Help Save My Sanity

[Halk]

I bought an Android phone a couple of months ago, a Samsung Galaxy S, and it's been nothing but frustration. There's dozens of problems with the software/firmware and I was lied to by the network I bought it from. That and any attempt to buy a memory card for it yields a fake.

I bought it to replace an aging old phone, and also to be an MP3 player.

Allshare doesn't work. It will stream videos, but if I want to use to stream music it crashes each and every time without fail. It's as bad now as it was when I got it.

It only has 16GB of memory, so it can't as it stands replace my MP3 player, I'll get a 32GB memory card for it sooner or later, and that will replace my 30GB MP3 player.

I've tried 3 apps for playing music on it, the default one, Museek, and MixZing. They're all awful, and not designed with the way I play my files in mind. I sort them by file structure Artist/Album/files and I navigate to the files and expect to be able to play all. All three of those music players seem to want to use playlists. Are there any good music players I could get instead of them? I managed to delete all the MP3s on the phone half an hour ago when I tried to get the default music player to do anything like what I was trying to tell it.

I have a server set up in the house using Windows Home Server which has all the storage for the house on it. It can serve music pretty well - my main PC streams from it flawlessly with Foobar. My Android phone seems to have no way at all to do it short of Allshare, which is crap. I'm not interested in streaming it through Windows Media Player 12 which is what I'm forced to do with Allshare. If I could point the phone at a networked directory then that'd be fine... assuming there's a music player out there that actually works.

Add to that the sheer stupidity of google calendar having no way to default to gmail calendar rather than the internal one on the phone, and no fix months later.

Firmware upgrades crashing through Kies.

Vodafone lying about usage limits.

The phone's battery lasting less than a day of use.

Taking longer to make a phonecall than my Nokia 1610.

Text messages showing as coming from somewhere else.

Android 2.2 upgrade failing to appear.

I'm about ready to send the phone back to Vodafone and go back to a tenner a month contract on a basic phone.

I was going to have a bath tonight, and I thought I'd try again to get music working on the phone across the network. It's now 2 ****ing hours later and I'm no further forward. The bath is cold though.

 

[Cyb3r5c4r]

froyo fixes most your issues. with the exception of vodafone beeing liars or just talking out der ass, there are a lot of fake 32GB memory cards floating around ebay.

go to: samfirmwares.com register and download I9000XXJPK (thats the latest version of froyo) also download the how to .pdf and odin 3v1.3, connect your phone and get flashing!

by the way if you can get windows home server to work this is a piece a cake. pm me if you need help i can talk you though on skype or msn

 

[snapper.fishes]

I bought an Android phone a couple of months ago, a Samsung Galaxy S, and it's been nothing but frustration. There's dozens of problems with the software/firmware and I was lied to by the network I bought it from. That and any attempt to buy a memory card for it yields a fake.

Do you mean they gave you a fake memory card? Take it back and ask for a replacement.

Allshare doesn't work. It will stream videos, but if I want to use to stream music it crashes each and every time without fail. It's as bad now as it was when I got it.

Allshare does work. Have you checked the guide thread?

It only has 16GB of memory, so it can't as it stands replace my MP3 player, I'll get a 32GB memory card for it sooner or later, and that will replace my 30GB MP3 player.

It certainly has less memory than an iPhone, but it's a lot cheaper. 16GB is also a lot compared to most android phones.

I've tried 3 apps for playing music on it, the default one, Museek, and MixZing. They're all awful, and not designed with the way I play my files in mind. I sort them by file structure Artist/Album/files and I navigate to the files and expect to be able to play all. All three of those music players seem to want to use playlists. Are there any good music players I could get instead of them? I managed to delete all the MP3s on the phone half an hour ago when I tried to get the default music player to do anything like what I was trying to tell it.

In the default music player, if you choose a song from the all tab, it will play every single song on your phone. If you choose artist, it will only play music from that artist, and the same goes for album.

I have a server set up in the house using Windows Home Server which has all the storage for the house on it. It can serve music pretty well - my main PC streams from it flawlessly with Foobar. My Android phone seems to have no way at all to do it short of Allshare, which is crap. I'm not interested in streaming it through Windows Media Player 12 which is what I'm forced to do with Allshare. If I could point the phone at a networked directory then that'd be fine... assuming there's a music player out there that actually works.

You can use Samsung PC Share manager instead. There's also an app called ES File Manager which seems to support FTP file server. But I haven't tried that yet.

Add to that the sheer stupidity of google calendar having no way to default to gmail calendar rather than the internal one on the phone, and no fix months later.

All you need to do is click the screen twice to set it as google calendar. That takes about a second.

Firmware upgrades crashing through Kies.

Agreed. This is bad.

Vodafone lying about usage limits.

Move out of UK.

The phone's battery lasting less than a day of use.

Mine lasts for quite a long time. Depends a lot on personal usage really.

Taking longer to make a phonecall than my Nokia 1610.

You can add frequently used contacts as shortcuts on the home screen.

Text messages showing as coming from somewhere else.

What do you mean by this?

Android 2.2 upgrade failing to appear.

It's just around the corner. We have been seeing 2.2 beta firmware for many regions for the last two months. They just need to fix a couple of glitches.

 

[Halk]

I was considerably more frustrated last night than was good for me... I'm surprised the responses are so helpful rather than telling me to suck it up and stop whining

The memory cards were from eBay. Very good fakes to be honest. I'll buy proper retail and that'll be the end of that. 16GB is indeed a fair chunk of memory for a phone and probably plenty for most people, however I do prefer to carry all my music with me. As for the cost it's not really a big concern. People are happy dropping a few extra grand on a car that does more than get them to a and b. I see no reason why I wouldn't drop a grand or two on a phone if it was perfect, I spend lots of money on tech. With a 32GB card then I could realistically have 45GB of music, which is 50% over my current (Cowon X5L) device. It's unclear to me what the battery life will be, it's only really bad if I turn the brightness up to a level where it looks good. I suspect the battery life while playing music with the screen off will be decent. There's also the prospect of an aftermarket thicker higher capacity battery at some point down the line.

I've not followed a guide thread for Allshare, I will do that at some point. I'm a little reluctant as it's going through two extra steps to get where I want. I just want direct access to my FLACs through the home network when I'm in my house. I don't actually want or need to stream the music through WMP and then Allshare, ideally I'd just like remote access to the drive.


The google calendar thing is an annoyance. Typically I'll set the calendar when I'm out and about and time isn't in great supply. It's a frustration to have to check the calendar on the device to ensure I didn't accidentally set it for the phone only. If I do that then if I check my calender from the office or at home, or indeed anywhere other than the phone itself then I'll miss the entry. It's a very simple fix and it's frustrating that it hasn't been done.

No intention of moving out of the UK. I have a place in Florida and US consumers get it up the arse much more than we do over here At least I can (and did) complain to Vodafone. Turns out 1GB of usage is nigh on impossible for me.

The taking longer to make a phonecall I believe I've fixed. I decided to root the phone today and stick the EXT2 lag fix on it. The phone, all over, is faster. The frustrating lag seems to have gone entirely - it also frustrated my music playing attempts too.

As for text messages... an example would be from Wednesday. I was in the pub watching the football on the way home from work and sent a text to a friend, and to my brother. It was more or less the same text "In the pub watching the football, fancy a pint?" The friend replied and I replied, and then later my brother sent me a text. His text appeared in the wrong stream of texts. I.e. it showed in the Andy conversation not the Alan one. Hopefully this is something Froyo fixes, it has happened before, so I was aware to watch for it. I might just stick Froyo on, I've not spent any time investigating how difficult it is to see if I'd be comfortable doing it, or if I should just wait for the update. To be frank though I'm less than impressed with Samsung Kies, it feels like a refresh of the same bloated heap of software that has been failing to work for me for years, I wouldn't trust it with my firmware over what I could do myself.

Edit : When I said I'd buy proper retail... I went and ordered one off an Amazon marketplace seller. 70 quid for it which was 15 quid cheaper than I could find elsewhere. At least it's not claiming to be a Kingston...

Edit : I've read the pdf suggested, which explains how to flash to Froyo. Seems pretty easy, the only thing I cannot do is remove the internal SD card. I'd like to replace it with a 32GB anyway. Is it reasonably easy to get to this, and is it really necessary to remove it prior to a firmware upgrade?

 

[snapper.fishes]

I don't think the internal sd is removable. It's probably welded to the motherboard. I haven't read the pdf guide, but don't you just flash using odin?

 

[MadBob]

I too have experienced the SMS showing as if from another person in my messages list, this can be fairly dodgy when replying as this also goes to the wrong person. not had this issue since flashing with Froyo though.

 

[Halk]

I don't think the internal sd is removable. It's probably welded to the motherboard. I haven't read the pdf guide, but don't you just flash using odin?

That's what it instructs you to do, yep. However the instructions say to remove SIM and SD card, I was checking in case it was obvious how to remove the internal SIM card - I guess not!

I think I'm going to wait on Vodafone coming out with Froyo, it should be less than a couple of weeks away. In the mean time I'll need to see about a music player that isn't a mess From what I see they all seem to be very similar to the one that comes with the phone - reskins with a few added features?

 

[big_mike]

suck it up and stop whining ;-)