****The Official Samsung Galaxy S II Thread***

[unwashed potato!]

Phones these days run on advanced operating systems, much like Windows / OSX. Think of it this way, if you switched your PC off, it wouldn't run alarms either

yeah it sucks. can't belive a feature that was around 5 years ago has now gone as phones get more advanced, and pc os's have never had this feature afaik!

to save battery i'd put the phone into airplace mode. doubt it uses very much battery at all and it'll let the alarm run.

 

[_Jimlad_]

i dont think its good to have the phone on all the time for many reasons, it is a shame you are required to keep power on it

 

[Robbo]

i dont think its good to have the phone on all the time for many reasons, it is a shame you are required to keep power on it

What are those reasons then? I've never seen anything to suggest its a bad idea to keep them on all the time. I've certainly kept all my modern smartphones on all of the time.

 

[kitch9]

You see this is what I want to hear, as I've been following this thread and a lot of the posts are related to poor battery performance and apps seemingly running and killing the battery for no reason.

What ROM version you two running?

KE7 official.

 

[kitch9]

5GHz had major problems with (concrete) walls so I am at 2.4GHz. Here the signal strength / measured speed is clearly better than with my old d-link (at the same distance) however still the problem of (concrete) walls and distance is quite a major one. I just put the new router to room where I spent most of the time and kept old router where it was - having 2 routers seems to be the only way how to maintain decent signal for SGS2 in different rooms. I haven't tested with distance of 10m with clear sight at the router, but less than 10m with walls / obstacles and the speed drops fairly quickly.

I am fairly sure (unless someone can prove otherwise) that the problem is in the phone not the other network elements. Also - not sure if 65mbit limit with perfect signal is common with smartphones but from a flagship device I definitely expected more.

I've read 65mbps is the limit, which unless you intend to just transfer files to and from the phone all day is plenty for me....

 

[.:SAmSuNG:.]

Is everyone just using the stock Google maps for sat navigation?

 

[Streeteh]

Is everyone just using the stock Google maps for sat navigation?

Yep, works a dream for me. Only complaint is that it doesn't tell you speed limits of roads and, while it will show you traffic on the map, it doesn't recalculate routes based on traffic.

It's still in beta though, so i'm hoping those issues will be resolved.

 

[Pookie Bear]

Two hours my phone has been on today - 15 minutes of music, two texts and otherwise it's been sleeping....and 2% used. Every other day this week it's been 90% or lower at the same stage. Very odd. The only difference is that I've had data turned off since yesterday - which is hardly convenient.

 

[_Jimlad_]

What are those reasons then? I've never seen anything to suggest its a bad idea to keep them on all the time. I've certainly kept all my modern smartphones on all of the time.

1. doing your bit for the environment
2. preserving your battery life
3. extending your phones life (theory) - ie the device/screen will have a life span
4. Surely its not great to surround yourself with all those waves and signals 24/7

surely its makes sense that you should turn any electrical item off when your not using it? for me that would be around 11:45pm until 8am

 

[mrk]

Nobody I haver ever known or heard of has turned their phone off at night and none of those people have suffered TEH CANC0RS!!!!!!!! from radio waves or whatever.

Oh and their phones have never died either, neither have any of my handsets.

Yep, works a dream for me. Only complaint is that it doesn't tell you speed limits of roads and, while it will show you traffic on the map, it doesn't recalculate routes based on traffic.

It's still in beta though, so i'm hoping those issues will be resolved.

You can reroute avoiding traffic, if the bottom left icon is orange/red then just tap it and you can reroute

It's a manual process but at least you get a visual icon to let you know there is traffic! (And of course a yellow/red overline on the map itself if traffic layer is enabled).

 

[kitch9]

1. doing your bit for the environment

Looks over at China......... Nah, I'll leave my Phone on that uses a few watts.

2. preserving your battery life

Li-ion will be fine for the 12-16 months I'll own my phone.

3. extending your phones life (theory) - ie the device/screen will have a life span

Divide 50,000 hours by 24........

4. Surely its not great to surround yourself with all those waves and signals 24/7

I'd wrap yourself up in tinfoil and live in the basement if that worries you.

surely its makes sense that you should turn any electrical item off when your not using it? for me that would be around 11:45pm until 8am

 

[.:SAmSuNG:.]

What if someone needs to get ahold of u in the night due to an emergancy?

 

[_Jimlad_]

What if someone needs to get ahold of u in the night due to an emergancy?

they can ring the landline

no seriously i do leave my phone on at night a fair bit, as my wife gets me up, but i do if i can like to turn the thing off for the reasons i mentioned above, if i have say for example 60% battery at bedtime, i wanna turn it off and no i have enough for the day without having to charge.

im sorry but i don't know how anyone can mock me for saying 'if you don't need to use an electrical device then turn it off' - guess people like kitch9 still live at home with mummy and daddy

 

[.:SAmSuNG:.]

Its each to there own so nobody should be mocking. There's no chance my phone battery will last 15 hours with my usage so IV got no option but to charge it Evey night.

 

[Streeteh]

For those that are interested, Martin Fields have finally started selling stock of their screen protectors for the S2 on their official website with 4-9 working day delivery at £14.98

It also includes a lens protector for the camera which is a nice touch imo.

 

[K1LLSW1TCH]

Hey guys, I got this phone yesterday, being my first Android handset everything is totally new to me and I'm feeling like a bit of a retard with the simplicity of some of my questions but I've got a few more if you guys wouldn't mind answering. I've been asking a friend for advice so far and while he's been great I don't want to keep bugging him.

Okay firstly, on my old phone it would tell me the network at the top of the phone next to the battery indicator, signal strength etc but on this phone it doesn't tell me that. Usually I wouldn't be bothered about this but the phone is on Orange on contract and where I live there isn't a great signal with Orange despite contradictory information on their own coverage checker. I've signed up to https://kareena.orange.co.uk/signal/ that which is supposed to give me access to T-Mobile's network when the Orange signal isn't great, but so far I've noticed no change in my signal at all and as it doesn't tell me at the top of the screen which network I'm connected to I'm not sure if I've set the thing up correctly.

Secondly I'd like to change my lockscreen but don't know how to go about it. I would have researched this myself but I know literally nothing about Android handsets, coming straight from an iPhone I'm used to my hand being held through virtually everything and not having many options in the way of customization outside of jailbreaking so when it comes to phones I really don't have a clue! Also on a related subject I can't seem to find a way to change my lockscreen wallpaper if someone could also help me with that.

Also are there any things I simply HAVE to have on my phone? The recommended apps thread is ridiculously big! One more thing, is there a specific place I should be looking for extra themes and stuff? I'm wary of downloading something dodgy from a random Chinese person and then it screwing up my £500 phone. Thanks in advance.

 

[icehot666]

For those that are interested, Martin Fields have finally started selling stock of their screen protectors for the S2 on their official website with 4-9 working day delivery at £14.98

It also includes a lens protector for the camera which is a nice touch imo.

oh thanks, at last! tried the SGP one but it's like a dust magnet with its sticky side, the martin fields being washable means i can redo the whole process if i get dust in it!

 

[Uhtred]

For those that are interested, Martin Fields have finally started selling stock of their screen protectors for the S2 on their official website with 4-9 working day delivery at £14.98

It also includes a lens protector for the camera which is a nice touch imo.

looking forward to your review Picked up 3 small scratches already so will probably order one if they are any good

 

[SKILL]

Hey guys, I got this phone yesterday, being my first Android handset everything is totally new to me and I'm feeling like a bit of a retard with the simplicity of some of my questions but I've got a few more if you guys wouldn't mind answering. I've been asking a friend for advice so far and while he's been great I don't want to keep bugging him.

Okay firstly, on my old phone it would tell me the network at the top of the phone next to the battery indicator, signal strength etc but on this phone it doesn't tell me that. Usually I wouldn't be bothered about this but the phone is on Orange on contract and where I live there isn't a great signal with Orange despite contradictory information on their own coverage checker. I've signed up to https://kareena.orange.co.uk/signal/ that which is supposed to give me access to T-Mobile's network when the Orange signal isn't great, but so far I've noticed no change in my signal at all and as it doesn't tell me at the top of the screen which network I'm connected to I'm not sure if I've set the thing up correctly.

Secondly I'd like to change my lockscreen but don't know how to go about it. I would have researched this myself but I know literally nothing about Android handsets, coming straight from an iPhone I'm used to my hand being held through virtually everything and not having many options in the way of customization outside of jailbreaking so when it comes to phones I really don't have a clue! Also on a related subject I can't seem to find a way to change my lockscreen wallpaper if someone could also help me with that.

Also are there any things I simply HAVE to have on my phone? The recommended apps thread is ridiculously big! One more thing, is there a specific place I should be looking for extra themes and stuff? I'm wary of downloading something dodgy from a random Chinese person and then it screwing up my £500 phone. Thanks in advance.

Provider/Carrier info:
This is something I'd like, not on the status bar (what I call the bit at the top ) but just on the lock screen would be nice to see, but for your purposes you can see the carrier if you pull down the notifications bar, it'll say either just 'Orange' or 'Orange T-Mobile' if you're sharing the masts. I've found it only switches over as a last resort though, so low signal Orange is used in preference to better signal T-Mobile, until the Orange signal dies completely if that makes sense?

Lockscreen:
Widgetlocker - https://market.android.com/details?id=com.teslacoilsw.widgetlocker&feature=search_result
very customisable and should be able to do whatever you want, for just background change however you can go to Settings -> Display -> Screen Display and there are settings for both homescreen and lockscreen wallpapers there

 

[incubation]

Any way to turn tones on for the phone keypad during calls? For example when I phone balance enquiries on 8888 the keypad creates tones but, when the call is active and the recorded message states "input your number" I input my number but there are no tones and the number is not recognised. Any way to turn it on during calls i'm assuming thats why it's not working atm, correct me if i'm wrong please.

Cheers.