Android Marshmallow update available for Samsung Galaxy S6

Finally, after months of waiting, Samsung has released the Android Marshmallow update onto their soon to be ex-flagship phone Galaxy S6 - four months after Android 6.0 was released on the Nexus series.

The update, which is rolling out at snail's pace and on the whim of carriers who rather you buy a new phone than update your current phone, is currently available on only a handful of Galaxy S6 variants. Namely, it is only available for the G920F global variant running in certain regions.

Fed up with waiting for Samsung to update my variant, I downloaded the bloatware-free French firmware (via XDA), and applied the update using Odin 3.10.7 for Windows. The process was simple enough, though it does expose a huge flaw with Android and Samsung's terrible update policy (like why do we need to wait months for firmware updates for certain variants to arrive or be forced to flash our firmware manually).

Here's a very quick guide (insert disclaimer claiming no responsibilities for any screw ups that may or many not happen) on how to successfully flash your Samsung phone with the latest firmware without tripping Knox:

• Turn off your device
• Press and hold down the Volume Down and Home button, and then press the Power button until you see a disclaimer, then release all buttons
• Press the Volume Up button to engage the 'Download mode'
• Connect your device to your computer
• Open Odin
• On Odin, check AP, and select the .tar firmware file you've downloaded and extracted
• Wait for Odin to verify
• Then press Start
• Go and make a pot of tea
• Depending on how many apps you have installed, your phone would have booted into a fresh new firmware
• Alternatively, do a factory wipe for a fresh install

In any case, the update brought a fresh breath of new life to my Galaxy S6 (in a much positive way than the disastrous Lollipop update did to my old Nexus 5), and also updated my phone's security update to February (from October).

It is still early days, but the phone just feel faster (probably placebo but a nice feeling regardless) despite not doing a factory wipe and the ability toggle app permissions is a huge welcome. But best of all is the support for manual control of the camera's shutter speed and RAW output. The S6's camera is pretty decent - perhaps one of the best on a smartphone - so the ability to gain more control over the control element is massive.

Samsung's regressive attitude to product support

Ever since my partner bought her iPhone 6S on launch day, it has received four or five software updates - I can't remember but it was at least once a month.

On the other hand, the last update on my Samsung Galaxy S6 was way way back in October. Meaning, not only is Samsung's so called flagship still running on the archaic Android 5.1, the security patch for it is October! The mind boggles on why this company still loves treating their customers with utter contempt. Even my five year old Windows 7 laptop is still getting its monthly security updates (and also a free Windows 10 update that I haven't applied yet), but not a barely year old flagship.

Android apologists will no doubt refer me to the Nexus series - which I did own for two years under the guise of the initially superb, but then deliberately neglected Nexus 5 phone. If there was a compelling new 5" Nexus phone running on updated hardware that isn't more expensive than the S6, then I would get it.

/Rant

Late to the Party

It is almost mid January and still no Marshmallow update for my Galaxy S6 - supposedly the current flagship Android device from Samsung. Come on Samsung!

Oh, happy new year!

My review of a dead Samsung Galaxy S4

Well this is awkward. This blog post should have been a review of the Samsung Galaxy S4 Android smartphone but alas, circumstances beyond my control has lead to this diatribe instead.

About 12 days ago I bought a white Galaxy S4, replacing my seven month old HTC Windows Phone 8X. I didn't need a new phone, I just wanted one. Before yesterday, the phone already had some teething problems but nothing too unusual. It doesn't charge as quick as it should but charge it does. Other problems are typical of a Samsung Galaxy phone - cheap build, scratch easy material and a laggy almost-forked Android OS. This despite a powerful Snapdragon 600 SoC - you know, the same one that powers the incredible HTC One with gusto.

In any case, yesterday I left the phone on the charger after a furious session of Temple Run 2, then went out for lunch. Returning I found a phone that is hot to touch, that refuses to boot up and wouldn't charge. I re-inserted the battery and tried again. Nothing. I switched to another micro USB cable as these cables breaks every other day. I even used a clean toothbrush the clean the S4's USB port (seriously, micro USB is the worse standard the industry has ever forced on us). I tried other USB chargers including one by Apple, another by Sony, another by Motorola and another by Google/Asus. No luck.

So there you go. A dead S4 was all I have to report for this blog post. Fortunately for me, the shop I bought it from refunded me. Still it kinda has put me off the Samsung Galaxy S4 (and its millions of variants) somewhat. I was back in the market for a new phone, and I almost bought a Lumia 925. Still, I think I will be waiting until Nokia announces the Lumia 1020's availability in this country (there is more to the world than the Americas, Nokia), and see what Apple and Google has in store for the next iPhone and Nexus revision.

The camera's pretty good though, despite the narrower focal length.

SGP Spigen Neo Hybrid for Samsung Galaxy S4 review

The Samsung Galaxy S4 might not be the prettiest smartphone out there, so when I recently acquired the soon to be former Android flagship, I set out to search for a case that would not only protect my investment, but also 'prettify' the phone. It wasn't easy. Fortunately I had an old case I once used on the Galaxy S2 lying around. A quick search on the web reveals that there is a version for the S4.

The Neo Hybrid is a two piece hybrid case. It comes in two separate parts, the inner layer which is made of silicone rubber, and a polycarbonate skeleton bumper-ish frame. This frame is designed to go over the base silicone layer. This gives the case a unique look, as well as offering users a small degree of customisation. In addition to the yellow I ordered, SGP also offers the Neo Hybrid in black, white and red variants. Three jelly bean button stickers are also included.

Unlike the many dodgy silicon cases you find on eBay, the silicon rubber inner case is soft and flexible. Installing the case is easy enough. First slip the silicon case over the phone. Once the inner case is fitted, you then simply slot the outer glossy skeleton frame into place. This isn't as easy as it appears as the frame is very tight and snug so make sure you have your largest memory card already installed. You would not want to be removing this case often.

Samsung Galaxy S III mini-review

 When the Samsung Galaxy S III was announced back in May, I walked away unimpressed by Samsung's efforts. While it was fast and has all the specs to make even the geekiest person giddy with excitement, the design, choice of finish and display was a let down to me. I expected more for the follow up to the mighty Galaxy S II.

Still, would a chance to use it for two weeks change my mind? As part of my #GemaltoNFC challenge, I was loaned one for two weeks. This was mainly to test the NFC payment feature. But for two weeks it also became my main phone where I tweet, check in and Instagram'ed pictures of coffee.

Powering the S3 is the Exynos 4212 SoC. This chipset contains a quad core ARM Cortex A-9 CPU (a now outdated architecture) and Mali-400MP GPU. This is impressive enough, but hardly noteworthy considering the move towards newer more efficient architecture such as Qualcomm's Krait and ARM's own Cortex A-15. The 1GB RAM is plenty, though many manufacturers, Samsung included, has since moved on towards using 2GB of RAM. Overkill for a smartphone? Well, at least you can multi-task easily. 16GB of flash storage can be augmented with a microSD card slot - a endangered feature these days one I am glad Samsung has decided to latch on to. Thanks to Samsung's generosity, you will also get 50GB of extra Dropbox storage.

With quad band GSP and quad band 3G DC-HSDA+ support, the phone is pretty much a world phone. A LTE version has also since been released. It also contains WiFi and Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity, A-GPS support (with GLONASS) and digital compass. Oh, and it also comes with wireless charging capability, a totally useless invention.

I mentioned earlier about how I found the screen disappointing. It isn't so much as the screen technology or colour saturation - all of which are great. The 4.8" Super AMOLED display has a great viewing angle, and works well in both outdoors and indoors condition, and it is very bright to boot. The over saturation isn't to everyone's taste but you can always dial down the saturation level in the settings. Sadly, the use of Pentile sub-matrix kills this otherwise nice looking screen. The screen's touchscreen sensitivity also appeared to be downgraded.

Lag Lag Lag

This is one blog post I am dreading to write, but I had to even if it invites a horde of fanboys over to stampede on the comment section. Last week I received a call from my brother who is now the proud owner of a Samsung Galaxy S3. I asked for his impressions and the first thing he mentioned was there is some lag. Lag? How is that possible? This monster has four fricking Cortex A9 cores. That's two more cores than I have on my laptop!

Then I remember what pretty much every Android smartphones review I ever wrote - each one has noticeable lags even the One X (which I loved - thanks HTC Sense!). Most are fine, and I am sure the Galaxy S3's lag isn't detrimental to its usability. But for a flagship phone with four cores, it shouldn't even lag, at all. Today I played with a friend's Galaxy Note 2, and boy, does the thing lag like it's entering a competition to see whether it can a trophy in lag. Even excusing the amazingly awful lag from the S-Pen stylus (something which never happened with old style resistive touchscreens), the Note 2 was practically unusable.

This isn't an Android witch hunt. In fact, I have been using a RAZR MAXX for more than a month now and since updating the ICS, the handset has been relatively lag free (shocker!). Only on rare occasions would the device stutter, and that's only because I have ten apps running in the background. I know Motorola gets a lot of stick for their lack of support, but I am pretty happy with the MOTOBLUR-free ICS update. Add to the fact that the RAZR MAXX has a massive battery, you would need to pry it off my dead fingers. And this is a device that has two partly Cortex A9 cores.

But, but, but, I hear some geeks protesting, you can install custom ROMs. I am sorry, but that's just no excuse and certainly isn't something one should use to excuse bad support. When one purchase a £450 smartphone, one should always expect that it runs the best as it could. Even as a self proclaimed geek, rooting and installing a custom ROM isn't something I would like to do. I have done my fair share of ROM 'hacking' back in the PalmOS days, and I can think of a thousand things I would rather do (like writing this) than downloading and installing nighties these days. No reviewers should excuse slowdowns because you can root.

Perhaps manufacturers just can't be bothered, hoping against hope that their poor coding could be fixed through sheer brute force. But there is a fundamental problem that, if even through multiple cores, a device would still not run as smoothly as it should. Google is attempting to fix this through Jelly Bean, but Jelly Bean isn't available for every smartphones out there is it? And what's to say that any improvement by Jelly Bean or subsequent version wouldn't be reversed by future iterations of TouchWiz, Sense etc.?

EE 4G LTE Hands-on

Everything Everywhere today announced a new company brand, EE, at a press event at the Science Museum in London. The UK telecommunications company, which was created after the merger of T-Mobile and Orange, has also detailed the plans on the impending 4G LTE rollout, the first in this country.

While the T-Mobile and Orange brand will co-exist alongside the new brand, EE will primarily be focused on providing fiber optic broadband and 4G LTE service. EE's new 4G network will be based on LTE (using band 800Mhz and 2600Mhz if I remember correctly). Four initial cities - London, Birmingham, Cardiff and Bristol, are currently on trial.

In addition to those cities, EE aims to launch LTE in Edinburgh, Belfast, Leeds, Sheffield, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow, Newcastle, Southampton, Hull, Nottingham and Derby by the end of the year. If you live in those cities, you are in luck. This will provide coverage for up to 20 million people or a third the population of Britain. No tariffs has been announced yet.

Phones already confirmed to be launching on the network includes the Samsung Galaxy S III LTE, HTC One XL, Huawei Ascend P1 LTE, Nokia Lumia 820 and Nokia Lumia 920, which will be an EE exclusive.. Also heavily hinted upon is the next generation Apple iPhone (5), rumoured to include LTE connectivity, due to be announced tomorrow.

Audiophiles rejoice: Samsung Galaxy S III contains a Wolfson DAC

Despite my initial disappointment with the external hardware of Samsung's new Galaxy S III, you can't deny that the device contains all the right sort of specs that would make it a successful flagship smartphone for 2012. Today, whilst lurking on my favourite audiophile headphone forum, Head-Fi, I stumbled upon a thread that confirms that the Galaxy S3 will contain a Wolfson DAC. That is a pretty awesome news if true, and will make the SGS3 a serious challenge to the Xperia S, at least when it comes to audio output.

Announced earlier this year, the Wolfson Micro WM1811 codec is allegedly similar to the one found on the highly regarded Samsung Galaxy S and Nexus S. This is awesome news because those two devices were actually rather good sounding. According to Wolfson's white paper, the WM1811 is a low power codec featuring a 24-bit 2-channel hi-fi DAC with 2 x 2W stereo speaker driver. It is capable of delivering 100db signal-to-noise ratio on DAC playback.

When Samsung removed the Wolfson DAC from the Galaxy S's successor, the Galaxy S II, there was a minor uproar within the headphone community. Wolfson after all powers most of Apple's none-touch iPod DAPs. With up to 64GB of storage plus another 64GB via an external microSDXC card, the SGS3 is set to be a favourite with audiophiles. FLAC anyone?

Source

Samsung Galaxy S III UK availability announced

The announcement of Samsung's latest flagship Galaxy S3 smartphone is probably the most polarising event this year as far as mobile tech goes. After all the hype (partly generated by the media themselves, and Samsung), it seems that the media and bloggers's opinions seems squarely divided on whether Samsung has actually delivered. Most has agreed that Samsung has delivered on specifications, but not on design.

While I do not find the S3 to be an ugly device, it does look a tad too generic, even by Samsung's standard. In fact, my first hands-on moment with the S3 gave me an initial poor impression on the build and design when compared to the HTC One X. And this coming from someone who once owned and loved the Galaxy S2. I quipeed that it feels plasticky, and before you accuse me of hating on plastic, I do find the Lumia 800 and One X to be excellent representation of what how great a phone can look and feel despite being made primarily of plastic.

In fact I showed my Android-phobic partner the picture above, and she immediately quipped about how generic looking the phone on the right is. It just feels more like a generic, albeit fast, Gateway laptop than a tough ThinkPad. Nothing wrong with that, as long as the price reflects that compromises has been made towards design.

Design aside, the S3 is a pretty capable device. My initial impressions on the hardware is positive and I like what Samsung has done with the software. I am still no fan of TouchWiz enchancement, especially now that stock Android ICS is shown to actually looks pretty reasonable, as far as UX goes. TouchWiz is a UI that can be traced back many years, and the current iteration is based on one that Samsung uses for their own (now abandoned) Bada OS and previous high end featurephones.

The Galaxy S3 will be released in the UK at the end of the month for a pricey sum of £500 sim-free. Everyone's favourite 'thinking outside the box network' Three UK has also announced that they will be stocking the Galaxy S3 for £34 a month on a two year contract with no fees upfront, which isn't bad for a plan which includes their industry thumping All You Can Eat data plan.

Samsung Galaxy S III hands-on and first impressions

Is it May 2012 already? Gosh, how fast has time flied this year. Well what better way to welcome the new month with a hands-on post about the new Samsung flagship superphone. Samsung today announced the Galaxy S III at the Samsung Unpacked 2012 PR event at Earl's Court in London. I was not supposed to attend (I've already booked off my break), but last minute rescheduling meant I was able to do so, just for you. But first let's get the specs out of the way.

Specifications:

• Samsung Exynos 4212 SoC with 1.4 GHz quad-core ARM Cortex A9 CPU and Mali-400MP GPU
• 1GB RAM and 16GB/32GB/64GB built-in flash storage
• 4.8" Super AMOLED HD capacitive touchscreen with 720 x 1280 resolution PenTile matrix
• Quad band GSM and 3G
• 21 Mbps HSDPA and 5.76 Mbps HSUPA
• Wolfson DAC (yay for audiophiles!)
• 8 Megapixel autofocus camera with LED flash and 1080p30 video recording
• 1.9 Megapixel front camera with 720p video recording
• Bluetooth 4.0 and WiFi 802.11b/g/n
• GPS with A-GPS, GLONASS
• Contactless charging, NFC
• microUSB with MHL