They actually sabotage their own hardware with their awful software. More Pixel 2s are sold than would otherwise be because people hate Touchwiz and all their bloat crap that much.
The Pixel 2 has the highest rated camera of all smartphones (https://www.dxomark.com/google-pixel-2-reviewed-sets-new-rec...)
https://www.androidauthority.com/dxomark-ranking-troublesome...
If Samsung would fire a bunch of people and stop throwing garbage add-ons and poor replacements for existing software they would dominate the market
Absolutely not. I just stopped using a Galaxy S8 and moved to the iPhone X purely because of day-to-day responsiveness, which the recently released Oreo update has made worse. My original Pixel, however, was far smoother during the same tasks.
I would pick a sturdy rugged phone over these cinderella phones any day of the week.
Clumsy cases absolutely destroy the elegance of these beautiful devices.
I'm not as confident about dropping them though.
However the Samsung Galaxy A3 I use has proved to be very durable.
Among casual drops, it has sustained multiple drops to stone floors from considerable heights and being violently thrown across the room (not by me).
The aluminium casing has some small dents and the Corning Gorilla Glass 4 screen has a few small scratches. Otherwise it's still in excellent condition.
Also, at least with the S8 series, the curvature is a lot less aggressive than Samsung's earlier curved screen phones (S7 edge series).
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/07/12/samsungs_tizen_no_l...
S9 looks awesome, a notable refinement over the S8. Stereo speakers and that camera! Let's not forget Samsung retaining the headphone jack either, a major win for those who prefer quality non wireless headphones. Having said that, I wonder if APTX-HD is supported by the S9 now.
I find headphones a very personal thing... Being an Audio Technica fanboy I have ANC9 for work (relatively fantastic audio quality/office sound cancelling, with Soundblaster E5), ADG1X for gaming + MSR7NC for music at home (on Soundblaster ZXR) - the latter being an indulgence so that I could have a pair of closed sets whilst working if noisy in the house, with a tiny amount of noise cancelling. Different qualities for different uses.
For the go I have the IM02s, but tips aren't the best so I'm currently using the AKGs that came with the S8+ (with Comply foam tips) - they work quite well.
I'm planning to buy an S8+ or similar soon, since its so much cheaper than Google Pixel, which isn't really officially sold here in Brazil (I loved my Nexus 5 though).
Mine's on Android 7.0. Samsung aren't too keen on pushing out updates in Australia in a rush; the telcos (Telstra) take their own sweet time too. That's where Apple has them soundly beat. Although, having said that, given last year's update history, perhaps Samsung's model is better after all - I rarely get breaking changes pushed down.
Plus they have dark mode for all their stock apps!
I will take Samsung, Huawei or LG interface changes over the defaults.
I still have a Rotel poweramp from 1985 in my front room which the Sonos is plugged into, working flawlessly. There's no chance my Sonos box will still be working past 2050.
If you added the functionality of the Sonos to the Rotel poweramp, it would have the same complexity-based problems.
I disagree that all solutions to this problem need the same complexity inherent in the Sonos and that the user experience could not be improved.
Using that with shairport-sync to cast to a Woburn speaker gives me more than adequate results and I'm not even using a USB DAC nor digital audio output via HDMI, just the Pi's basic line-out.
I still loathe using iTunes on any machine I support, because it's often such a mess. It seems like Apples software quality is such a dice roll.
I found these products and force-fed management software absolutely horrid. I didn't even want iTunes on the family computers, or a dependency on Windows. I maintained a couple of old desktops for my siblings, for very basic Linux desktop appropriate tasks, as in browsing and OpenOffice (I didn't believe in Linux on the desktop and I still don't, for my own use).
So, an mp3 player that didn't let me transfer and/or play my meticulously organized mp3 and/or FLAC collection was just plain cancer in my opinion.
As a teenage "family sysadmin" I made sure everyone got USB mass storage compatible mp3 players and used media library software like Winamp 5 or Amarok (the original branch that's currently known as clementine) for media management.
The way iTunes was intrusive is of course why it worked for ordinary folks, who didn't have a "sysadmin" like me. But iTunes was such as piece of flaming garbage it couldn't even remove dead/missing files from its media library database automatically.
It's amazing how bad iTunes remains, and I've never used it for music. I mostly like Apple's approach to things these days, now that my time is worth money. The only thing iTunes does well in my opinion is that it takes disk image backups of iOS devices, an essential part of why I now use iPhones, but that's another story.
However, the iPods/iTunes had their good points, none of which I didn't understand at the time. The iPod, if memory serves, never ever rebuilt its media database on its own. That was the job of the iTunes software, for the sake of optimization and keeping the iPod system lean, pleasant and fast (please correct me if I'm wrong).
This philosophy remains visible with Apple's Airport Wi-Fi base stations to this day. Apple base stations do require a proprietary Windows or Mac utility, which was a non-starter for 19-year-old me. But the Airport utility still basically uploads conf files to the base stations, which run pretty nice and slimmed down NetBSD based firmware.
In retrospect, it was smart of Apple not to do stupid bullshit like vulnerable and memory bloating web interfaces on base stations. Those Airport base stations are solid, and by the way, a decade-old models are still supported with updates. The listening daemons available on Airports, Airplay, Apple's lossless (!) music streaming, since 2004 (!), and printer sharing, never had to compete for RAM.
Anyways, at the time, in the early-mid 00s, the only benefit I saw in being in the iPod ecosystem was early adoption and universal support of AAC as the go-to lossy codec. Fiddling with those VBR presets for the Lame encoder was and remains the only way to get decent sounding mp3s, without maxing out the codec at 320 kbps. A maxed out bitrate would have been just wasteful on a my tight budget in 2004. I had no money to spend on storage, so I wanted my music collection near-transparent mp3 VBR files with average bitrates around 200 kbps. My equipment was just worse, so I could live with those bitrates. Good headphones used to cost money and portables had pretty modest headphone output quality.
Btw, features like seeking and correct time displays for VBR mp3 was far from perfectly supported at the time. Amazingly, this still remains the case, which, by the way, is one of the reasons why podcasts are almost universally CBR mp3, even when produced or prepared for distribution by people who know what they're doing.
Flash storage was expensive at the time. So, I used CD-RWs with mp3 compatible portable CD players, mostly from Sony. It was risk management on my part - I didn't want a fancy HDD based mp3 player because I couldn't afford to replace it if I ever dropped the damned thing.
And 512 megs of non-replaceable flash storage was just too tight for a vacation, which is what cheap small mp3 players provided. Eventually, mp3 players were good enough though. My last flash based mp3 player before my first smartphone was a Sandisk Sansa Fuze, it supported removable microSDHC, I think, and even the Vorbis and FLAC codecs.
I got into Mac with the late 2008, first pre-pro unibody Macbook, because I worked a service desk gig at the time at the time, and consequently didn't want to even see Windows in my spare time. I also wanted Unix on the desktop, which is a problem Apple still solves, although at a premium.
To be honest, I don't I think I ever would've switched to iPhone due to the missing USB mass storage mode if Spotify hadn't completely taken over my day-to-day music listening. But what pushed me from Androids early was the lack of even security updates on newish flagship phones back in 2011. I considered iOS 5 with music through Spotify good enough, and I've never looked back since.
I understand worse is better. It's just that every so often it gets me down.
I'm finding that while the iPhone's hardware beats most of what Android has to offer, a lot of iOS has weird user design choices (hidden search fields, strange menu placement in apps, random antagonistic design choices), that just seem mildly inconvenient at best.
Also iOS 11 had way more bugs than any Android release I've ever used.
I actually do not understand how Apple dropped the ball so badly. Someone should not be getting a bonus.
I get that people have always complained about older phones being slower on later OS releases, but actually the overal, performance of the phone is fine. For some reason there’s a ton of UI lag on loading screens in the phone app and calculator that’s really frustrating. The phone is only a few years old, but feels like my old 3GS. It’s really annoying to have to pause and wait for the UI to become active in two apps I use extensively, and often want to use in a hurry. This is supposed to be a 64bit desktop class CPU. Games load fast and are snappy as hell. How come loading a dial screen is such a massive undertaking? It’s inexplicable.
Apple skims on RAM/GPU when they upgrade screens or come out with something new. Screen updates sell on hype. People can't wait another cycle for better hardware.
iPhone 3G, iPhone 4, iPad 1, iPad 3, 1st gen Retina MBP, iPhone 6 Plus, iPhone X.
https://www.sonymobile.com/global-en/products/phones/xperia-...
To name one current example, both Android and iOS have the concept of a global password manager for third party apps (and the web-browser). Both Google and Apple offer a password manager that hooks into it. But on Android third party password managers can also utilize the system APIs, whereas on iOS they cannot.
Meaning password managers on iOS are stuck with copy/switch/paste/switch/copy/switch/paste for username and password respectively. On Android you get a popup next to the input box, press it, and it is populated.
This is just one current example but if you look at the history of iOS Apple has been doing this forever. NFC locked to Apple Pay was a previous good example.
Before Apple added the current global autofill APIs on iOS, third party password managers could register a Safari extension. Ignoring how poor the user experience of doing it this way was, it also limited autofill to third party apps based around a Safari webview who chose not to opt out of third party extensions (namely only these apps[0] worked). Very few of the top 250 apps were supported and that remains the case to this day.
Apple added global autofill APIs, but as of today those APIs are only available to Apple. This allows Apple to create a password manager which works across Safari, Safari webview (with or without extensions enabled), and even fully native apps.
If an app isn't listed in [0] it will only work with Apple's password manager or copy/paste. Some apps missing include: Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat, Google's app suite (gmail, google maps, etc), Netflix, Spotify, et al.
Calling my post "incorrect" while understanding the difference between the global autofill APIs and Safari extensions is disingenuous and inaccurate.
Well, no. What you said was; "But on Android third party password managers can also utilize the system APIs, whereas on iOS they cannot.", which isn't 'absolutely accurate' at all. The share sheet uses a system API to inject the username/password combination. Your statement is demonstrably inaccurate. It's not as fluid as Android's approach, granted. To make you statement more accurate, you should add '...the same system APIs.", although, I'm not sure that is actually the case.
> If an app isn't listed in [0] it will only work with Apple's password manager or copy/paste. Some apps missing include: Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat, Google's app suite (gmail, google maps, etc), Netflix, Spotify, et al.
Ironically, that list totally disproves what you are suggesting, and arguably, the bad actors here are Facebook and Google who own most of the titles listed.
Yes it is.
The global autofill APIs on Android are available to all apps. The global autofill APIs on iOS are available to Apple.
> Your statement is demonstrably inaccurate.
Only if you intentionally strip out context of the statement and paint it as saying something else entirely. Let's look at that line in-context:
> To name one current example, both Android and iOS have the concept of a global password manager for third party apps (and the web-browser). Both Google and Apple offer a password manager that hooks into it. But on Android third party password managers can also utilize the system APIs, whereas on iOS they cannot.
It is pretty obvious IN CONTEXT which "system APIs" I was referring to since the previous two sentences and the entire thrust of the post is about one specific topic. Pulling apart my post to strip out context, and then attacking the context-less parts is just arguing for arguing's sake.
You aren't even making a point about the issue I raised (restricted system APIs), you're just being pedantic.
> Ironically, that list totally disproves what you are suggesting, and arguably, the bad actors here are Facebook and Google who own most of the titles listed.
They aren't "bad actors" because they choose to use native controls instead of a webview.
Odd, 1Password filling usename and password fields in different apps without using webview must have been a figment of my imagination. Thanks for correcting me on that. /s
> They aren't "bad actors" because they choose to use native controls instead of a webview.
Ironically, Google uses a webview to login to all their apps on iOS.
Today, I have moments when I'm just disgusted with Apple, as well as with 3rd party apps on iOS from well funded companies who should be doing better. Though to be fair, most of the time, things do work. It's just that I run into the odd place where...WAT!?
I also really dislike (maybe this is just me) that I can't deal with files as files on an iPhone. I can't just move an mp3 or an ebook to the memory, find it via an app and open it. It feels so locked it.
You can use iPhones with PCs and Android phones with Macs.
Please stop making such inflammatory statements with no substance.
On the Pixel it has a singular context aware volume control that doesn't work very well. I've loaded YouTube, pressed volume up/down, and had my ringer volume change more times than I can count.
Even on iOS which has a similar context aware volume control the experience is superior since you can also change the volume from the dock and disable the setting titled "[Ringer] Change with buttons" so it doesn't do anything until media is in focus.
I rarely need to change my ringer volume, I just need a quickly accessible way of going into "Do Not Disturb"/Silence mode for the cinema and meetings. Samsung even offers that from the power menu which is super convenient.
It used to always advertise being a media player so any time the app was active the volume buttons default changed the media volume. They just broke it intentionally.
Can't watch ads if you screen is off!
When I first subscribed to Google Play Music, in the UK, it included "YouTube Music Key", which had the same feature to allow YouTube videos to play in the background, and it worked just fine in the UK.
Then they rebranded YouTube Music Key to YouTube Red, and since YouTube Red isn't available in the UK for legal reasons unrelated to backgrounding YouTube videos, they disabled the backgrounding feature in the UK, even though UK subscribers are still paying for a YouTube Red subscription (that cannot be used in the UK).
[1]: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=catchpower.gog...
With the new-ish priority mode and "do not disturb" modes, I change my ringer volume about as often as I change my "alarm" volume (which is almost never).
I only ever change my media volume, and thanks to apps like that one it can become the default.
On my phone it's under Settings -> Buttons -> Volume buttons -> Control ringtone volume.
I spent a while some time ago trying to watch for any modern phone to get full LineageOS support, and eventually just gave up. The closest things came was "partial support for the Galaxy S8, but it will ruin the camera". How much of a future is there here?
Edit: from elsewhere in the thread ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16460503 ):
> I bought an S8 with the intention of putting LineageOS on it. Sadly to this day there are things not working which are essential, like making calls or using LTE data... or wifi.. or the camera.
(Just to be clear, the Pixel is losing this comparison... it isn't supported at all. But the fact that the Pixel is losing doesn't mean we can say Samsung is winning... this looks more like a loss for everyone.)
Those instructions didn't actually work. Following the only remaining advice LOS has to offer, I went to their IRC channel to ask what was wrong. After waiting more than half a day, I eventually got a response: "no one really talks in here".
Needless to say, I did not get any help.
Oh. My. God. Thank you. Around about the S5/S7 era I stoppped flashing my phone every 5 minutes, but now with my S7 drinking battery fluid every minute of the day I've been wondering where CM had gone.
Personally, I would rather rip out my own entrails than buy another Google hardware device and expose myself to their garbage customer service.
Strange. When I switched from a Samsung S5 to a Pixel, the feature I missed the most was Samsung's notification badges. Since my work and personal messages came in on difference apps, I could prioritize with just a glance at my home screen. Now I have a long list of notifications to manage.
Other than that, I do love my Pixel. Google updates are the best.
I thought about getting a Pixel, but luckily I had the opportunity to try it out and didnt convince me. The camera was nice, but for half the price you could get a Huawei which are pretty awesome hardware wise...
The S9/S9+ seem mostly "meh, more of the same". Slightly better camera, some seeping-out-to-the-masses ML novelties, but basically standard incremental upgrade stuff.
At this point I have had S1 (which I helped launch in the US, even went to Samsung HQ in Korea), S3, S6 and S8+ and they're all fine, if expensive, though the Bixby button is definitely annoying on the S8+. I am open to change I just can't find another brand I trust, HTC is dying and the Chinese ones are all full of shitty spyware and popups.
I'm impressed by the S9, but the new features aren't compelling enough to me to upgrade, so maybe next year.
Thas was from people working on printers/scanners, but I feel that this very much defines their mobile business as well.
Maybe that is the end game. Make andoid look bad, then turn around with their own OS that you can optionally install on all of their phones. Maybe even other devices. I mean they cant possibly be trying to make people like using their phones.
It'll take a lot more than a few vendor-specific OS tweaks to put non-tech people off.
To be clear, I agree that the OS modifications implemented by Samsung feel like they result in a less performant experience.
Warning: anecdata below!
My girlfriend's family regularly use various tech devices (laptops, phones, tablets) and are technically literate in the use of such devices for consumptive purposes and I'd rate them as relatively technically illiterate in the use of tech for creating anything beyond simple MS Office-type documents.
As a generalisation, they pay zero attention to the tech media (I'd say they are largely unaware of tech media sources), obtain all tech news via mainstream media and are influenced by both mainstream and Facebook advertising which they don't see as advertising but as useful information.
They have strong brand loyalty or, more specifically, they have a definite preference towards brands they believe have served them well in the past.
They all generally opt for Samsung phones. This seems rooted in prior positive experience with earlier-generation Galaxy devices.
They appear not to differentiate between Samsung's Galaxy line and Samsung's other lines of lower-priced smartphone ranges, suggesting a bias for the brand over the hardware/software combo itself. Their choice of phone contract seems based on Samsung and price almost exclusively.
I have seen them switch from technically better to technically worse hardware and still be pleased with their new phone. A new phone is often perceived as better than an old phone purely due to it being newer.
My girlfriend's mother used Sony phones for years predominantly based on her positive experiences with the Sony brand in non-related lines such as TVs.
She switched recently to a Galaxy S8 when her contract was up for renewal. Her decision was based mostly on the preference for Samsung phones in her immediate family. Her only issue with it was the dedicated Bixby button and her issue was not with Bixby itself but with her unsteady hands pressing the button unwantedly. My girlfriend disabled the button and her mother now perceives the phone as the best thing to have ever existed. She bought a wireless charger, again due to her shaky hands being unable to cope with plugging in a charging cable. The positive association with the wireless charger further reinforces her positive opinion of the S8 regardless of the fact that wireless charging exists across many phone brands and ranges.
The bloat of vendor-specific OS modifications is a non-issue. If the bloat factor is consistent, a phone today is faster and better than a phone of two years ago.
They see smartphones grouped into three families: iPhones, Android phones and Samsung phones. That the OS on a Samsung phone is based on Android is not considered. That a phone may not get OS upgrades in a timely manner, or at all, is a complete non-issue for people that don't know that such updates exist, don't generally care about the OS and who replace their phone every two years.
Similar to how many get a Windows upgrade only by buying a new computer (although less-so now with Windows 10 but more so historically), many get an Android OS upgrade only when getting a new phone. That a phone should get, or needs to have, OS upgrades is also a complete non-issue.
In short, for those not close to the tech industry, there is nothing wrong with Samsung phones. The common gripes we in the tech field often mention (slow/lacking updates, under-performant UI tweaks aka lack of purity) are so much of a non-issue for the majority of Samsung phone users to make effectively zero difference to Samsung.
[Editted for typos]
I'm enjoying a vanilla Android 7.1 experience on my old Samsung S4, which is (subjectively) faster than many new crapware-loaded flagships.
I'd certainly entertain replacing my S4 with an S9, provided I'm able to install Lineage on it as easily as I was my S4.
Edit: Oreo notifications dots clear all notifications when you open the application which is rather useless imo. Also still doesn't display a number. https://android.stackexchange.com/q/191401
Oreo has added those
Sounds like it is a matter of preferences though, they could disappear and I would not even notice : I read most of my notifications from the locker screen or notification shade anyway