Smartphone disappointment +recommendation?

[eskimo]

Virgin gave me a free Galaxy Ace 2, how nice. But means i'm tied into a 24 month contract. I pay 20p more a month but with the same stuff, quite adequate? I've got 14 days to try this thing out and can send it back for free if i don't like it. Or i could sell it for £100 perhaps and buy something better. Also my Nokia 6330 classic, the speaker no longer works. So phone calls are a pain using loud speaker only.

So Galaxy Ace 2:

Shit battery, as expected

Shit as a phone. Takes so long to make a call with shitty shortcuts

Shit at txting. Qwerty touch is wank. Too slow and can't be done without looking

Satnav/ GPS awesome. I need one of these!

Vids and pics, not interested i have better music player with amoled screen, superior sound and battery

Internet surfing is kinda cool. But my nokia 6330 did email and forums fine.

Youtube, not bothered yet.

Decent camera will come in handy, so that's cool.

These phones seem overly tailored to people who must get up to date information on pointless things such as FB. The whole thing is gimmicky and a nuisance. "i must sync with this todo this, and i must access this todo this," Bullshit, f**k off.

I want another Nokia 6303 classic but with a better screen, processor and photo lens.

Other annoyances.

Pinch to zoom, f**k, just stay at the same zoom for every page already, i am eating with my other hand.

Not being able to change the layout of the main screen.

Making a shortcut for a contact on the main screen only to give me shit like FB, email etc.

Setting an alarm, have i got to make a shortcut for this too? I will make so many shortcuts that i'll need folders just to organise my shortcuts.

Reminders, ^the same^

This is stuff i can only remember in the 2 days i've used the f**king thing.

Are there actually any advantages to this phone other than camera, internet, GPS?

Edited March 4, 2013 by eskimo

[Muel]

I have a Galaxy S3 (and a spare Galaxy S somewhere), and I'm starting to think that the smartphone is too much of a compromised formula. I think the best system is to have a normal phone (ideally a Nokia 3310) and a tablet. That way you can actually read web pages, your phone doesn't run out of battery, texting with one hand is easy and apps are easier to use.

If you're the sort of person tiny, delicate, girly hands then smartphones seem to work well, but I have pretty fat thumbs and arthritis, so I can't hit the right thing accurately enough. When I write out a text message, I usually get at least 30% of the characters wrong, even though I chose the S3 because it had the biggest touch screen on the market at the time, so the keys on the keyboard were the biggest.

Edited March 4, 2013 by Muel

[haydon_peter]

I'm looking into 'upgrading' from a old school Nokia C1 to one of these smart phone jobbies as well so it is interesting to read your thoughts on making the change. It's amusing because I'm quite techie and work in IT but still have a trusty old style mobile

The Galaxy Ace 2 was actually one of the phones I'm looking at and people seem to rave about it for the price. I'm not sure how useful this will be but Samsung have confirmed that the Ace 2 is one of the handsets that will be upgraded to the 4.1.2 Jelly Bean OS as well as a newer version of the Samsung navigation system so that might help with some of the useless to text and navigation issues you mention?

Unlike you I'm flat out refusing to go contract. There is no way I am paying out £20+ a month to get a 'free' handset and be locked into a contract for 24 months when I can get a Giffgaff SIM for £10 a month and end up with more minutes etc... included. It is annoying that I will get raped for the initial purchase of the phone (The Ace 2 is currently about £170) but when you calculate the cost over 24 months it works out cheaper to get the SIM free phone and a Giffgaff SIM!

[dann2707]

I have a Galaxy S3 (and a spare Galaxy S somewhere), and I'm starting to think that the smartphone is too much of a compromised formula. I think the best system is to have a normal phone (ideally a Nokia 3310) and a tablet. That way you can actually read web pages, your phone doesn't run out of battery, texting with one hand is easy and apps are easier to use.If you're the sort of person tiny, delicate, girly hands then smartphones seem to work well, but I have pretty fat thumbs and arthritis, so I can't hit the right thing accurately enough. When I write out a text message, I usually get at least 30% of the characters wrong, even though I chose the S3 because it had the biggest touch screen on the market at the time, so the keys on the keyboard were the biggest.

I'm the same as you with the spelling errors. I downloaded SwiftKey and it's improved my texting life so much!

There's a trial on the store, takes a few days to get used to it and I wasn't sold but now I can't imagine texting without it.

[eskimo]

I'm looking into 'upgrading' from a old school Nokia C1 to one of these smart phone jobbies as well so it is interesting to read your thoughts on making the change. It's amusing because I'm quite techie and work in IT but still have a trusty old style mobile

The Galaxy Ace 2 was actually one of the phones I'm looking at and people seem to rave about it for the price. I'm not sure how useful this will be but Samsung have confirmed that the Ace 2 is one of the handsets that will be upgraded to the 4.1.2 Jelly Bean OS as well as a newer version of the Samsung navigation system so that might help with some of the useless to text and navigation issues you mention?

Unlike you I'm flat out refusing to go contract. There is no way I am paying out £20+ a month to get a 'free' handset and be locked into a contract for 24 months when I can get a Giffgaff SIM for £10 a month and end up with more minutes etc... included. It is annoying that I will get raped for the initial purchase of the phone (The Ace 2 is currently about £170) but when you calculate the cost over 24 months it works out cheaper to get the SIM free phone and a Giffgaff SIM!

Agreed with all that, and i read about Jellybean too. Understanding technology more is the reason why you'd think this/ these phone is/ are dumb.

I waited to reply until i had some more time using this thing. I've got rather complacent with using Firefox now, killed 500mb with downloading apps and stuff. Checking the awesome Metcheck weather app, email app, news, forums and information is real real nice but unneeded. I feel like i'm being sucked into this thing, like a film on TV where you know you don't care, don't want to watch, have things todo but can't stop until the adverts come on so you can get up and turn the f**king things off. I now see why everyone has lost their eyes to one of these things. If i stop moving, i'm on it! While it does save me from checking emails/ (daily routine stuff that you have to do) when i get home, i don't think it's really saving much time.

The internet looks lush on this compared to the 6303, i can also watch Twitch TV (gaming streams) on work breaks also, and other Youtube bollocks.

So it's been almost 2 weeks, and i've got so far as to getting some apps to make my phone's life easier/ faster, bought a 32gb micro SD card (£15), but not even moved anything from my computer to it, or even taken a photo. I previously thought it would be great to have decent photo capabilities just in case. But you know what, when do i really need to take a photo of something that's cool/ unusual?! (most people with these i think only use it so they show FB stuff that you wouldn't even mention in normal conversation anyway, that's how un-important the pics are)

GPS, i've used this a bit, and it's still great! But when Satnavs on Amazon appear to have many good reviews at £30-£50 i wonder..

Qwerty is still a pain, and requires me to be accurate. Though i did go back 1-9 number pad, and it's easier todo but messy with having to switch between pads for the use of symbols. Why not use T9 etc? I personally want to type how i want to type and using qwerty is still going require me to look. I've looked at some apps for better pads but nothing seemed that great.

The loudspeaker, still isn't that loud either. Using it in the car isn't any better than previous phones.

Soo the conclusion, very tempted to send this back. If it can cost me £160, it would be going back for sure.

Camera's are overated. If you know you're going somewhere special/ different you'd take a camera anyway.

GPS, flawless. Google maps etc. Possible saving over £50+/- if you haven't a Satnav already.

Portable internet. Nokia 6303 checked emails/ forums/ FB to a low standard, this Ace 2 does is much "nicer", but that's all.

Apps that only perceive you to thinking they're helping you out.

Works slower as a phone.

Cannot be dropped even once.

I would REALLY question why you would want a smartphone atm. The technology is still young and frankly shit. You could save money over buying a camera, sat nav, mp3 and another phone versus just this. But you'd be carrying an expensive, fragile, large device everywhere. But the price is very negligible and up for big debate i think.

Edited March 10, 2013 by eskimo

[dann2707]

Or just don't buy a shit smartphone?

I literally don't know what I'd do with out mine now (cliché I know).

It just has everything and does everything I need. For example my friend missed out on a lab as he was at a job interview at Uni so he didn't get the sheet. I just took a photo with my phone (switched to the paper view setting so it almost scans it like a scanner) and sent it to him instantly through whatsapp.

Every picture I take on my phone instantly gets uploaded to my virtual drive on dropbox so when I come home from the day or the weekend they are all there on my computer ready to be uploaded to facebook rah etc.

I have a widget on my home screen that allows me to control music, skip tracks etc which isn't amazing however i've set the settings on the app so that I only have to press the side "volume up" button to skip track. So when I'm driving and it's plugged into the aux input I don't have to skip tracks by turning the screen on I simply reach my hand down and press the vol up button.

I don't have the time to list all the other benefits as I want breakfast and it's mothers day but I just love how they make my life so much easier. Mines taken so many knocks too.

[eskimo]

Or just don't buy a shit smartphone?

I literally don't know what I'd do with out mine now (cliché I know).

I don't have the time to list all the other benefits as I want breakfast and it's mothers day but I just love how they make my life so much easier. Mines taken so many knocks too.

It was free. as mentioned.

Tell me to why it's so good, that's what my initial post asked. I don't want to be too hasty is returning in if it as good as you say it is. So please list these things, as otherwise you're not answering my initial question.

[shercofray]

I would REALLY question why you would want a smartphone atm. The technology is still young and frankly shit. You could save money over buying a camera, sat nav, mp3 and another phone versus just this. But you'd be carrying an expensive, fragile, large device everywhere. But the price is very negligible and up for big debate i think.

I changed from a good blackberry to an iPhone 5 a month a ago and it has been so much better. Everything you want is just there. It's so good to have as you never know when you may have the opportunity to take a great photo etc but you always have the choice. The cost of a camera that would take to this quality would be close to the phone value! You'll get used to the qwerty keyboard soon, just takes a few weeks

[dann2707]

Massive apologies! I failed to read the last line of the op! I thought you were saying that smartphones in general was a waste of time. I'm talking about smartphones in general in my above post.

I have the htc one S and it's literally perfect for me.

[CurtisRider]

I had some Samsung smart phone and I found it to be as annoying as you felt in your first post. I then got given an iPhone 4 and can't really see myself going back to anything else, it does everything I need (and more, that I don't ever use but it's nice to have the option). Maybe I feel that way because I didn't pay anything for it but I would certainly be wanting to get another one if this got broken. The whole addictiveness of all the features soon got boring, I just use it for phone calls, texts and emails which it does very well

[TROYston]

Never ever buy a Samsung Wave. You might be waving good-bye to it as it leaves your hand destined for the wall after freezing for the 100000th time, or lagging/hanging or instead of putting a space, it puts a full-stop.
Mine has now developed a new trick, upon shutting itself down, it decides to restart with 0%-8% battery Literally it was on charge and it froze shutdown and turned back on because it popped up saying 'Battery full please unplug charger' whilst reading a document on it.

[TrialsIsHard]

I have a Nokia Lumia 920, and although it has all those annoying features you talked about it's actually nice to use. It also integrates facebook chat with texting, which can be really helpful but also the most frustrating thing on the planet.

Nokia moved away from the whole 'cram as many useless features as you can into one tiny phone so it's impossible to use' craze, and developed a really nice OS which is customizable so you can have the important apps bigger, and the less important ones smaller. I had a HTC Desire HD before which was so over-powered by features I would never use, that it was just frustrating. Instead of making the fundamentals of the phone good, such as texting. They decided to make everything worse and try to put a billion features on it which were all not very good. I could also hold my breath for longer than the battery could hold electricity.

I do sort of wish that I had a phone that I could leave in my bag like a Nokia 3410, that I could just put my SIM into when I went riding or something so if someone calls me I can talk to them. But if someone replies to one of my tweets, there's no chance of it interrupting me to let me know.

Edited March 12, 2013 by TrialsIsHard

[Blake]

If you get a smartphone we can play bike race together

[eskimo]

If you get a smartphone we can play bike race together

I have a smartphone and i would happily stamp on it if i get such requests via txt.

H4LO.

Looks like i'm keeping this thing now. Seems to pissing me off less and less now. The internet is fun and informative for lunch breaks, and i found the music player has a 30min turn off feature which is cool for sleeping. Though i've killed 900mb of data in 10 days. ermmmmmmm what?

[TrialsIsHard]

Though i've killed 900mb of data in 10 days. ermmmmmmm what?

You've been playing with the GPS haven't you? From my past experiences that uses a massive amount of data as it's constantly relaying information to and from your phone.

[Luke Rainbird]

More likely the killer?

The internet looks lush on this compared to the 6303, i can also watch Twitch TV (gaming streams) on work breaks also, and other Youtube bollocks.

[eskimo]

You've been playing with the GPS haven't you? From my past experiences that uses a massive amount of data as it's constantly relaying information to and from your phone.

More likely the killer?

Yes! isn't it ironic how the things i like about this phone are now the things that are going to irritate me.

I've turned the internet fully off between (only forum) internet sessions. If i get down to 20mb before i get more data, the sim's coming out!

[Blake]

Yes! isn't it ironic how the things i like about this phone are now the things that are going to irritate me.

I've turned the internet fully off between (only forum) internet sessions. If i get down to 20mb before i get more data, the sim's coming out!

Do you not have wifi at home?

[Luke Dunstan]

Just received my shiny new HTC One, it's an absolute peach...

Anything from a Galaxy S2 and above in the Galaxy range will be a great buy though.

[Ben Cox]

The galaxy S is still a very good phone! Just replaced mine with an S3 which is amazing though.

Ben

[eskimo]

Do you not have wifi at home?

Nah.

Anything from a Galaxy S2 and above in the Galaxy range will be a great buy though.

I hear otherwise.

I've no more internet left, and i took a photo with the camera yesterday. I'm definitely making use of this non necessary piece of tech.