Worth Moving Back to Android?

Darklord2150

Darklord2150

Darklord2150

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Joined
8 Sep 2005
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122
Location
London, UK
About 18 months ago, I got rid of my Samsung Galaxy S2 and eventually settled on an iPhone 5. At the time, I was turned off android for a number of reasons, mostly the delay in rolling out ICS on SGS2, where custom ROMs had the downside of rapidly draining the battery, I used to use my phone a lot for gaming and iOS seemed to have much better exclusives, and I used to heavily use iTunes to manage my music collection. At the time, going back to iOS seemed to be the natural decision.

However, circumstances have changed. I moved my music over to Foobar2000 and now only use iTunes for syncing stuff to the iPhone, I also now use a tablet that has limited the need for gaming on my phone. Simply put, most of the reasons I went to iOS no longer exist. I am tired of how simplistic and aged iOS as a whole is, as well as how much it hand-holds the user and looking at how far android phones have come since the S2 has been tempting me to give Android another shot.

I was hoping anyone who made the leap over recently or anyone who owns one of the flagship android phones could answer a few qualms I have to help me make my decision. For now, I am assuming I would end up getting the Galaxy S4. I really was tempted to get an HTC One but the lack of a 64GB model was a deal-breaker for me:
  • How is the battery life nowadays? The S2 battery I had was atrocious, it would drain quickly, sometimes it would randomly use a lot of CPU resources causing the phone to heat up and burn the battery life. I've heard that most recent Android phones are miles better now when it comes to battery.
  • How sturdy is the casing? My biggest issue with the Galaxy series as a whole is how cheap it feels considering the components, especially compared to the HTC One.
  • How is the app quality gaming-wise? When I had the S2 i recall there was basically Shadowgun, Tegra 2 games and emulators. While i would love playing PS1 games on my phone again, I am intrigued to know whether iOS still has a massive lead gaming-wise.
  • What is the camera quality like on the S4? I ask this not just in terms of the actual hardware, but how is the camera app?
  • Does TouchWiz still suck? (Not a big deal if it does, I'd probably flash a stock ROM on it)
  • How easy is it to move apps to the SD card? I've heard that on standard Samsung firmware it's almost impossible. I would probably put a 64GB MicroSD card on the S4 so I would like to know how viable it would be if I need to put apps on it.
 
1) Battery life is much better than the S2. My friend had the same problem on his S2, he tried various fixes but eventually decided to sell it on and grab a Nexus 4.

2) The S4 is plastic but it does feel quite sturdy.

3) Pretty much most of the high end games on iOS can now be found on Android, so no need to worry about that.

4) Personally I would say the S4's camera quality + app is better than the iPhone 5's, but I haven't really played around with it much to have a more confident answer.

5) Yes, TouchWiz is even more bloated than ever, in fact it seems to be the most laggiest out of the current high end phones. Stock Android/HTC's Sense 5 feels much, much better. There is however the Google Edition ROM that's avaliable to the Snapdragon version of the S4 which loses all the Samsung extra but a much smoother experience.

6) Previous firmwire didn't allow you to move apps to the SD card, but the latest update will allow you to. However, I've heard it's only the app that's movable, and not the app data that can sometimes be much bigger than the app itself. Which is silly considering the ultra low free space left on the internal memory.

If you're willing to spend ~£700... there's a 64gb HTC One from MobiCity :p. Apart from the internal space problem, I would say the HTC One is overall the better phone.
 
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Orcvader said:
5) Yes, TouchWiz is even more bloated than ever, in fact it seems to be the most laggiest out of the current high end phones. Stock Android/HTC's Sense 5 feels much, much better. There is however the Google Edition ROM that's avaliable to the Snapdragon version of the S4 which loses all the Samsung extra but a much smoother experience.
Click to expand...

Yes TouchWiz is very bloated with a load of Samsung apps, however the inconsistent lag was fixed with the 'MEA' update.

Since the OP knows how to root/use odin etc, he can just flash a SLIM Stock ROM via odin to get rid of all the bloat and update to the latest FW at the same time.

And the HTC has it's fair share of downsides too. Mission to unlock bootloader/root, slow charging, stupid nav button layout, poor notification led, hard to reach power button, power and vol buttons have poor feedback, 32GB max, lame battery usage chart off the top of my head. Still a great phone no doubt there.
 
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Darklord2150 said:
  • How is the battery life nowadays? The S2 battery I had was atrocious, it would drain quickly, sometimes it would randomly use a lot of CPU resources causing the phone to heat up and burn the battery life. I've heard that most recent Android phones are miles better now when it comes to battery.
  • How sturdy is the casing? My biggest issue with the Galaxy series as a whole is how cheap it feels considering the components, especially compared to the HTC One.
  • How is the app quality gaming-wise? When I had the S2 i recall there was basically Shadowgun, Tegra 2 games and emulators. While i would love playing PS1 games on my phone again, I am intrigued to know whether iOS still has a massive lead gaming-wise.
  • What is the camera quality like on the S4? I ask this not just in terms of the actual hardware, but how is the camera app?
  • Does TouchWiz still suck? (Not a big deal if it does, I'd probably flash a stock ROM on it)
  • How easy is it to move apps to the SD card? I've heard that on standard Samsung firmware it's almost impossible. I would probably put a 64GB MicroSD card on the S4 so I would like to know how viable it would be if I need to put apps on it.
Click to expand...

If have 2 S2's here without battery problems. You shouldn't have a problem with modern android phones.

casings haven't moved. Still the same just shaped differently

camera quality on the S4 is a massive improvement on most phones.
S3 was better/same as iPhone but Samsung stepped it up a level

Gaming has moved on in a big way.

Touchwiz is good apart from I hate the home screen which is easily replaceable for free.

apps to Sd is working but it's down to the developer to where the extra data is stored
 
Battery Life is excellent on the S4 - it will only be poor if you have an app or service misbehaving and draining battery.

The S4 feels great in the had, very ergonomic. Yes it's plastic but it feels great, no creaks in normal use.

Plenty of games and the S4 has the muscle to play them all.

Touchwiz is actually quite nice in the current iteration, a lot more toned down and refined. If your into rooting, then install a custom rom with stock google theme which will make it look like a nexus device. I'm on Foxhound ROM.

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Apps to SD works on the Samsung in the MEA update. But it's a useless feature as it doesn't move big game data to SD, just apk data.
 
HTC's sync manager does a rather good job of managing your things and working with iTunes. Not sure if/when the 64GB model will be in the UK though. The battery life is generally fine and - as with all of the powerful phones - you will burn through the battery when playing intensive games.

I sometimes think that I should have maybe stayed iOS for the ease of use and integration, but the HTC has enough capacity for me, and is the only device I would bother with that isn't an iPhone.

- I am sort of 'off-track' for what you were asking, but I thought it may be useful.
 
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Thanks guys for the advice so far, it's more or less convinced me to make the jump to android. The only thing left is to decide between the HTC One and the Samsung Galaxy S4. Software on each phone likely won't matter as I'd probably just flash the Google Play edition ROM on it. From what I gather, the HTC One has superior construction, better audio quality and image stabilisation, at the cost of storage size while the SGS4 has slightly better specs and the ability to expand storage, at the cost of construction quality.

From this, I would probably prefer the HTC One. Unfortunately, I would need a 64GB version as the iPhone I have now only has 10GB left out of 64GB. The cheapest HTC One 64GB models I can find are £707 from MobiCity or ~£620 if I used eBay. The Cheapest SGS4 I can find is ~£470 new or ~£370 second-hand. Adding a 64GB MicroSD card would be +£40 so the total would be roughly £410/£510 for the SGS4 or £620 for the HTC One.

I know most consider the HTC One to be the better phone, but is it worth the £110 difference?
 
Darklord2150 said:
Thanks guys for the advice so far, it's more or less convinced me to make the jump to android. The only thing left is to decide between the HTC One and the Samsung Galaxy S4. Software on each phone likely won't matter as I'd probably just flash the Google Play edition ROM on it. From what I gather, the HTC One has superior construction, better audio quality and image stabilisation, at the cost of storage size while the SGS4 has slightly better specs and the ability to expand storage, at the cost of construction quality.

From this, I would probably prefer the HTC One. Unfortunately, I would need a 64GB version as the iPhone I have now only has 10GB left out of 64GB. The cheapest HTC One 64GB models I can find are £707 from MobiCity or ~£620 if I used eBay. The Cheapest SGS4 I can find is ~£470 new or ~£370 second-hand. Adding a 64GB MicroSD card would be +£40 so the total would be roughly £410/£510 for the SGS4 or £620 for the HTC One.

I know most consider the HTC One to be the better phone, but is it worth the £110 difference?
Click to expand...

I'd say not, Ultimately they're very similar phones and comes down to build and styling to differentiate between them. I prefer the look of the HTC one but, I'd rather save £110 for a similar phone.
 
Darklord2150 said:
....while the SGS4 has slightly better specs and the ability to expand storage, at the cost of construction quality.
Click to expand...

Build quality on the S4 is brilliant. What most people complain about is the is the plastic rear. I see this as a plus because it means i can wear the back cover out if i want to and when i want a new one i just grab one for a few quid on the bay. It easy to maintain. All glass/aluminium phones you would need to replace the outer fascia and that's not cheap.

And, you and nor will anyone else, will be looking at the rear of the phone in real life operations.

S4 is a gorgeous phone.
 
As for build quality on both the S4 & HTC One, i'm gonna go with the S4 on this I've seen a few HTC One now knocking about & they all had some sort of QC problem with the casing, S4 may be made out of plastic but it built better in my book.

I have an S4 so yeah i might seem bias towards it, but every S4 i've looked at have had no issues at all where on the other hand a pal of mine had 3 HTC One's all had problem or one sort or another so changed it after the 3rd one to a S4 with no issues at all.
 
I've gotta agree here Ixon.

Been a Galaxy man for the last 2 versions (S2 & S3) so went for the build quality/materials-hype of the HTCO reviews, just to see what the fuss was about!

I can't deny it's a lovely phone but have decided to go back to the G-range and get the S4.... For me, it's just a smoother experience - the build quality thing is minimal to me, once in the hand, the GS4 feels just as good as the HTCO...but the user experience is better IMO.

Anyone for a Black HTCO..??? :)
 
On android you can personalise the phoned more and there are less restrictions on what can be installed so make the switch back.
 
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