I love having new gadgets.. got me a Samsung Galaxy 3S

[FPAlpha]

So i've been fretting for months or years if i should upgrade and finally get a real smartphone until i finally said F.. it! and ordered the Galaxy 3S and it arrived today.. unfortunately my new provider didn't send me the new SIM card today too.. should arrive today. Ah well.. i can still do most of it by WiFi.

Don't you just love having new tech toys?

All the time spent getting to know the possibilities, tweaking the settings and filling it with updates and other stuff.

I'm a total noob when it comes to actually using a smartphone so i have no clue.. it's great!

So any recommendations or must have apps? I'm absolutely no social media guy so you can pass apps for Facebook, Twitter etc.

[Robert Maxwell]

I got a Galaxy Nexus not long ago. Nice phone. I was actually debating between the S3 and the Nexus. They're very similar apart from a few details.

It was an upgrade from a Samsung Intercept. The difference is tremendous. I love it.

As for apps, I use:

Accupedo - Pedometer
Astrid Tasks - Task management
Chrome - Web browser
eBuddy - Chat
Gauge Battery - Nice battery widget
Light Flow - Custom LED notifications
Netflix - Well, Netflix!
Pandora - Streaming music
SMS Backup & Restore - Archiving text messages so they aren't slowing down your messaging app but you still have a history
SMS Popup - Pops up text messages even when your phone is "asleep"
SwiftKey - Awesome replacement keyboard, much better than the original (unless you have Swype, that might be better)
Widget Locker - Better lock screen (worth the $3.99 or whatever it is)

I also have some nice games on here.

[ebusinesstutor]

Congrats on your new Samsung. I have the Galaxy Note.

Here are some apps I like to have on my smart phone:

Pulse.me - newsreading
Aldiko - ebook reading
Out of Milk - my grocery list
SpringPad - my note program
Sky Safari - star chart
Compass
Dropbox
Chrome - my browser
First Aid
Netflix

[Santaman]

http://johnsphones.org/

I've got one of these. my brother bought me the gold edition.

Its very smart, can´t crash and you always can access the address book even if your battery is empty which is a rather rare occasion, mine lasts 6 weeks on standby...

[Mark_Nguyen]

Congrats! My wife got a Galaxy Note earlier this year and loves it... It's big, but that bigness lets so much more be done with it. Also, it's big enough that she plays with it more and stopped borrowing my Acer A700 tablet.

I use Pulse religiously as my go-to news aggregator, News 360 to provide me with random articles. MX Video is awesome as a media player program and can play pretty much anything. Browser-wise, I use Quick ICS because I love the thumb-only quick control options, though the stock JB browser works fine too.

Alas, my work-provided Blackberry is due to be replaced... By an iPhone. Perhaps it's time to change jobs... :P

Mark

[farmkid]

I would love to upgrade to something like that; maybe someday. My phone is one of the early Android phones. I does most of what I want it to, but just barely. Anyway, here are the apps I've found most useful:

Battery Monitory Widget (from 3C)
System Tuner (also from 3C)
GPS Essentials
WiFi Analyzer
Pandora
RealCalc Scientific Calculator (I just prefer RPN)
SMS Backup and Restore
Terminal Emulator

I soon plan to get a OBD2 bluetooth adapter and the Torque Pro app as well. You might be interested in that if you ever do any work on your car.

There are others I use a lot as well, but those are more specific to me and my life and probably not of interest to you unless you have the same bank, carrier, religion, etc.

[Robert Maxwell]

farmkid wrote:

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I soon plan to get a OBD2 bluetooth adapter and the Torque Pro app as well. You might be interested in that if you ever do any work on your car.

Let me know which adapter you end up buying. I've been thinking about getting one, but I understand the quality of the cheap ones is very hit-and-miss. Which one you get and how much you pay for it would be of interest to me (as well as it quality and reliability, of course!)

[farmkid]

Robert Maxwell wrote:

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Let me know which adapter you end up buying. I've been thinking about getting one, but I understand the quality of the cheap ones is very hit-and-miss. Which one you get and how much you pay for it would be of interest to me (as well as it quality and reliability, of course!)

I ended up ordering this one from Amazon. There seem to be three or four different models of cheap ones out there and many sellers for each one. This is one of those. Realizing that the cheap ones seem to be hit-or-miss, I just picked one that seemed to have decent ratings more often than not and took a chance. It works just fine for me so far, although I haven't had it long enough to really put it though its paces.

I do find, however, that it's not really practical to drive around with it installed and connected to my phone for routine driving. It maxes out the CPU usage on my phone and runs the battery down very fast. Even plugged in the phone can't charge, as the power coming in from the charger is just barely enough to supply the needs of the phone. In other words, Torque is a high drain app.

[RAMA]

just curious as to why "fretting" was involved?

[trekkiedane]

My mum got one of those for x-mas. Since it's her first swipe/tap/shake operated device I get to be her go-to tech wizard (same with the ipad dad got for x-mas).

Sounds cool, right? -well it's not! It means I have to figure out how to problemsolve on two devices I don't have and on two operating systems I have never before done anything on

I have however found that of the two devices, the S III is the one I too would like to have. Only, my N900 (from 2009) still does everything I could ever want from a smartphone (although somewhat slower than newer phones)


But, yeah, congrats on your phone -it is a nifty toy and quite the smart phone

[RoJoHen]

Got an iPhone just before Samsung started coming out with all these new awesome gadgets. Now I really want to switch.

[Robert Maxwell]

RoJoHen wrote:

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Got an iPhone just before Samsung started coming out with all these new awesome gadgets. Now I really want to switch.

I'm very happy with my Galaxy Nexus.

[Lindley]

I do some work with the Samsung phones. They're decent. I don't mind having an iPhone as my personal device though.

[FPAlpha]

trekkiedane wrote:

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My mum got one of those for x-mas. Since it's her first swipe/tap/shake operated device I get to be her go-to tech wizard (same with the ipad dad got for x-mas).

Sounds cool, right? -well it's not! It means I have to figure out how to problemsolve on two devices I don't have and on two operating systems I have never before done anything on

I have however found that of the two devices, the S III is the one I too would like to have. Only, my N900 (from 2009) still does everything I could ever want from a smartphone (although somewhat slower than newer phones)


But, yeah, congrats on your phone -it is a nifty toy and quite the smart phone

Welcome to my world a few years back when i made the mistake and gave my dad an old laptop i didn't use (and was too dingy to sell).
Result was me on permant tech support alert (we only lived about 200m apart back then) and i became a master in installing a Windows OS every 2-3 months.
Fortunately he retired a few years ago and moved away which probably saved our relationship in the long run.. now he pays a young software engineer to provide tech support (and after talking to him he admitted indirectly that he sometimes regrets having offered his help. Sucka! ).

Anyway.. very happy with my phone. Still not a poweruser who juggles multiple apps at the same time and is connected to everything but the occasional web surfing during lunch break, checking mails and using the nav system is quite handy.

[Robert Maxwell]

Lindley wrote:

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I do some work with the Samsung phones. They're decent. I don't mind having an iPhone as my personal device though.

My last Samsung device was the Intercept, which was basically a slightly better version of the Moment. My experience is that Samsung makes top-notch high-end smartphones, but if you look at the mid- or low-range, they suck pretty hard. Underpowered, underperforming, unfriendly.