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Android Shortcomings.

edub

Newbie
Mar 24, 2010
15
1
There seem to be a few threads in which people complain of particular shortcomings of the Android OS. I thought it might be a good idea to compile a list which may be send to the powers that be in the future.

So, if you have a complaint about your Android OS, please share. And if anyone knows how to resolve an issue, that would be great.

I will begin.

Music player:

Evidently there is no way to arrange your music the way you want and no stop button. Do I seroiusly need to use the app killer to stop a song?

Navigator:

No way to save a destination except to back out and re-enter it as a contact. Why? And why aren't destinations saved in a different list from the phone numbers?

Phone:

The phone doesn't default to the dial pad or home screen. Every step must be manually undone. If I speed dial a contact or select them from "contacts," then hang up, I am in my speed dial folder, contact list or call log; not at the home screen or dial pad where I should be.

Call Waiting:

All my incoming calles have required me to unlock the screen which seems to hang up on everyone. This is probably my fault though.

I'm sure there are more to come...
 
I think it just needs to be polished. If you get an HTC phone running a custom rom (Sense) its pretty smooth. If you get the Droid or a phone running plain Android it seems to be a little laggy. Switching from the iPhone to this made it really apparent because the iPhone is so smooth but I'll take the Android phone over the iPhone any day especially since I'm replying to this on my laptop tethered w/ my Droid.
 
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It would be nice to have it preinstalled to set different notification sounds for different contacts. Not just ringtones, I text more often. Blackberry's RIM OS has it, hoping Android 2.? will maybe add this little feature someday.

Not sure what you are talking about for sure here. Are you talking about the lack of additional ringtones and/or notification sounds, or are you talking about receiving a specific sound notification when you get a text from a certain person?

If you use an app like, Handcent, you are allowed much more customization, including specific notification options per contact.

The addition of more sounds and ringtones (and even alarms) can be accomplished by adding alarms, notifications, and ringtones folders into the media/audio folder on you SD card.
 
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Texting:

If someone doesn't respond before the screen goes dark, I must push the button to activate the screen and then unlock it. Once unlocked, I have to pull down the notification menu and click the message and then click the text box to display the keyboard.

That is five steps before I can start typing my response. That is pretty horrible considering that my last phone simply had to be opened and a single button pressed.

Does anyone know where the Android OS was developed? It seems that the people who developed it are not experienced cell phone users - India perhaps?

I sure hope these issues will be addressed in the near future.
 
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Texting:

If someone doesn't respond before the screen goes dark, I must push the button to activate the screen and then unlock it. Once unlocked, I have to pull down the notification menu and click the message and then click the text box to display the keyboard.

That is five steps before I can start typing my response. That is pretty horrible considering that my last phone simply had to be opened and a single button pressed.

If you download handcent sms (a free app from the market) you can do it in one or two steps; power button, click the text box. Run it as awidget and enable popups over your lock screen. Try out that sms app and you will find you have a lot more options than the stock sms app.
 
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there are apps that fix most these problems, i think the one the OP needs is called "Not call log"

chart
 
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My phone.. and my daughter's phone... lose calls ALL THE TIME while we're driving. By 'all the time', I mean at least once during every call I make while using the bluetooth connection through my car. She has the same problems, and she had a different car. The bluetooth connection is lost, but the phone itself still maintains the call. The caller hears muffled sounds so I know they are still there. But I can't necessarily hang up since the phone's in my purse. If I can get my hands on the phone, I can then use the phone on speaker. Sometimes I can even force it back to the bluetooth connection by pushing the bluetooth button off and on. But having to handle the phone negates the reason I am using it in the first place - driving HANDSFREE! I have called Motorola and the answer I get is "we're working on an update!" Sounds like they are aware of the problem - sure hope there's a fix soon.
 
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My phone.. and my daughter's phone... lose calls ALL THE TIME while we're driving. By 'all the time', I mean at least once during every call I make while using the bluetooth connection through my car. She has the same problems, and she had a different car. The bluetooth connection is lost, but the phone itself still maintains the call. The caller hears muffled sounds so I know they are still there. But I can't necessarily hang up since the phone's in my purse. If I can get my hands on the phone, I can then use the phone on speaker. Sometimes I can even force it back to the bluetooth connection by pushing the bluetooth button off and on. But having to handle the phone negates the reason I am using it in the first place - driving HANDSFREE! I have called Motorola and the answer I get is "we're working on an update!" Sounds like they are aware of the problem - sure hope there's a fix soon.

Maybe its the bluetooth technology the car is using? Have you used a different phone that works fine with the cars?
 
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Maybe its the bluetooth technology the car is using? Have you used a different phone that works fine with the cars?
YES.. I have used another phone with this bluetooth system. It was a Motorola 755. It worked flawlessly. I never lost a call. I have contacted Acura (the car is a 2006 TSX), a number of times, to see if they have any suggestions, but they are still "testing" the Droid. I suspect the only help I will get is for them to say it's not compatible. This would prompt one to think it was the car, except my daughter has a Toyota Sienna and her car does the same thing. The call is lost, but if you look at the phone, it's still connected. I did speak to Motorola and they said they are working on a fix. But that might just be a standard answer for any issue I raised. They also told me to pull the battery etc, but I knew that would not make a difference.

For me, this is pretty significant negative. I love everything the Droid can do, but I need it to be a safe phone, first and foremost. I don't want to be fiddling with the phone while I'm driving, digging through my purse etc. I don't want to have to keep it perched on my lap in case I need to push speakerphone buttons. I just want to be able to push the button on the steering wheel and say "hello" and know the only time the phone will go silent is when I say "goodbye". I don't think that's too much to ask from a phone.
 
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The only thing I feel my Droid is missing, is an equalizer. I listen to a lot of streaming music and some tracks make speakers pop due to heavy bass output. Happens sometimes when listening to mp3 files. No matter what what volume setting I have the phone set to. I know others have this same issue.

Astro player beta. Great app.
 
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I also find it exceedingly difficult to press the home key.. sheez, perhaps you should have a simpler phone if one button is affecting you this way. ;)

Wrong. I have folders for speed dial and text. The home button doesn't close these and doesn't work as long as they are open.

You know, most of us are here to hep others through constructive conversation. Snide comments are both unnecessary and unhelpful.


To all those who actually posted helpful suggestions - thank you.
 
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Calendar needs full functionality to match online, and also needs to repeat alarms and snooze them (for calendar items). Right now it's too weak to be reliable.

Contacts need to be more customizable, I hate not being able to properly add people to groups and am annoyed by the difference in address fields between the Droid and online.

Headset voice dial; c'mon!

Music sortable by Genre and better playlist creation (like Genius). Being able to sort tunes the way I want, not just by random tag data. EQ built in, correctly.

More and better productivity apps. I feel like my app IQ dropped 90 points coming over from an ancient Palm PDA.

A cleaner and smarter market. Why is it a struggle to find apps, they should be subcategorized by specific type. Clearly the devs aren't that great on how to tag/keyword their products either, so someone needs to step up.

I'm sure there's more. Don't get me wrong; Android is the best thing out there right now due to its freedoms, but it still has a ways to go before it's a mature and pro-grade offering.
 
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Droid Bluetooth sucks, period. After getting the new phone, I treated myself to a BT earpiece, an Aliph Jawbone Prime 3, not cheap. Then I find that there's no BT voice dialing on this otherwise 22nd Century device, and I'm already tired of hearing complaints about how it sounds. I hope to heck I can get my $100 back for the Jawbone...:mad:
 
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Droid Bluetooth sucks, period. After getting the new phone, I treated myself to a BT earpiece, an Aliph Jawbone Prime 3, not cheap. Then I find that there's no BT voice dialing on this otherwise 22nd Century device, and I'm already tired of hearing complaints about how it sounds. I hope to heck I can get my $100 back for the Jawbone...:mad:

That is messed up. My old Razor would voice dial via Blue Tooth. Although, it wouldn't do much good anyway because the voice dial brings up a list of possible matches and you must manually select one.
 
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you know instead of griping on here. take it to the source as that's how stuff changes. let them know what you would like to see and if enough people says the same think. you might see it in the next update. man people are getting lazy now a days. pretty soon people will say why cant the phone read my mind to know what I want it to do.

this is another useless thread of aimless bickering.
 
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you know instead of griping on here. take it to the source as that's how stuff changes. let them know what you would like to see and if enough people says the same think. you might see it in the next update. man people are getting lazy now a days. pretty soon people will say why cant the phone read my mind to know what I want it to do.

this is another useless thread of aimless bickering.

I HAVE taken it to the source. A number of times. As I'm sure many of those who have had issues have done. And actually, I don't think this is another useless thread of aimless bickering. I think this is a place for others who have the same issues to know it's not THEM, but the phone. Consider yourself lucky that you are 100% satisfied with the function of your Droid.

Me, I'm frustrated! I can't keep a conversation on my phone for more than 5 minutes at a time while I'm on bluetooth. It does not do this when I am not. So yeah.. it's the blue tooth connection. I used to be able to use my old ancient, not so smart phone without a hitch. I just want the same connectivity with my so very smart phone.
 
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Droid Bluetooth sucks, period. After getting the new phone, I treated myself to a BT earpiece, an Aliph Jawbone Prime 3, not cheap. Then I find that there's no BT voice dialing on this otherwise 22nd Century device, and I'm already tired of hearing complaints about how it sounds. I hope to heck I can get my $100 back for the Jawbone...:mad:

Thats odd, my $17 monoprice bluetooth sounds just like im using the regular phone says people I talk to...

BT Voice Dialing is in 2.1... at least milestone 2.1...
 
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