Ok the honeymoon period is starting to wear off....

[Sammuel1973]

I know there is a case with battery for the S8+ that's pretty cheap on Amazon. Wondering if those are a good solution for those with juice issues. Haven't checked if there is a Note 8 version out yet.

Great point. I did have the OEM battery cases from Samsung for my S7 and S7E, but they were way too bulky to hold throughout the day. I suspect the N8 battery case will be bulky too. The replaceable N4 batteries are easier and smaller/slimmer to keep in my pocket.

Update: Plus, the battery cases only added a few hours. When I was at 6 Flags, my N4 lasted me from 7am to 10 pm, with 2 extra batteries!

 

[Fr0gburp3r]

I've already ordered me a power bank case for my N8 because I'll be at theme parks all day for 3 days in a row taking videos and photos. No way the battery alone and is gonna get me through half the day.

 

[RumoredNow]

Wait, aren't you a fan of Windows?

Sure I've done, but I've also used android all along since Cupcake and my current daily is a Sony Xperia X on 7.1.1 Nougat. Iterations I have skipped since would be Donut, Gingerbread and Oreo.

Being a fan of one thing and practiced at another are not mutually exclusive so there is no real point in your mentioning what I'm a fan of... Is my pedigree in question? Please ask if you have questions. Should I supply a resume? Do I need one?

Microsoft's policies and practices on data collection, usage and sharing are far worse.

Written policies and my experience are two separate things.

In my experience Microsoft is 90% interested in telemetry gathering to improve on their product by collecting data from real world use and the tools to eliminate or reduce tracking are fairly easy to find and straightforward.

Further in my experience, taming Google/Android data gathering is less straightforward and takes a lot more time and effort and they are 75% concerned with with what I look at in order to tailor advertising to me and they want to decide for me what I should buy and from whom.

Also, Google AKA Android used to be much better about user privacy, but they have morphed into a greed machine (beginning somewhere after phones and tablets merged under ICS and getting progressively worse since) and they are obsessed with the idea that each and every being exists as part of a herd of advertising consumption beasts and not customers. Their true customer has become Advertisers and not users. We are now a tool to them. A means to make ever increasing $. This is the corporate way.

And here's the difference. Microsoft makes money primarily off software and services so they want those to be consumer friendly. Google makes money from advertising as the vast majority of their revenue so they want to push ads at all costs, including the cost of your privacy. Not your privacy exposed to the governments of the world, by and large, because we are "their herds" and they want us feeding from their trough. Rather the cost of your privacy being negligible for THEM as we are "under their care" and they know best what it is we should be "fed." They've now taken the further step of curating not just how we see ads, but have determined that the sanctity of their right to serve ads should now affect what content we should see lest it impact their ability to serve those ads. I am of course speaking about the recent upheavals over at YouTube such as the Adpocolypse and the new shadow banning practices. Couched under the guise of altruistically protecting people from "wrong think" (and don't get me started on why in the name of all that is wholesome and good a corporation should never be allowed to be the arbiter of independent persons thoughts). Under this excuse of "protection" they are merely trying to prevent advertiser withdrawal. If advertisers didn't complain about the content things would have gone merrily along as they had been. Altruism has little to nothing to do with it except as the misguided notion that Big Google knows best.

That doesn't excuse anything that Google does...

Just as you said, whatever A does should not be used to excuse B's behavior. So all you've done is try and cast an aspersion toward me for being "a fan of Windows" (and I guess that must be "wrong think") before introducing a straw man argument which you yourself conclude is meaningless.

...some perspective can be useful.

I agree. Funny how my perspective helps form my opinion. How else should it be? Again I think this is a dig at my pedigree to try and establish that I have no personal experience on which to form opinion. I ask again, do I need a resume on file to chronicle my tech experience before I can submit an opinion? You've not addressed the opinion at all, just myself and my qualifications.

 

[Aquila]

Sure I've done, but I've also used android all along since Cupcake and my current daily is a Sony Xperia X on 7.1.1 Nougat. Iterations I have skipped since would be Donut, Gingerbread and Oreo.

Being a fan of one thing and practiced at another are not mutually exclusive so there is no real point in your mentioning what I'm a fan of... Is my pedigree in question? Please ask if you have questions. Should I supply a resume? Do I need one?




Written policies and my experience are two separate things.

In my experience Microsoft is 90% interested in telemetry gathering to improve on their product by collecting data from real world use and the tools to eliminate or reduce tracking are fairly easy to find and straightforward.

Further in my experience, taming Google/Android data gathering is less straightforward and takes a lot more time and effort and they are 75% concerned with with what I look at in order to tailor advertising to me and they want to decide for me what I should buy and from whom.

Also, Google AKA Android used to be much better about user privacy, but they have morphed into a greed machine (beginning somewhere after phones and tablets merged under ICS and getting progressively worse since) and they are obsessed with the idea that each and every being exists as part of a herd of advertising consumption beasts and not customers. Their true customer has become Advertisers and not users. We are now a tool to them. A means to make ever increasing $. This is the corporate way.

And here's the difference. Microsoft makes money primarily off software and services so they want those to be consumer friendly. Google makes money from advertising as the vast majority of their revenue so they want to push ads at all costs, including the cost of your privacy. Not your privacy exposed to the governments of the world, by and large, because we are "their herds" and they want us feeding from their trough. Rather the cost of your privacy being negligible for THEM as we are "under their care" and they know best what it is we should be "fed." They've now taken the further step of curating not just how we see ads, but have determined that the sanctity of their right to serve ads should now affect what content we should see lest it impact their ability to serve those ads. I am of course speaking about the recent upheavals over at YouTube such as the Adpocolypse and the new shadow banning practices. Couched under the guise of altruistically protecting people from "wrong think" (and don't get me started on why in the name of all that is wholesome and good a corporation should never be allowed to be the arbiter of independent persons thoughts). Under this excuse of "protection" they are merely trying to prevent advertiser withdrawal. If advertisers didn't complain about the content things would have gone merrily along as they had been. Altruism has little to nothing to do with it except as the misguided notion that Big Google knows best.




Just as you said, whatever A does should not be used to excuse B's behavior. So all you've done is try and cast an aspersion toward me for being "a fan of Windows" (and I guess that must be "wrong think") before introducing a straw man argument which you yourself conclude is meaningless.




I agree. Funny how my perspective helps form my opinion. How else should it be? Again I think this is a dig at my pedigree to try and establish that I have no personal experience on which to form opinion. I ask again, do I need a resume on file to chronicle my tech experience before I can submit an opinion? You've not addressed the opinion at all, just myself and my qualifications.

There were no digs or aspersions or anything like that, I have no idea how you got that out of what I wrote but I am sorry it was taking that way because that is not what I meant at all.

 

[Mike Dee]

LOL... The honeymoon period will always wear off, with every phone you buy. It's what happens after that that will determine your decision. Will you start looking for reasons to not like the phone? Small annoyances become larger as the grass starts to look greener elsewhere.

I think the iPhone X looks great, it's the one I'd buy if I did an iPhone. I just can't get pass that notch up top, or Apple's greed when it comes to ACCESSORIES. I will say Apple does a great job of making you feel like you're missing out on something. But I'd personally wait on early reviews first.

I'm stuck trying to decide between the Note and V30, so I get where you're coming from. But I know that whichever I choose will come with a honeymoon period that will wear off.

With the V20 I haven't looked for reasons not to like it. Hell, I don't even know why I'm thinking I need something different. It does everything I want it to do and anything I jump will cost me to lose something. Even going to the V30 will cost me features.... Though there are some to be gained though.

 

[Mike Dee]

Sounds like marriage.

You went there.... Lol

 

[digdah]

To each their own. Personally I can't pull myself away from Samsung Pay. Being able to use my phone on a regular POS terminal is the real future. You need to learn how to work around the quirks. I would hate to be in a walled garden so quick. It takes some time to figure out what is causing battery drain...at least in Android's case. If that's not your thing Apple does an excellent job for you.

 

[pool_shark]

I'm tapped out: $2,500 on Verizon stuff in the last 4 months. But I could give my almost new S8+ to the wife and buy the Note 8 on payments. But she refuses to give up her iPhone. My problem is the alimony. We've been married a long time and the payments are going to swamp the savings on the phone. Going to have to mull this over.

I have a question if you don't mind.
Why did you buy the S8 knowing the Note 8 was coming?
I see all the time people saying they came from the previously latest phone and now have the latest, but 8 never cared to ask why, til now.
Is it an infatuation with having the latest thing and if so, do you know why you have to have the latest?

It's just a curiosity for me, you do not have to answer if you'd rather not.

 

[KupKrazy]

I know there is a case with battery for the S8+ that's pretty cheap on Amazon. Wondering if those are a good solution for those with juice issues. Haven't checked if there is a Note 8 version out yet.

I have the one you are talking about for the S8+ (I think one company makes it and a lot of resellers sell it) and it looks like they have it for the Note 8 too now, as well.

Anyway, for what it is worth - the case actually worked well with my S8+, for anyone wondering. Since it is 5500mA, it will charge your phone completely and still have some juice left over. I liked it better than the mophie battery case for the S8+ mostly because of the extra capacity of the battery. The mophie one doesn't have enough to charge the S8+ completely from zero. So, from a purely battery usage point of view, it worked really well and allowed me to last the whole day and more at Disneyland.

Other pros about this case is that you do not need to carry a dongle for your earphones as the headphone jack is not deep in a hole like in a mophie case, and also despite what some have said - NFC payments do work. You just need to make sure you angle the phone with the open space in the case around the camera.

The cons about the case is that it is not a great case for protection of the phone. The phone is held in place by a flexible plastic that holds the phone around the edge. It indeed holds the phone securely but it makes me wonder a few things: how long will the plastic last as you take the phone in and out and how much protection does it actually give the phone. To answer the second question, I would not count on it with any real drops. It is really more of a scratch protector for the edge and because it's just a thin layer of rubber/plastic, it doesn't offer much lip at all if you have the phone placed facing down. This is not a case for protection of the phone.

Anyway, I know this is about the S8+ version of the case, but I imagine that this totally applies for the Note 8 version of it that I see on Amazon now and that I will eventually buy. It seems appropriate to write my experience with the S8+ version.

 

[TechnologyTwitt]

No - you can't... because that's essentially what I did. Between playing around with Bixby & finally ending up crippling it.. then setting up Google Assistant instead... then downloading the apps I want.. oops wait, apparently one of the apps I downloaded is conflicting with Google Assistant... trouble shoot that takes a few days.

Again, all minor things but.. unless you literally take your phone out of the box & don't install or tweak a darn thing, then I guess you can just begin using it.

IT WAS POWER SAVING MODE ALL ALONG!

* Discovery -> With power saving mode on, OK Google will not work.

 

[Forgewizard]

Proximity to excellent cell service weighs heavily upon battery drain. Consider using WiFi at every opportunity. And definitely utilize the onboard optimizers to turn off background apps.