This is follow up to Part 1, Part 2, and some venting.
It’s safe to say I’ll never buy a Samsung device ever again. I’m also never going to buy a subsidized phone from T-Mobile again. I’d rather spend the money and get a “un-handcuffed” device. I like T-Mobile’s service, but not the useless crapware they force on the phone.
I’m not sure who is to blame (Samsung or T-Mobile), but here are my frustrations with the phone:
- GPS isn’t accurate. It’s ok for driving navigation, but horrible for apps like CardioTrainer. I’m not alone as I read others complaining too.
- I hate both Samsung’s keyboard and Swype, which are both pre-installed on the phone. Why they don’t offer the default Android keyboard in addition to those is puzzling. I actually despise Samsung’s keyboard. There are so many issues to list I’m not going to bother. I had to install (and pay for!!!) another keyboard app. I would have been happy (and $1.99 richer) if they just left the damn default Android keyboard on it to begin with. Companies (Samsung or T-Mobile) who do things like this because they think they know what’s better for their customers make me sick.
- The bloat/crapware is on my nerves. There is one app (doubletwist) that continuously turns itself on. Welp, I can’t turn it off or uninstall it because some friggin genius at Samsung or T-Mobile forced it on the phone for me. On top of that, like I wrote before, 10% of the storage space is used up by apps I don’t want.
- My wife has the same phone, so it’s not isolated… We must reboot our phones occasionally after going from WiFi to network because the network doesn’t get picked back up.
- The battery usage report always lists only cell standby and display. It never reports any apps that may be using battery. Don’t know if this is due to meddling by Samsung or T-Mobile or a bug with Android.
- I hate the music player. I liked it on my G1. I think this is another area either Samsung or T-Mobile screwed with the default Android player. It also randomly pauses at times.
- I hate the swipe actions to answer calls or to unlock the phone.
- It has no LED indicator light to tell me if there are e-mails, texts, missed calls, etc. Luckily there is an app NoLED that is a decent substitute, but there should be no need.
That’s all I can think of for now. It’s enough to leave a bad taste in my mouth and to avoid Samsung and to be careful with T-Mobile crapware in the future.