ICS - What's the big deal?

[mightyfacundo]

Am I the only one who doesn't understand the ICS love? Don't get me wrong, it's not bad or anything, but I just don't understand what the big deal is. Now I can swipe away notifications instead of tapping on the "x" to get rid of them and swipe away recent programs. I can create folders now, but there are other apps/widgets (like circle launcher) that allow me to do the same thing. Things look a little cleaner overall, but is that all there is to ICS?

I don't dislike it, but I'm having a hard time understanding why this was supposed to be such a huge step up from Gingerbread/Honeycomb. Can someone out there who thinks ICS is awesome help me to understand why it is? Again, I didn't post this to bash ICS. I just feel like I'm missing the boat somehow. Thanks.

One last thing, I do like Chrome Beta, so that's definitely one benfit.

 

[B. Diddy]

A few things I like about ICS:

1. Battery performance is better optimized. We all know that the A100 has pretty lousy battery life. I haven't done formal testing, but I have noticed that the battery drains less while idle.

2. I think the ability to make folders is more efficient than filling up the homescreens with shortcuts or using a 3rd party app, and improves performance to boot. Filling up homescreens with shortcuts leads to more sluggish homescreen swiping and response (I noticed this with my A500). A 3rd party app, although probably relatively small in size, still uses up extra storage and functional memory. And don't even mention the glitchy Acer Content Folders.

3. Chrome Beta is pretty cool, but I also noticed a significant performance boost in the stock browser. Try it if you haven't already--it's much faster than before, and in fact now rivals Dolphin HD, which used to be my browser of choice. You can sync your Google bookmarks with the stock browser, so you don't necessarily need Chrome.

4. You can now disable preinstalled apps (i.e., bloatware). Although you can't uninstall them completely, disabling them will at least prevent them from starting at all, and therefore save you some processing power. True, if you root your tablet, you can get rid of bloatware altogether, but I'd rather not run the risk of bricking my device by rooting and installing custom ROMs.

I'm sure there's other stuff as well, but these are the things I've noticed.

 

[ScatterBrained]

In addition to the things B.Diddy listed, you can create a full system backup without rooting. The status bar is automatically hidden when watching videos when connected to a tv via hdmi. Take a screenshot by holding the volume key and the power button at the same time. Stock browser can save pages for offline reading. You can see how much data is being used by specific apps.

 

[mightyfacundo]

Thanks for poiting out some ICS features B. Diddy and ScatterBrained.

B. Diddy, now that you mention it, it does seem to have bettery battery life while idling, but like you, I just wish it would have increased the battery life while in use! But at least it charges quickly! As for the stock browser, I really don't notice much of a difference, but Dolphin is still laggy for me. It is still faster than stock but slower that Chrome, but that might just be on my tab. I didn't realize I could disable certain apps, so thanks for the tip!

ScatterBrained, good info. How do I create a full system back-up and does it take up storage space from the 5.36 GB? I didn't know about the screenshot either so thanks for that, and I like to see how much data is being used by the apps. Again, thanks for pointing out these features!

 

[ScatterBrained]

Connect the tab to a pc via the usb cable to do a full system backup. Make sure you have the Acer usb drivers iinstalled. You will also need the Android SDK. The backup would be stored on your pc, so nope it wont take up any internal storage space.

I'm going to make a post with detailed instructions on how to do the backup.

 

[mightyfacundo]

Thanks ScatterBrained. I'll be looking forward to the detailed instructions.