London Fixed-gear and Single-speed

1st time I switched on plane mode it was not as good as I was hoping.

@GA2G there are far nicer looking widgets than that one. I use switchpro which I think I paid for but it is one of the nicest looking ones IMO obviously.

I agree that there are less obtrusive widgets, but the one I use has the highest rating, and it works as described. It can't be smaller, and I like the green bar within the widget.

By the way, I like your wallpaper. Is it some type of security wallpaper, that guarantees that nobody would ever steal your phone? It appears that you like a bit of a cluttered environment. :-)


EDIT:
Hang on a second, is that from a Galaxy Note? I see 5 shortcuts at the bottom of the screen.

It is crazy cluttered, I like mine a bit more chilled.

I kind of liked how ridiculously bad the wallpaper was and haven't been arsed changing it as WP Clock needs something bold there. The Widgets are all individual and you can have the indicator any colour you want. I chose that blue as it matches the status bar colour. Although I have that hidden as you can see.

Definitely not a Note I'm afraid, SGS 2 running Go Launcher. I couldn't handle something that big in my pocket. Ooh err missus!

Yes you could. Don't be bashful.

Lifehacker's 5 Best Android Phones

Summary of their results:

1. Samsung Galaxy Note
2. HTC One X
3. Samsung Galaxy S II
4. Motorola Droid series (Droid Maxx, Droid 4)
5. Samsung Galaxy Nexus


Its not scientific of course, but interesting nonetheless.

I've gone for the HTC One X. Had been after the Galaxy Nexus but the 32GB storage and 25GB Dropbox upgrade swayed me.

Wasn't happy about the battery, then realised I've yet to buy a spare or replacement for a phone.

Any ideas whats new with ics?

Blimey - I'll bookmark that for later reading thanks.

Are many people using auxiliary batteries?

I got one of those duracell ones (which turned out to be pretty poor for a couple of reasons).

These ones look pretty good. (about four times the capacity at the same cost, compared to the duracell one I bought). Anyone using them?

The SAMSUNG event tomorrow is at 7pm UK time, and in Oxford Street, at the Phones4U shop. Its supposed to be for the Galaxy S III, but some think its for a new tablet........I doubt it would be such a huge deal, if it was for a humdrum tablet.


(Note the goth fixieskidder).

http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/4550...-oxford-street

http://www.technobuffalo.com/compani...-iii-liveblog/

http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/02/s...bile-unpacked/

Rumour has it that it will be available in blue and white.



Is anybody going to work tomorrow? Has the government issued notice of an emergency holiday? Were the jets and the military out today as a show of strength, just because the phone launch tomorrow? It all makes sense now.

But if the battery is non-replaceable, then I won't be getting it. I hope they don't follow the Sony and HTC path on that issue.

White tyres ain't goth.

Another battery related question.

After rooting and switching to CM7, my battery life was great, full day of medium usage, no problem.

In the last week, my battery life has taken a huge nose dive. Massive. Previously, if you look at this:



Standby is using 2 times display, it's usually the other way round. Any ideas??

Why is WiFi and Standby rinsing battery all of a sudden? WTF is it doing?

Were you travelling?

Even on standby it needs to get a signal, if you're travelling (in a car or train), then it will constantly be searching for towers.

So travelling could be the reason.

Can't think of another scenario in which standby might consume power like that.

I have been commuting by train for the last week, this did cross my mind after some research, but it then carries on like that throughout the day. I sit at a desk all day...

Same desk? Perhaps a tower is down nearby and it's hunting to a differet one?

I've noticed since upgrading my phnoe to ICS Galaxy S2 my battery hasn't been all that good.

For some reason my RAM is now running at 400mb with the mem cleared. This was around half that before the ICS update. Has anyone else noticed this? I'm really tempted to root now.

Yeah, same desk. That could be it, I am just confused and annoyed.

It is possible that if you have a weak signal that it could be searching, but if your workplace is the same location as usual you would've noticed prior to now.

Best tip to test: Put the phone in airplane mode when you're on the train, see if that solves it.

OK, will do.

Actually, I've just been thinking, I dropped my phone hard enough to scratch the screen recently. Fucked the antenna?

Antenna's being internal are quite hard to screw up. They tend to be a slither of metal down the inside, and either are attached to the mainboard still, or aren't... they work, or they don't.

So I think it's unlikely.

Although... if you'd said you'd sat on the phone and it cracked... i.e. potentially bent the mainboard. Then it becomes plausible.

But a drop is going to do far more damage to the outside than the inside.

OK, airplane mode test.

Samsung Earls Court Event.

http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/4551...y-s-iii-launch


EDIT:
8MP Camera = Fucken Fail.

Hellooooooooo SONY Hayabusa or Mint 1.

Finally got ICS on my desire after nearly bricking it (my own fault for missing a simple mistake) kind of underwhelmed by it tbh, a few nice new features but mainly stuff that was already implemented in pre-ics Sense and a there's a few Sense features I miss such as smart dialing. Gonna stick with it for a while to see if I warm to it

What I've found about ICS that is really negative, is how resource hungry the Google Play store is when it's being run. Much much much more resource hungry. And if it's not exited fully, and happens to run in the background, then battery life drops of a cliff.

Been getting exactly the same with Google maps, might just be this beta rom though

for me, play seems to lie dormant for a few weeks, then wake up and decide to update 5-10 apps at the same time. And this will make my sensation unusable for about half an hour. Very irritating.

I seem to have no end of shit samdung apps running all the time with no idea wtf they are. If I root do i lose all those too??

Not by just rooting, but if you flash a better build...

Install dialer one, for smart dialling.

They all seem to be running the battery down.

I can't believe that the ICS is using loads more of the RAM than the old 2.3 (2.4 I can't remember) was using. It all seems to be having a bad effect on the battery.

If I'm bored tonight I may even try rooting - underclock the processor and be laughing.

This hurts my head.

Can I just say something once and hope that everyone reads it?

Android is based on Linux, Linux will *always* attempt to use every bit of RAM as efficiently as possible.

Using RAM is a *good* thing.

Not using RAM, but putting things in storage is a very *bad* thing.

It takes no more power to have RAM full, then it does for it to be powered and mostly empty.

Numbers every developer should know: http://stackoverflow.com/a/4087315

Onboard memory (flash on the mainboard) is somewhere just shy of the HDD timing due to the various controllers that need to be traversed on the way there.

A simple and plain read:
http://www.linuxatemyram.com/

Linux using RAM is good, other systems showing lots of free RAM is bad.

The only thing you should care about on your Android phone is whether you have enough onboard or extensible storage to hold all of the applications and data that you want. RAM is not a problem.

Regarding power: RAM uses virtually no power, the amount is infinitely small. Far far more power is used to read something off of onboard storage... so from a power perspective you want your RAM to be gorging itself on all the applications that you use the most... it will save your battery rather than use it.

I should make one clarification point: Running lots of apps for no gain to you will be using the battery... but it will be using the battery due to CPU processing, accessing sensors, data via 3G and wifi, etc. It won't be using power because of RAM.

So yes, uninstall apps that run background processes that you no longer want. But not because of RAM, but because of everything else the app could be doing.

Do you want the dirty secret on what uses the most power?

Adverts.

Programs with adverts have to run frameworks that monitor usage and then perform many HTTP requests to fetch adverts and their images.

If you ever get the option to purchase a "Pro" version of an app for a quid or two... take it. They disable the advert framework, and it spares your battery more than anything else you could do.

I guess I should have mentioned about all the samsung apps running in the background constantly too. Samsunng social hub - wtf is that?

You on ICS? Go into Settings > Applications > Running, and then stop the ones you don't care about.

If they start at startup, then they won't start again until the next time you boot.

You can stop the couple of Social Hub ones, and also syncmlDS.

Although really... just consider Cyanogen mod 9 when it is available as stable for your phone.

I can't help with crapware that manufacturers install.

For me, facebook and google maps are almost always running - needs force close, and often so is twitter (don't have an account nor have i ever clicked it). I really don't understand why every app that is non-essential to run the phone is pre-installed with no means of un-installing or turning off permanently. I would flash and install a custom rom on my streak if there was a simple way for an idiot like me to do it. I know I'll never get more than a day from the battery, 5inch screen, but some days it seems that every app is on regardless of my usage.

I find some of the social hubs you close them and they open again straight after - example at the moment I've got running;

Juice defender
Facebook - no idea why
battery widget - so I can see % and not just a green bar at the top that means bugger all
Software update
settings
SyncML - DS
Social Hub
Google services
MAPServiceSamsung
Digital Clock
Exchange services
Task manager
SecPhone
Samsung keypad


Half of these I have no idea what they do. I don't even think my HTC had all that crap running in the background.

You could just root and then install titanium backup pro to freeze the apps you don't want running. This way you still run stock ics. Might be worth a shot.

Oh, ditch juice defender as it is an utter myth that it saves battery. It won't stop any background processes which prevent your phone from entering deep sleep.

I don't understand what you mean with Ti back up? I never used it before when I rooted with cynaogen.

I've thought that Juice defender actually works though - or am I completely wrong?

Its an app that can backup all of your installed apps and associated data for when you wipe and flash a new rom, or an old one for that matter. One of the features of the paid version, is that you can freeze the manufacturers apps which drain your battery. You don't need to be running a custom rom, but you do need root for it to install.

One of the reasons I rooted my phone within hours of getting it was to install this and block all the T Mob shite. That wasn't enough so I flashed AndyX rom to get rid of the Samsung shite too.

Well not bothered about about GS3. Perfectly happy with my GS2 still. Stock ICS is just a pleasure to use.

Interesting read but I wasn't sure about these two:
A gigabit ethernet has a theoretical maximum throughput of 125Mb/s, whereas a modern SSD can happily reach 500Mb/s in real-world tests.

It does say "disk" rather than SSD. Implies the spinny things.

Maybe they mean floppy disk.

I'm also rather underwhelmed by the S III. The wait continues......

I want one.

Would rather a One X over an SIII but this leap isn't enough to warrant getting one.