Jelly Bean there is no good reason to update.

 

[lynnpudas]

SwiftKey isn't a launch its just a keyboard. Nova launcher replaces TouchWiz. I like go launcher prime myself. Next launcher is good to and basically a sister to go launcher. To! It tends to be a bit buggier.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using Tapatalk

 

[Kelly Kearns]

NO! It IS awful. Do some research. I discovered you only LOSE features by taking the update. If you like your phone on Jelly Bean there is no good reason to update.

What features do you lose?

 

[Kelly Kearns]

Hi guys my Note3 just got a 200mb update notification actually might have been 260mb is it KitKat and should I update it I've heard it's awful.

Posted via Android Central App

I disagree with those that say do not update and many others disagree. I was on 4.3 for a long time. There is only one thing so far about 4.3 that I like better than 4.4 and that is the "Settings Widgets" that were in 4.3 and earlier. I used 4 of those, to have a buttons on my home screen that would open "Applications, Battery, Data and Display" and that Settings Widget is gone in 4.4 It is a minor cosmetic thing. I put the "Settings button" in the App drawer on my desktop and I then have to tap "Application Manager" and the "Usage Manager" button is on my desktop and that brings up the Battery and Data and the Active app button I have on my desktop now, so I don't have to click and hold home. Oh, there is one more thing and it again, is only cosmetic. I used the assistive light and alarm clock widget and I had a certain place for them. I don't like the alarm clock widget, but honestly, before I never actually used the widget often, it just looked good next to the assistive light widget. now the assistive light widget is a round button, so it still works fine. I just had to change a couple of things I had arranged a certain way before.

I've not had any issues that only a few have talked about with the SD Card, everything still works the same. The problems others have mentioned, will not be an issue long, developers will correct that. My camera still saves pictures to my SD Card and I still move things around, rename, copy/delete, etc on my SD with my phone, still using "My Files" like I did with 4.3 and everything back to at least Gingerbread.

I would update. Just plan, as always with any firmware upgrade you ever do, after the upgrade is finished, boot into recovery mode, wipe the partitian cache and then do the "wipe data/factory reset" while still in recovery boot mode. I do that one instead of the factory reset in Settings. Since you will do that reset, just have everything you want to save, moved to your SD card or connect to Kies and do a backup of what you want, from there.

 

[FBA]

NO! It IS awful. Do some research. I discovered you only LOSE features by taking the update. If you like your phone on Jelly Bean there is no good reason to update.

I think you're the one that needs to do some research. You lose nothing; you only gain.

@AlfBrigs - KitKat is a 430MB update, not 200 or 260

 

[jpr]

I think you're the one that needs to do some research. You lose nothing; you only gain.

@AlfBrigs - KitKat is a 430MB update, not 200 or 260

The OP failed to mention he has a Neo. The size of the update would likely be different than ours. But the update notification should tell him what the update is.

I agree there is nothing to fear with the KitKat update. 90% of the problems reported in the various threads here turned out to not even be remotely related to the update. The other 10% were almost all resolved. There are just a few things that have to be done in a different manner than before. Nothing that can't be worked out. Not a big deal and nothing awful at all. There are 2 or 3 people trolling this forum posting everywhere they can trying to scare people and spreading lies.

 

[darkmage619]

What features do you lose?

Here's one: Third party apps access to your sd card without having the root the phone to 'fix' it! This has been a great feature of android phones for years. KitKat takes it away. You also have to use a special flash .apk to be able to visit flash sites since KitKat removed certain APIs. There are TONS of complaints on the many forums including this detailing the issues they've had with KitKat. Battery drains being one of them. If you guys don't want to use the sd card thats fine but many do and don't need or want Google to disable their devices in the name of 'security'. My phone is still on Jelly Bean and guess what? I still have not had my sd card data corrupted by any PlayStore apps. It's almost like Google wasn't really protecting us from anything. The day I download a rogue app from the PlayStore is the day I 'upgrade' my phone. Stay away from KitKat!

 

[Kelly Kearns]

I have already upgraded, no problem with any videos and haven't even installed flash this time. No issues with anything being different with my SD card and no corrupted SD card.

The above goes for several I know that teat every phone out there.

Sent from my Awesome Note 3

 

[Kelly Kearns]

Oh and forgot to add, my battery has been better than my Note 2 and I got 18-20 hours out of it.

Sent from my Awesome Note 3

 

[lynnpudas]

Hey Kelly, do you like your Awesome Note 3?

 

[lynnpudas]

Here's one: Third party apps access to your sd card without having the root the phone to 'fix' it! This has been a great feature of android phones for years. KitKat takes it away. You also have to use a special flash .apk to be able to visit flash sites since KitKat removed certain APIs. There are TONS of complaints on the many forums including this detailing the issues they've had with KitKat. Battery drains being one of them. If you guys don't want to use the sd card thats fine but many do and don't need or want Google to disable their devices in the name of 'security'. My phone is still on Jelly Bean and guess what? I still have not had my sd card data corrupted by any PlayStore apps. It's almost like Google wasn't really protecting us from anything. The day I download a rogue app from the PlayStore is the day I 'upgrade' my phone. Stay away from KitKat!

I've got kitkat and can store stuff on sd card and I'm not rooted. I rooted my note 2 and loved what I got from it but I missed getting some updates and wasn't quite sure how to install other roms and was happy with what my note 2 did so didn't want to take a chance. The ironic thing about all of it was everyone was saying the update with multitasking was coming and mine would never come so I gave up and rooted my phone. Half way through the process, got my update but I was too far in the process to back out and install the update. It worked out fine though. I don't think there was anything in the updates after that, that I found intriguing.

But, I'm off topic, I do have kitkat and I can put third party apps on my sd card. I've put a few but the one in my phone is only an 8 gig sdcard and have had it through 2 or 3 phones. I've ordered a 32 gb card so sometime today, I'm going to transfer what I got on sd card to my laptop replace the sd card and then put everything on the 32 gig. Kinda wish I'd got the 64 gig now though. Aw well, we'll save that for the note 5. Although maybe not. I'm hearing the next note will have a 5.9 inch display so no telling how big the note 5 will be. 6 inches might be pushing it a bit. I always thought the galaxy mega??? or whatever it was called was a bit much.