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Very frustrated with Android

jt807

Newbie
Jun 25, 2010
11
1
I have had my phone about a month now, and I am sick of it. I have a couple more days before my 30 days is up, and I am seriously thinking about taking it back and going back to blackberry.

I have an EVO. It does some really cool stuff, the screen is awesome, great pictures, lots of speed. All kinds of really neat stuff about it. I don't even have a problem with the battery life, gets me through most days. I don't need it to last 3 days; I charge it every night.

So why can't I make it so it vibrates before it rings, so when I am in a meeting I have a chance to silence it?

Why can't I make it so it will alert me when I have a calendar event, and then, if I miss that alert, it keeps reminding me every minute or so? Same with missed calls and text messages. I would also like those notifications to sound different, and vibrate first, so again I can silence then.

To me they got ahead of themselves, and did some really neat stuff, but they never refined the basics.

I have been told to download several apps to handle these issues, and I have downloaded most of them. Maybe if I could ever get everythign set, such as turn this notifcation to notify only, this to alert, etc. etc. etc., then I could get it so it performs adequately. Most of those applications are still pretty buggy. I have only used free ones; I haven't heard of a paid app that handles this. If there was, then I would gladly try that. I have no problem paying for development for a really application. I don't necessarily want to give any money to some basement hack who has an app on the web that is about 80% bug free, maybe even 95% if you have everything configured just right, reboot every third tuesday, and walk backwards in to church every other sunday.

Is anyone else as frustrated as I am? If they paid a little bit of attention to the basics, then they would have a kick butt OS. Pretty frustrating.
 
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So why can't I make it so it vibrates before it rings, so when I am in a meeting I have a chance to silence it?

Why not silence or set your phone to vibrate before the meeting? It's usually considered rude not to do so beforehand. Train yourself to do it.


Why can't I make it so it will alert me when I have a calendar event, and then, if I miss that alert, it keeps reminding me every minute or so? Same with missed calls and text messages. I would also like those notifications to sound different, and vibrate first, so again I can silence then.

As far as I know, that's exactly how the notifications work. It will go off, then remind you at an interval you set. Again, not sure why you would need them to vibrate first. If you're in an environment where the ringer should be off, turn it off.


Is anyone else as frustrated as I am? If they paid a little bit of attention to the basics, then they would have a kick butt OS. Pretty frustrating.

I'm sure a lot of people have varying levels of frustration and annoyances with their devices. It's not up to Google or HTC to account for every little detail that every single person wants. They'd never be able to ship the product. If your Blackberry did these things, then that's maybe the better platform.

Otherwise it's up to you to tweak the UI and download apps that fulfill your needs. If you can get your needs met using these resources, then what's the problem?
 
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So why can't I make it so it vibrates before it rings, so when I am in a meeting I have a chance to silence it?

Just make a ringtone that starts with 10 or fifteen seconds of silence and then use it for the default for both calls and message notifications. Set it to ring and vibrate and voila, you're good to go. However, a phone buzzing across a conference table is just as annoying as a ring.

Why can't I make it so it will alert me when I have a calendar event, and then, if I miss that alert, it keeps reminding me every minute or so?

That's a good question. Perhaps if you tell us how you are doing it now, we can advise you on a better way. In any case, Google calendar syncs with the phone calendar and it's usually easier to manage your schedule from there.

Is anyone else as frustrated as I am? If they paid a little bit of attention to the basics, then they would have a kick butt OS. Pretty frustrating.

Part of the problem with switching from one phone to a completely different phone is that you have to learn how to set everything all over again. It becomes especially frustrating when you expect the new device to behave exactly as the old one did. I'll give you an example ... when I first got my Nexus, I was used to initiating voice commands through a Bluetooth hands-free ear piece. I had assumed that Android would do exactly the same thing because to me it was "one of the basics." It took a bit of getting used to (and with FroYo, it works similar to WinMo) but it was as effective ... just different.
 
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As you and everyone will come to learn, the default music player, texting, and email apps are all a POS on android. This is why so many people have been looking into apps like handcent and doubletwist among other various music and email apps.

I think that is a problem. The most used Apps (anybody on here that doesn't get/send more emails + text messages each day compared to voice calls) should be more refined?
 
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Why not silence or set your phone to vibrate before the meeting? It's usually considered rude not to do so beforehand. Train yourself to do it.

Train myself? What other smart phone will not do this?

GForce,
What resource can I use for this? The manual doesn't say how to make that happen (already read it front to back). I will be amazed if what you say is true, especially based on the number of other similar complaints I have seen and how many apps have been developed to try to handle these issues.

My main point that this stuff should be pretty standard. My wifes $25 virgin mobile phone does a lot of this.
 
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Train myself? What other smart phone will not do this?

If you're going into a setting where an audible ringtone would be considered rude or is discouraged, how hard is it to simply silence the phone beforehand?

It's just simple etiquette. It's not the phone's fault if the ringer goes off in a meeting and you look bad, it's yours.
 
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If you're going into a setting where an audible ringtone would be considered rude or is discouraged, how hard is it to simply silence the phone beforehand?

It's just simple etiquette. It's not the phone's fault if the ringer goes off in a meeting and you look bad, it's yours.

agreed, i personally never go into any form of meeting without first setting my profile to silent or switching the phone off all together. any thing else is just plain rude in my opinion.
 
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Train myself? What other smart phone will not do this?

GForce,
What resource can I use for this? The manual doesn't say how to make that happen (already read it front to back). I will be amazed if what you say is true, especially based on the number of other similar complaints I have seen and how many apps have been developed to try to handle these issues.

My main point that this stuff should be pretty standard. My wifes $25 virgin mobile phone does a lot of this.

Why does putting your phone on vibrate during a meaning sound so hard?
 
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So why can't I make it so it vibrates before it rings, so when I am in a meeting I have a chance to silence it?

Why can't I make it so it will alert me when I have a calendar event, and then, if I miss that alert, it keeps reminding me every minute or so? Same with missed calls and text messages. I would also like those notifications to sound different, and vibrate first, so again I can silence then.

on my incredible i just hold down on the power button and i can put it on vibrate or i can silent the phone easy enough but i also have a widget that i can touch and it does the same thing.
as far as the calendar thing goes mine has the alarm on it from the start,i shut it off in the settings because when it beeps all the time it drives me crazy. not trying to anger you but i must agree with some one else that earlier said you may need to get more to know the phone better.i have the incredible and i love it,they seem to do almost anything.once you get to know all the things it can and cant do. just my 2 cents.
 
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There are enough answers on here already.

Did you learn everything about your desktop PC in under a month?

I have said this a few times in posts. Think of the phone as a PC because to me (not a techie) thinking like this has helped me immensely as it makes a lot more sence when working it or trying to do things.

I had never even heard of Android till I got the X10 and even then when doing some reading of the phone did I think about googling Android as I just guessed it was an OS like other phones had. After 2 months of usage and rooting my phone I think I now know my way around the phone but like my PC when I think right I did that before how did I do it before?
 
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I understand your frustration with the EVO! I also upgraded from a blackberry to the EVO. Only kept it 2 weeks. Went back to a brand new blackberry bold but after the size of the EVO screen and some other fun things about it I wasn't happy with the blackberry any longer. soooooo, I then got an HTC Hero which is much better for me. The EVO was just to big in my hands. Now, I"m having quirky problems with my Hero and even though I got it 3 days ago and have he black tie, Best Buy employee's are giving me the "you don't know what we do" kinda crap. I have started to document as much as I can about the problems so I can be ready for them. I liked the specific functions of my blackberry but was ready to upgrade to some newer technology. If my Hero was working well I think I would like it. LOL.
 
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Train myself? What other smart phone will not do this?


The proper question is

Make your phone do it? What other smart human will not SET THEIR PHONE TO SILENT before going into a meeting?



as for your wierd question I quoted above- heaps of phones do not do this. Maybe your old phone does, your wife's phone does, but thats not a majority. Get you head around it!
 
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My main point that this stuff should be pretty standard.
This is stated all the time by people. IMO, part of the point of Android is that it is extensible. Otherwise, why not just go with a phone where you're stuck with what's stock? Everyone has some random thing that they think "should be standard".

Do yourself a favor and don't assume that you have to use the device as it's delivered. If you aren't happy with the stock functionality then hit the Market (well, maybe not the Market directly since browsing it is an exercise in futility) and the forums.

IMO, complaining that something isn't standard on Android is about as silly as writing off PC's because they come delivered with crappy apps like Notepad, Wordpad and Paint.

My wifes $25 virgin mobile phone does a lot of this.
...and there's a much, much longer list of what it can't do while I'm sure Android could do what you're asking for. Would you seriously switch to using the same model phone? Keep it in perspective.
 
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to the OP i hope you find what you're looking for.

I think the issue is that you've gotten used to how your phone functions and change can sometimes be tough. Good luck finding a solution and if you do please post it up here b/c i would like this functionality as well. As noted above you can make one yourself through some creativity.
 
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first off, i'll have to agree with everyone above that it's completely ridiculous that you dont just put your phone on vibrate before a meeting. As far as the calendar thing, try HTC's calendar widget, it does all the things you are asking for. If you are this frustrated over these medial little problems you would probably be better off with a simpler phone. But anyways, I'm sure once you get to know the OS, you'll come to love it! blackberry has went downhill over the past year, and I wouldn't recommend their devices to anyone. Hope to see you around the forums :)
 
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like the poster above said try an app like locale.
i currently use setting profiles, and set it to go into silent mode and turn on vibrate mode when you are in meetings, ie set by keyword for say "meeting" in calendar so when ever you have meeting set in calendar the phone will auto change settings to suit.

i use it to go into silent mode when i arrive at work and then change back to normal when i leave work.

i also have mine to silent during the night.
 
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