I bought a new phone

Tom S - If you like music apps, try Shazam and Tunein Radio, both free. And keep in mind that you might like the smartphone enough that you'll use it instead of the laptop a lot. And don't say "no, I won't" because you said you weren't going to get a smartphone

Wendy
p.s. If it's still raining there, feel free to send it to Colorado. We're desperate.

It's not an unlimited high speed data plan, which is what I said my prior research revealed. 5GB/month is probably adequate for most folks. I just have an issue with '4G' and 'Unlimited' appearing together, leaving the customer to read the ultra-small print, or get a surprise later. But that's the way of marketeers and the competitive market they're in.

Tom, get an app to turn your new phone into a WiFi Hotspot and you can get rid of the aircard.  Now how big does that 5 gig look?  I'm with Virgin Mobile and I used to have unlimited internet, but now I get throttled after using 2.5 gigs each month.  But this is 3G not 4G.

Wendy said:

Tom S - If you like music apps, try Shazam and Tunein Radio, both free. And keep in mind that you might like the smartphone enough that you'll use it instead of the laptop a lot. And don't say "no, I won't" because you said you weren't going to get a smartphone

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I don't listen to radio nor do I need to download music. I spent three years (2006-2009) putting together a collection of my 2000 most favorite songs of all time. They are on both my portable mp3 players, both my computers and my in dash mp3 player. They will also be on my smartphone as soon as I get my 32 gig microSD card in the mail. I spent a lot of time putting the songs in a "random" order. The collection includes my 60 most favorite albums of all time that are played in album order. In other words it plays about 20 random songs, then an album, then 20 more random songs, then an album, etc. It is programmed like my own personal radio station, except there are no commercials, no disc jockey and no songs I don't like.

I really do love my smartphone. I have never said I would never get one, what I said is that I would not pay $80 per month for one. But I can't see it ever being used more than my laptop. I tried looking at the forum on the smart phone and that just plain sucks. It is like looking at Playboy magazine 10 feet away through a peephole. So surfing the web is out. The two main applications I use on my laptop is Lightroom, for editing photos and Audition for editing music. Neither of which could be done to my satisfaction on a smart phone. Yes I know there is a Photoshop app, but that would never work for me.

I am getting used to doing email on the phone and I like that. I can turn the phone sideways and that makes the on screen keyboard almost usable. I am sure I will get better at it with time.

It stopped raining, so I can't send it too you. If you want rain just follow me. Bad weather follows me around like a shadow.

Tom, you can also change the font size, for easier reading on your smart phone.

Marie.

Tom I'm impress with your purchase. I think you hit the jack pot. How much reasearch did you do?

I would be interested in knowing the difference between the prepaid phone and a contract phone. Do they have the same installed apps?

I hate all the preinstall stuff that's on my phone, that I'll never use.

mariekie4 said:

Tom, you can also change the font size, for easier reading on your smart phone.

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The font size is not the issue. I can read it just fine. It is the constant scrolling that bothers me. But what bothers me more is the fact that I would have to use the tiny little virtual keyboard to respond to threads. The keyboard is fine for sending two sentence replies to emails, but for anything longer it really gets irritating.

Barb said:

Tom I'm impress with your purchase. I think you hit the jack pot. How much reasearch did you do?

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I feel like I hit the jackpot also. I have been wanting a smart phone for a long time. I have no credit so I had to wait for the prices to drop and for a smart phone to be offered on a prepaid contract. I started my research in the beginning of June and I bought the phone on June 20th. I did an intensive amount of research before I pushed the button.

I would be interested in knowing the difference between the prepaid phone and a contract phone. Do they have the same installed apps?

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As far as I can tell the apps are identical.

I hate all the preinstall stuff that's on my phone, that I'll never use.

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I hate the stuff too. There are two ways around them that I have found. The first is to "root" your phone. What that does is give you administrative privileges so you can uninstall the apps. This is a slightly risky move as you could turn your phone into a "brick". However lots and lots of geeks do this without a problem and there are ways to unbrick the phone. Rooting your phone will also void the warranty. If you do root it then there are apps that will make your phone go faster. However sideloaded apps can also have malware. I am not an expert in rooting but I have no desire to do it. I found a better way to get rid of the apps and still keep them there.

I only have a handful of apps I will actually be using. So I have put a shortcut for those apps on my home page. This makes it so I rarely have to leave my home page. Here is a screen capture of my home page. If I want to use any of the other apps they are one click of the applications button away.

Keep in mind that the apps at the bottom of the page are open and may slow down the phone.

You can change the first 3 apps in the dock (the bottom row of icons) to any apps that are installed on the phone.  They aren't necessarily running, but are available on any home page for convenience.  I have my dialer, Dolphin HD browser and camera down there.  The right most icon is fixed to the all apps display.

At least, this is true on phones running Motoblur, other manufacturer UIs may differ.

Wendy said:

Keep in mind that the apps at the bottom of the page are open and may slow down the phone.

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Not on my phone they aren't open. Those are just shortcuts. If I scroll to the next page it shows a list of running apps. I keep that number at zero unless I am using one.

Ned said:

You can change the first 3 apps in the dock (the bottom row of icons) to any apps that are installed on the phone.  They aren't necessarily running, but are available on any home page for convenience.  I have my dialer, Dolphin HD browser and camera down there.  The right most icon is fixed to the all apps display.

At least, this is true on phones running Motoblur, other manufacturer UIs may differ.

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My UI differs. I can't move or delete any of the 4 icons on the bottom row. But that is Ok with me since I want them all there.

Good for you, Tom!! You are enviably frugal and have found a deal that will work for you. Am sure you are just beginning to find the many ways you will use your new smart phone. I keep finding new ways - both that help me and those that amuse me. For sure can't image running my business now w/o it. And now with tethering, if I can make a phone call, I can connect any of my computers to the web from wherever.

I've got around 600 tracks plus about 50 old music videos that I have downloaded for free over the years. The old stuff is easy to find for free, such as Kenny Rogers and Dolly singing Islands in the Stream the year they won the award. One of my favorites is the Celine Delone singing the sound track to Titanic. And as always, Free is Good. I store my music and videos by having a folder for each artist. I don't care what album the track came from - tho they are displayed. I then can use the player on my phone or computer to select by artist, genre, or whatever. As to randomness, that's an option on all of my players - unless you want fixed randomness. I then do playlists for sequences of tracks I might want - such as when driving in heavy traffic, I have several soothing tracks in a playlist. A mellow Chris Botti trumpet followed by a few Eva Cassidy tracks get me though most tough situations. 

As to the peep hole and Playboy.  8) I read the forum all the time while out and about, Tom. I just go into landscape, enlarge the text with my thumb and index finder and read away. One of my favorite ways to kill time while waiting on a repair or whatever is to read one of my books from Kindle. I also don't text or even email from the phone unless it's critical - tho I do thumb touch type.

Another thing that works for me that I might mention is the use of the fone for references. I have, e.g., a ToDo List, notes for my photography stuff while out and about, user manuals, coded passwords, et.al, in Word or Excel. I place shortcuts to them on one page of my fone and on the desktops of all computers (3). The physical locations of each I keep in my the Dropbox folder on each device. That way, a mouse click from anywhere on any device let's me read, add, change, or delete content with auto sync to all the other devices.

BTW, does your phone have HDMI output? Connecting that puppy to your HDTV with unlimited web would be a blast . . .

Anyway, enjoy your your new toy, Tom . . .

They will also be on my smartphone as soon as I get my 32 gig microSD card in the mail.

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iPhone users love that feature . . .  BTW, I also carry an extra battery - got 2 for my Samsung Charge plus stand alone charger for less than $25.

Bob, if you're trying to thumb type on the onscreen keyboard, you need to get Swype.  Many new phones come with it already installed.  My Bionic and Tom's Exhibit both do.  With just a few minutes practice you'll be typing 10x faster than you can with your thumbs or even with several fingers

Bob Buchanan said:

BTW, does your phone have HDMI output? Connecting that puppy to your HDTV with unlimited web would be a blast . . .

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No, the Exhibit does not come with an HDMI output. Even if it did I wouldn't use it. I could tether it to my laptop and connect the laptop to the TV but I won't be doing that. First off I have been collecting DVD box sets for the last few months and I now have about 100. They average 4 discs a set so I have around 400 DVDs to watch, mostly documentaries. So I don't need content from the Internet. And there is very little free content on the Internet that would impress me. Most of that "free" content comes with ads and to me that means it is not free at all. But I am positive there are other folks who will read this thread and try it.

Ned said:

Bob, if you're trying to thumb type on the onscreen keyboard, you need to get Swype.  Many new phones come with it already installed.  My Bionic and Tom's Exhibit both do.  With just a few minutes practice you'll be typing 10x faster than you can with your thumbs or even with several fingers

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Ned is correct, my Exhibit does come with Swype. And Ned is correct, it is considerably faster. In an earlier post I mentioned driving to San Francisco with my niece who was texting the whole time. She was using Swype and was very good at it. I had no clue why she was fingerpainting on her screen, and I did not ask her why. When I got my Exhibit I discovered that Swype was included with the bundle and I found out what it was. I have only had the phone three days so I am still getting used to it. If I start doing a lot of typing I will try it out.

Swype is available for a free download for Android, but it is not available for iPhone.

http://www.swype.com/

I don't attempt to read the forum or write/reply to a message in full browser mode on my smartphone. We have a couple of text modes available, using one or other of these URLs:  here and here. These text views might look ugly on a full PC screen, but they're better than the full browser mode on a small smartphone screen. These views have been available here for the last 7 years.

OTOH I do view the forum in a browser on my Samsung Galaxy 10" tablet. I also write/reply to messages on this device, although an on-screen keyboard isn't my favorite interface, especially for things that I'd normally use a mouse for. But I get by.

I have a ten inch netbook which is my primary computer now a days. I can access the forum on it and I have no problem reading or typing since it does have an almost full sized keyboard. The forum looks good and works fine on a 10" screen. But on my phone it is just too much work for me to make it worth while. Many times when I reply to a post I do some Google searching first and that is a real pain on the phone. Some web sites are accessible but most are not. 

Many times when I reply to a post I do some Google searching first and that is a real pain on the phone.

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Ask Google if they have a text view, just like we have here on the forum; It might make it easier to use their site (if they have a text view).

zzyzx said:

Swype is available for a free download for Android, but it is not available for iPhone.

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Yes, it is.