Switching from iOS tomorrow!

[plasticparadox]

Hi, I'm buying my very first Android device tomorrow. I've settled on the Samsung Galaxy S III.

I've heard that Samsung phones use a skin that some people say isn't very good. How would I go about removing that ski and using stock Android? And what disadvantages to that are there?

Thanks in advance.

 

[umpirerob]

First of all, welcome! Second of all, try the skin (touchwiz) for yourself before you dump it. Should you choose to dump it, there are dozens of custom launchers to download like Nova, Apex, Holo, Go, etc. Unlike iOS, there are so many choices, you'll just have to play around until you find the best for you, but that's the fun part! Read through the forum threads and you'll find so much great info on just about anything you can imagine!

Sent from my HTC Mecha using Tapatalk 2.

 

[umpirerob]

When you really get advanced, you can root and ROM your device for even more customization!

Sent from my HTC Mecha using Tapatalk 2.

 

[Paul627g]

Aside from the above mentioned use of 3rd party launchers... If you decide to try rooting there is something below you might like to keep an eye out for.

Eventually there will be a custom ROM called Cyanogen Mod CM9 or even CM10 (Based on JellyBean) for the SGSIII devices.

This is the most popular development team of custom ROMs and they give you a very nice tweaked & performance optimized version of Vanilla Android for your device, which means the removal of the OEM skin.

 

[plasticparadox]

Thanks. I'm buying NTT Docomo's version of the S III. There's some Japan specific hardware differences such as the Felica NFC chip and One-seg TV tuner that I'm curious about - will those most likely work with Cyanogen Mod or something else non-stock?

I know this is kind of an obscure question.

[edit] Also, the Japan version of the S III doesn't include S Voice, according to Docomo's product page. Reason being that it hasn't been localized to the Japanese language yet. Is there any way to download that in English somewhere?

 

[PvilleComp]

Most likely the One-seg TV tuner would not work on Cyanogen Mod, unless a dev decides to write for it specifically. Depends on how important that feature is to you.

 

[plasticparadox]

Thanks very much. Looks like I'll be staying on TouchWiz for now.

I'll be heading over to Docomo after work today to pick up the S III. I haven't been this excited about a gadget in a long time!

 

[Dumb1]

I'm curious now that you have taken the plunge what do you think? Reason I ask is I.'ll be doing the same very soon.

 

[plasticparadox]

Thanks for asking.
It's been a bunch of headaches with the phone company so unfortunately I haven't been able to take possession of the GS III yet... hopefully I'll have all that dealt with in the next few days and I'll be able to post back with my first impressions.

One thing to watch out for though, before you make the jump:

If you switch to an Android device from an iPhone (with iMessage activated), anyone who?s previously been sending you iMessages will no longer be able to send you texts. This is because there is apparently a bug with the iMessage system that doesn?t deactivate iMessage, even after you?ve switched your phone number to another device.

Resolution here.

 

[clodfelterac]

another nice benefit of root and a custom rom is no carrier iq... not to mention the great development communities and their support blows away any support youd ever get from the manufacturer/carrier... overclocking... removing bloatware... themes... the list goes on, and on, and on... lol...

 

[Dumb1]

Made the switch, I like the phone but I got a steep learning curve in front of me.

 

[Devinator]

Made the switch, I like the phone but I got a steep learning curve in front of me.

Sure, there is always a learning curve with something new. But, you have a great resource here at AC to help you along the way.

 

[plasticparadox]

Congrats on the new phone. Can you tell me what you dislike about the Galaxy?

 

[Dumb1]

Congrats on the new phone. Can you tell me what you dislike about the Galaxy?

Nothing! I love the phone more and more as I use it and get used to Android. The only real complaint I have at the moment is I can't seem to get my work exchange server to work...I'm not sure why.

I have found all the apps that I used with the iphone and they all are top notch.

I do not see iphones in my future I love the way you can customize the wall papers, widgets and the toggles are great!

 

[plasticparadox]

Good to hear! Makes me feel better about making the switch myself. Hope you figure out the Exchange server thing, as my main e-mail address is Hotmail via Exchange Activesync.

 

[Devinator]

What is wrong with Exchange?

 

[Dumb1]

What is wrong with Exchange?

I'm not sure, when I put in all the required information I get an error message. I started a thread on it . I copied the same settings I had on my iphone...no luck.

 

[Devinator]

Yea, I saw that thread. I actually posted there you should look for someone else with an Android phone doing this and ask them for help, that's what I'd do. It sounds like you are going to contact your IT anyway, like EvilMonkey suggested. But, lets stick to that thread.

 

[plasticparadox]

Finally got the GS3 yesterday! Loving it now, but yesterday was a lot of fussing with downloading apps, creating accounts and fiddling with settings.

I think I finally have it the way I want, and I think that with the automatic updates, I won't have to do much more than just use the phone! In that way I think it's better than iOS, where you have to check for updates to apps if, like me, you're slightly OCD about stuff like that.

Coming from iOS, I had a hard time grasping the concept of widgets, but now I love them. I wish some were better designed though. I downloaded Beautiful Widgets and replaced the standard Samsung weather/clock widget.

I think I'm OK with TouchWiz. I downloaded a few other launchers, I think Apex and also one more. But there wasn't a huge difference that I noticed, besides the home screen transition effects.

There's a few things that I kind of expected to work off the bat, but didn't. Hulu's app doesn't seem to be ready for the GS3 yet, at least in Japan. Gameloft's catalog of 3D games is severely lacking in the Japanese Google Play store (or for the GS3). Those things are irritating, because I'm going on a 4 day trip from tomorrow and I expected to have things like Hulu up and running.

S Voice and S Beam are missing from the Japan model. This kind of irritates me, that they would have some features for one market, and not others. Especially a flagship feature like S Voice. It's not a dealbreaker, and even I can predict that I wouldn't actually use it in daily life, but still.

:-! Loving the big screen, but still waiting on the Hulu app to be able to fully enjoy it. YouTube video quality seems better on Android, as well.

Loving the Google Maps and Google Navigation, especially on that badass screen. Yesterday the walking navigation helped me get to a job interview on time. And the GS3's GPS seemed to be faster and more accurate than the iPhone's. The maps are the single biggest reason I ditched the iPhone - their new iOS 6 maps look crappy to me.

S Planner seems OK but I preferred the iPhone's calendar app. Perhaps the stock Android calendar is better than S Planner but I haven't seen it yet.

Some of the apps are better on Android than iOS, and vice versa. For example, PayPal's iOS app was updated a few months ago and looks awesome, while Android still has the old version. But This American Life's app is better on Android because it lets you download podcasts directly to the Android music app.

The stigma that iOS apps are beautiful and Android apps are ugly isn't necessarily true. iOS apps do seem a tad more refined and their interfaces are more standardized, but Android isn't as bad as people have said.

:-$ Some of the GS3's motion gestures, like turning over the phone to silence music, annoyed the crap out of me. When listening to music in bed, I hold the phone face down. After 30 minutes of wondering why the music kept cutting out, I finally figured out that stupid gesture was to blame. So that's been shut off. Made for humans, my ass.

Overall though, I like the phone a lot. Glad I switched. Especially those maps! Gosh those are good.

 

[Rukbat]

S Planner seems OK but I preferred the iPhone's calendar app. Perhaps the stock Android calendar is better than S Planner but I haven't seen it yet.

Google Calendar plus your choice of Android calendar app may solve that for you. There are many app choices.

The stigma that iOS apps are beautiful and Android apps are ugly isn't necessarily true. iOS apps do seem a tad more refined and their interfaces are more standardized

That's one of the main differences. Apple products lock the user and the developer into what Apple thinks is best for you. Open source products, like Android, allow a lot more latitude for both. (Developers can even release their own versions of the Android OS - not so for iOS.)