Help problems with phone imported from korea

[precious_mew]

Hi,
I recently just purchased my Samsung Galaxy S here in the Philippines. It is said to have been imported from Korea. The back cover says Anycall and there is no Android logo at the back, only Anycall logo. There are just some minor glitches that I was hoping you can help me sort out. I don't know if the Froyo update will be able to help solve some of these problems, but it seems to me this problems came about because Anycall customized the phone. It's open line so I was able to use it here. There are some Korean letters, but it has a translation. I was hoping I can get rid of the Korean letters. So here are some problems I encountered:
1. There is no Radio!! I know this is built-in but I can't find it. This I can live without so it's ok if I don't get to solve this. It's just killing me that I paid for that feature and I can't use it.
2. The sms characters is limited to 80 only!! Now this is a total rip-off! I'm going to try other android softwares for sending sms maybe I can send more than 80.
3. There is no Social Hub. I know I can download this in the android market but like the radio, I paid for this feature!!
4. When I try calling a contact, there are 2 options. Call Korea or Call other countries. Although even if I select any of the two, I still can call a local number. I just don't know if these has additional charges, meaning if the local calls I make are considered international calls.
5. This is not really a problem but do any of your phones have an antenna? Coz mine has located at the top.
6. In my contacts list, at the right hand side there are korean letters and the letters A and Z only. I don't know if this is also the case for other phones.
Hope you can help me with my problems. Thanks so much!

 

[mjlyte]

you have some strange model and i dont think its original???!!! hmm.....

 

[PhoenixFx]

Hi,
I recently just purchased my Samsung Galaxy S here in the Philippines. It is said to have been imported from Korea. The back cover says Anycall and there is no Android logo at the back, only Anycall logo. There are just some minor glitches that I was hoping you can help me sort out. I don't know if the Froyo update will be able to help solve some of these problems, but it seems to me this problems came about because Anycall customized the phone. It's open line so I was able to use it here. There are some Korean letters, but it has a translation. I was hoping I can get rid of the Korean letters. So here are some problems I encountered:

Anycall is Samsung’s Korean domestic brand name; its not a carrier; but don’t worry about not having Galaxy S written on it, it is very similar to the international Galaxy S in terms of basic hardware (CPU, RAM, Screen etc). But there are few hardware differences, perhaps the most notable is having an integrated DMB TV (that antenna you have is for that). I believe the model number for that particular variant is called Samsung M110s.

1. There is no Radio!! I know this is built-in but I can't find it. This I can live without so it's ok if I don't get to solve this. It's just killing me that I paid for that feature and I can't use it.

I’m not sure about the radio, one other person has also complained about not being able to find a radio on that particular model, perhaps there is none??. Or maybe you have to go through the TV interface to access radio, give it a try and see, just an idea.

2. The sms characters is limited to 80 only!! Now this is a total rip-off! I'm going to try other android softwares for sending sms maybe I can send more than 80.

Perhaps that 80 character limit has something to do with Korean characters using double bytes for a single character (unicode). Its not a rip off rather a technical limitation. Most extended character sets (i.e Chinese, Japanese and perhaps even Korean) use 2 bytes to represent one character. Therefore the number of characters you can send in a SMS is half of the standard size (160). Perhaps there is a way to switch to the standard English character set and go up to 160; see if there is an option to switch between languages for typing. Again, speculating....

3. There is no Social Hub. I know I can download this in the android market but like the radio, I paid for this feature!!

You didn’t pay for it if you bought the Korean version, you paid for a TV and whatever Korean customizations .

4. When I try calling a contact, there are 2 options. Call Korea or Call other countries. Although even if I select any of the two, I still can call a local number. I just don't know if these has additional charges, meaning if the local calls I make are considered international calls.

Yet again something to do with Korean customization, I think. I don’t think you’ll be charged at international rates because you are using a local SIM right ? Your network provider can correctly identify local calls even if they are dialed in international call format (i.e +63xxxxxxx).

5. This is not really a problem but do any of your phones have an antenna? Coz mine has located at the top.

No, regular Galaxy S doesn’t have a TV so no antenna. But that TV will not work in your country because DMB TV format is only used in few countries (Philippines is not one of them)

6. In my contacts list, at the right hand side there are korean letters and the letters A and Z only. I don't know if this is also the case for other phones.

Again a Korean customization. On regular Galaxy S we have A, B, C .. all the way up to Z (all characters)

I suggest you take it back and get it replaced with an international Galaxy S (i9000GT). Tell the store that there are some limitations and you didn’t want to buy this Korean customized version, tell them about the radio, SMS limitation and all that. But frankly you should have done some research before you went and bought one..

Hope you can help me with my problems. Thanks so much!

I don't think any of us here, or the Froyo update can *fix* any of the problems you have listed above, because they are not really *problems*, all of them are due to korean customizations. Most likely you wont be able to update your phone with a standard Galaxy S firmware either, because there are hardware differences. So you will have to depend on the Korean firmware for any future updates, and all Korean firmware will have the same feature set.

 

[precious_mew]

Hi,
Thanks so much for the reply. I didn't think that there was going to be a different one. I checked all the other features that I knew was present in a Samsung Galaxy S phone. I talked with the store and told them all that the problems I noticed and they asked me to return the phone and they said they will be doing some installations. Thanks for pointing out that with this phone, I might not be able to get an update. I'll point that to them when I return the phone. I hope this will work out coz I really want this phone!!

 

[PhoenixFx]

Hi,
Thanks so much for the reply. I didn't think that there was going to be a different one. I checked all the other features that I knew was present in a Samsung Galaxy S phone. I talked with the store and told them all that the problems I noticed and they asked me to return the phone and they said they will be doing some installations. Thanks for pointing out that with this phone, I might not be able to get an update. I'll point that to them when I return the phone. I hope this will work out coz I really want this phone!!

Galaxy S has so many variants, 4 physically different models in the US market alone : Sprint has one with a Hardware slide out keyboard supporting 4G networks, Fascinate on Verizon supporting CDMA, AT&T Captivate with a completely different square edged metallic black plate design, T-Mobile Vibrant with standard Galaxy S design but with 4 capacitive buttons. Then there is the Korean version with a TV tuner, and finally the standard Galaxy S (i9000GT) in rest of the world. There might be more, who knows..

With that phone you still should be able to get updates once they are released to the Korean market. And I'm sure there will be 3rd party / beta updates and hacks for it in the korean community, but you'll have to hang out in Korean forums to get all the latest info. There is a chance that you might be able to still update yours with a standard Galaxy S firmware, but I wouldn't count on it. Better return it and get the normal Galaxy S.