Help New Note Problems. What gives?

[xfile102]

I have a GS2. Love it. Best phone I've ever owned. Waiting for a GS3. My GF had an Infuse and loved it. So when we heard about the Note, it was marketed by our local ATT store as the best of both worlds: Same powerful hardware as the GS2, and a GARGANTUAN screen even bigger than her Infuse. So, we bought it. Wow. PROBLEMS. I have seen a few KIND OF addressed in different threads here, but none completely. So I am asking for advice, help, and guidance.
Issue #1: 4G Data. And ONLY 4G data. If we are in a major city, great. If not, phone is a brick. Makes calls and that's it. ATT says if you aren't in a 4G coverage area you have to type a LOOONNG code to make the phone switch to 2G to be able to pickup standard Edge networks. Then you have to type the LOONG code yo switch back in 4G areas. Thats crap for an $800 phone. Would rooting fix or give an option for toggling between Edge and 3G/4G?
Issue #2: Slowdown/Lag. All the time, while texting, typing in the browser, any text input, the on screen text lags far behind the input. Also, when closing out of apps, the home screen renders widget by widget. So if I am in the browser, hit the home button, the app icons on the home screen will show up, then a second or two later the weather widget will pop up, then the clock. Simply ridiculous. This lag is consistent with all apps and closing in and out. Would rooting fix this?
Issue #3: The Stock Browser. Open the browser, browse, open several tabs, get a call, text message, or for any reason decide to hit home to leave the browser, and the browser will completely close. All tabs. Back to home when you open it again. No saving tabs, or the page you were on. Ever.
What gives? She is about to throw this poor GN out the window.
P.S.- These are the things that have been tried so far:
Battery Removed several times a day
Rebooted by Holding down the power button until phone shits off (Hard Boot) several times a day.

 

[NeoGrandizer]

Issue #1: 4G Data. And ONLY 4G data. If we are in a major city, great. If not, phone is a brick. Makes calls and that's it. ATT says if you aren't in a 4G coverage area you have to type a LOOONNG code to make the phone switch to 2G to be able to pickup standard Edge networks. Then you have to type the LOONG code yo switch back in 4G areas. Thats crap for an $800 phone. Would rooting fix or give an option for toggling between Edge and 3G/4G?

Blame AT&T for that and not the Note. On my Canadian Note, I can switch LTE off in the stock ROM. So rooting should be able to bring that function back.

Issue #2: Slowdown/Lag. All the time, while texting, typing in the browser, any text input, the on screen text lags far behind the input. Also, when closing out of apps, the home screen renders widget by widget. So if I am in the browser, hit the home button, the app icons on the home screen will show up, then a second or two later the weather widget will pop up, then the clock. Simply ridiculous. This lag is consistent with all apps and closing in and out. Would rooting fix this?

Have you tried to hard reset the Note and see if it'll clear the lag? Some users have been able to resolve this with a hard reset. However, others had to exchange their Notes when a hard reset did not resolve the issue.

I do experience lag when I first use the device waking from standby. Other times, it's because I really bogged down the system resources with too many apps running in background. Sometimes I forget I'm on a phone and not a computer.

Issue #3: The Stock Browser. Open the browser, browse, open several tabs, get a call, text message, or for any reason decide to hit home to leave the browser, and the browser will completely close. All tabs. Back to home when you open it again. No saving tabs, or the page you were on. Ever.

I don't use the stock browser, so no comment.

What gives? She is about to throw this poor GN out the window.
P.S.- These are the things that have been tried so far:
Battery Removed several times a day
Rebooted by Holding down the power button until phone shits off (Hard Boot) several times a day.

Try to do a hard reset and see if some of the issues are resolved (especially the lag). If not, try to exchange it for another Note (the one you have might be defective).

Usually it's good practice to power cycle the device once in a while to have it in tip top shape. Also hard resetting it every few months helps clean up the internals after a while of installing/uninstalling apps (at least that's what I was doing with Windows Mobile). Have a good habit of doing regular backups.

 

[Fred G. Vader]

Just fyi, be aware that doing a hard reset will wipe your phone clean, it'll be as if you just got the phone brand new out of the box. So save off any photos, music, etc that's not synced to cloud storage already.

Also i use the dolphin browser and never have any problems like what you described. i never use the stock browser.

 

[aggie87]

Just fyi, be aware that doing a hard reset will wipe your phone clean, it'll be as if you just got the phone brand new out of the box. So save off any photos, music, etc that's not synced to cloud storage already.

Also i use the dolphin browser and never have any problems like what you described. i never use the stock browser.

I find the Angel browser to be the best. It's the closest to Safari or Internet Explorer, at least (regarding Tabs and other stuff).

 

[droidcentric]

I find the Angel browser to be the best. It's the closest to Safari or Internet Explorer, at least (regarding Tabs and other stuff).

Also consider Dolphin, Duck, Safari, Maxthon and Opera.