1 Month In on Note 4

[mtbrown19]

Greetings,

Just wanted to introduce myself to the AC community. I switched over from a Blackberry Z10 to the Note 4 about a month ago (my first Android device). I was active in the Crackberry forums so I figured with the device switch I would spend my first month getting to know the device and lurk about here looking for info and tips. Overall I am happy with the change. The learning curve hasn't been too steep and I have quickly become accustomed to the increased screen real estate. I'm a big believer in understanding the technology that I possess so I'm sure I will have some questions over the next while and I hope I can contribute as well.

Cheers!

 

[WeAreAllUnique]

Welcome to Android central and the Note 4. It's a terrific device. I have had all of the Notes and have loved them all. There is a lot of useful information in the forums so take your time and enjoy.

 

[pmccartney]

I'm in a similar situation. Came from Z30. 10 years on BlackBerry devices.
This didn't take much to figure out.
There are a few things I really miss about BB10 that just can't be duplicated on this Note 4 but I am managing.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[mtbrown19]

I'm in a similar situation. Came from Z30. 10 years on BlackBerry devices.
This didn't take much to figure out.
There are a few things I really miss about BB10 that just can't be duplicated on this Note 4 but I am managing.

Posted via the Android Central App

There are a few things I miss as well and I have tried using cascades gestures a few times. I really loved the BB10 OS but I finally ran out of patience with the lack of support amongst app developers.

 

[Goosty]

There are a few things I miss as well and I have tried using cascades gestures a few times. I really loved the BB10 OS but I finally ran out of patience with the lack of support amongst app developers.

Same here about the app support. I was loyal to blackberry for a long time but will never go back. This is my 2nd android device and I absolutely love this phone. Once I got over not having that keyboard I was happy I switched.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[azBuddah]

I left BB as well, or will be. My N4 should be here today. I did try a droid phone once before, and hated it but it was the first generation. Jumping ship for the same reason as you folks, lack of apps and support. I know the lack of physical keyboard is going to be an adjustment. Since you've had some hands on time anything you care to share with a noob? I'm on verizon, so I know there is no root at this time.

 

[mtbrown19]

I left BB as well, or will be. My N4 should be here today. I did try a droid phone once before, and hated it but it was the first generation. Jumping ship for the same reason as you folks, lack of apps and support. I know the lack of physical keyboard is going to be an adjustment. Since you've had some hands on time anything you care to share with a noob? I'm on verizon, so I know there is no root at this time.

The lack of a keyboard isn't a factor for me as the last phone that I had that had a keyboard was the Torch and I barely ever used it.

Some thoughts:
Screen Size - I do a lot of work from my phone and having the big screen + the high resolution is definitely a step up considering I have reading glasses.
Apps - So even though there was Android Runtime for BB that was supposed to give BB users access to Android Apps, more often than not the app once loaded would not work as designed ie limited functionality if not all out failure. Now everything works as it should.
S Pen - Use it...for everything that you can so you know what it can do. It may seem gimmicky at first but I use it at times when using my finger would suffice just to keep my screen smudge free. I find it pretty useful for swype typing even. The bonus is that I can remote in to my desktop and the S Pen acts as a mouse for the cursor in the Windows environment.
Email - I definitely miss the hub on my Z10. It felt more a part of the OS than the Samsung Email does. There was never any lag or delay when going to emails or any other messages in the hub as it was always active. It's not that the email experience on Android is bad, it's just not as efficient as it was on my BB. The Cascades experience with attachments from the hub on BB was superior as well. The hub and how BB handles messaging would be the one thing I would love to see copied.
Touchwiz - Not having owned another Android device, I can't say yet if it is good, bad, or somewhere in between. I figure I should spend the time getting to know it before test driving another launcher. I find it interesting that some people report "no lag" as that is not my experience so far. It's not everywhere and it isn't intolerable, but it's there. I would say the 2 places I find it annoying are when opening the email app (see above) and when wanting to review the picture last taken with the camera.
Settings - As with the S Pen, explore the settings. There is a lot there that will allow you to tailor your user experience with the phone to your liking. Additionally, there are lots of websites/forums/videos with tips and tricks for this phone that are worth checking out. One thing I will mention here is that I found the finger print scanner as a unlock for the phone unreliable and disappointing. I would have loved it had they gotten this right.
Rooting - Again, I want to get to know the phone as it was intended before I start messing with this but knowing myself this may be in my future...

Overall, I am really happy with the phone; I wouldn't have kept it if I wasn't. Some of my points above aren't meant to be nit picky, just some thoughts from my perspective coming from a different device that isn't an iphone.

 

[goin_nil]

Since you've had some hands on time anything you care to share with a noob?

I've used the S Pen more than I thought I would, especially for taking notes and capturing the screen or parts of the screen. Some apps that I've found more handy than I expected are:

1. S Finder - you can access this in the pull down notification bar. If you don't see it, pull down with two fingers to see ALL the options. S Finder allows you to search handwritten notes on your phone for keywords. It indexes everything you handwrite, quickly (within seconds of writing it, you can search on it, without even converting your handwritten text to typed text).

2. Scrapbook - I've been using the S Pen Smart Select (the square lasso) for collecting images I find interesting or funny, such as from a Daily Comics app or on websites.

3. S Pen Action Memo is quite handy. The very same day I got my phone I had to call around to lawn mower places to get quotes. After I dialed the phone #, I frantically looked around for a pen and paper to write on. Then I realized, I don't need that! Everything I need is right on my phone and very quick to access. Just pull the pen out, boom, it (Action Memo) is right there. Awesome! And it's also searchable later. Another big awesome!

 

[goin_nil]

One of my favorite features is the Fast Charging. The battery already lasts all day (waking hours). But on those days where I use it a bit more than normal or I'm going out for the night, it's great to charge it for 15, 20, or 30 minutes and be good to go for another 8+ hours WITHOUT swapping batteries.

 

[Katrina White1]

You Tube tips and tricks videos are invaluable. You'll be pros in no time. Enjoy!

SGN4 :-D

 

[Jamie Wooten]

I also came from Blackberry, I actually had the Passport. Great phone and really liked where BB was headed. The problem was app support. Being in real estate there were a few apps that needed and side loading wasn't working for me. I'm beginning to really like this Note 4 and don't see myself going back anytime real soon!

 

[RexdaleNap]

Lol I went from z10 to note 3 and just came back to passport.

Z had bad battery life although I never tried 10.2.2 and note I just got tired of the bloatware.

Good luck I would root and get that thing running fast as possible.

Good to be back on a real kb like my old bold and torch.

 

[ronpfid]

The lack of a keyboard isn't a factor for me as the last phone that I had that had a keyboard was the Torch and I barely ever used it.

Some thoughts:
Screen Size - I do a lot of work from my phone and having the big screen + the high resolution is definitely a step up considering I have reading glasses.
Apps - So even though there was Android Runtime for BB that was supposed to give BB users access to Android Apps, more often than not the app once loaded would not work as designed ie limited functionality if not all out failure. Now everything works as it should.
S Pen - Use it...for everything that you can so you know what it can do. It may seem gimmicky at first but I use it at times when using my finger would suffice just to keep my screen smudge free. I find it pretty useful for swype typing even. The bonus is that I can remote in to my desktop and the S Pen acts as a mouse for the cursor in the Windows environment.
Email - I definitely miss the hub on my Z10. It felt more a part of the OS than the Samsung Email does. There was never any lag or delay when going to emails or any other messages in the hub as it was always active. It's not that the email experience on Android is bad, it's just not as efficient as it was on my BB. The Cascades experience with attachments from the hub on BB was superior as well. The hub and how BB handles messaging would be the one thing I would love to see copied.
Touchwiz - Not having owned another Android device, I can't say yet if it is good, bad, or somewhere in between. I figure I should spend the time getting to know it before test driving another launcher. I find it interesting that some people report "no lag" as that is not my experience so far. It's not everywhere and it isn't intolerable, but it's there. I would say the 2 places I find it annoying are when opening the email app (see above) and when wanting to review the picture last taken with the camera.
Settings - As with the S Pen, explore the settings. There is a lot there that will allow you to tailor your user experience with the phone to your liking. Additionally, there are lots of websites/forums/videos with tips and tricks for this phone that are worth checking out. One thing I will mention here is that I found the finger print scanner as a unlock for the phone unreliable and disappointing. I would have loved it had they gotten this right.
Rooting - Again, I want to get to know the phone as it was intended before I start messing with this but knowing myself this may be in my future...

Overall, I am really happy with the phone; I wouldn't have kept it if I wasn't. Some of my points above aren't meant to be nit picky, just some thoughts from my perspective coming from a different device that isn't an iphone.

Wow, lots of us here. I still have my Z30 but have been using my note 4 for a couple months now. I'm the same, I loved the hub but having working native apps that notify is really nice for my business. Especially a working paypal app that lets me know instantly when a customer pays or orders something.

I installed 2 apps that really make my Note 4 experience better.
1) Aquamail - It's way better than Samsung's email, you can customize the heck out of how it looks (fonts colors, actions, etc etc), it looks more like the HUB's email list. And if you install number 2 app listed below, you can have a full screen email widget and put it to the left of home so it kinda looks like the HUB
2) Nova Prime launcher. With custom icons and the grid set higher it looks way better than touchwiz.

 

[azBuddah]

I got my Note 4 now, we are on day 2. I was about to throw it against the wall the first few hours, my main concern was getting all my contacts, calendar, & email setup. I went from having about 350 contacts on my BB to over 1 thousand on the Note. A crap load of dupes., and it did the same thing with the calendar. After reading and trying different tools I said screw it and did a wipe of the phone only to go back through the setup and have everything all duplicated again. Did more reading, then found out that google was populating the phone as well as Verizon. I didn’t know Verizon was even syncing the BB? So I turned off the syncing to one of the services and ran the dupe finder again and got all that cleared.

After watching a couple of videos on settings and operation started getting the hang of it. Installed a new texting app. (Textra), didn’t like the stock one. Got a new email app. (Aquamail), that will handle multiple accounts I’m becoming happy. Still looking for a calendar app that I like. I’ve played with the s-pen a little and its pretty cool. Now I’ve gotten sucked into the Themer vortex, and have been working on a theme or 2 for the phone.

Wife is laughing because I still have the original plastic on the phone front & back, and the phone hasn’t left the house. I don’t want to scratch it until my case gets here which should be today, and screen protector to be here next week.

Android has come a long way since I last tried it, still trying to get used to typing on the virtual keyboard but improving with practice. It is great to be able to get applications that work again. I know I still have lots to learn but so far I’m happy that I’ve made the switch!

 

[PlanetPluto7]

You might try Calengoo for a calender. It really has too many options to bother setting them all but is very fast and syncs with other calenders like Google's.

 

[BB_Junky]

Ha, welcome everyone long time BBRY user here as well. The Z30 is now in the drawer with the Z10 and my N4 is in my pocket daily as well.

 

[goin_nil]

You might try Calengoo for a calender. It really has too many options to bother setting them all but is very fast and syncs with other calenders like Google's.

Calengoo is great! My wife and I have used it for 5 years now. Her on iPhone, me with android.

You are right, tons of options - which is great. Make it EXACTLY how you want. Customize everything.

 

[RexdaleNap]

I may try aquamail I always thought k9 mail was the best.

I may stay on android then lol.

Would you be able to post a screenshot and how does it work with multiple email accounts (the widget)?

eh just tried it prefer hub and physical keyboard but I can see why someone would switch from z10/30 to note 4.

If I had z30 instead of 10 I may still be using that intead of note 3 but I use my phone for communication only.

To the point where I even have stuff like bbm disabled on passport.

Hope to learn more about Android and I don't want to seem like I'm advertising for bb just putting in 2 cents.

--
Not everyone needs physical kb but in my case I prefer it.

I still think classic/9900 kb is better though. A 4" touch screen + touch sensitive keyboard would be my perfect phone along with atleast 1.5ghz quad core. 2gb ram

Basically classic w/o trackpad and few more cores lol. Maybe not even quad I used z10 early on when it was unoptimized if they have optimized it I may be fine with dual.

 

[azBuddah]

I've been testing out Business Calendar, seem there isn't a free version of Calengoo. So far I'm liking this and may upgrade to the pro if I decide on keeping it? Does Calengoo also do tasks?
Thinking of getting Akrutosync so I can keep my outlook sync'd with my home PC when I travel

I keep getting side tracked playing with the Themer app.. Before I know it the wife is complaining that I'm spending way too much time messing with my phone. LOL

Can't really comment on battery life yet, because I am on it a lot. So far haven't had any response time issues though. Will probably get the second battery and charger for when I travel.

So far no regrets. Just a bit of a learning curve.

 

[goin_nil]

I've been testing out Business Calendar, seem there isn't a free version of Calengoo. So far I'm liking this and may upgrade to the pro if I decide on keeping it? Does Calengoo also do tasks?

Yes, Calengoo also does tasks. I use those extensively (multiple times a day). They sync with Google Tasks.

I typically hear Business Calendar referred to a lot when people refer their Marty favorite calendar apps right along side Calengoo. So I'm sure it's a great app too. I've never used Business Calendar but looks like it gets great reviews on Google Play, just like Calengoo gets.

I've had personal experience (just through email and Google Hangouts chat) with the developer of Calengoo, Dominique.

He has always been very helpful, prompt, & professional in every communication. You can tell that he puts a lot of effort into his app and takes great pride in his work.