I recently purchased a Samsung Vibrant to replace my Nexus One. I was quite happy with it at first, impressed by the beautiful screen and how light the phone was, but was quickly disappointed by the pathetic iPhone-ripping Android version implemented by Samsung.
One problem that is particularly annoying is that I cannot receive long text messages from my boyfriend, a vanilla Droid user on Verizon. After the 180 someodd characters, apparently the text converts to an MMS. On my Nexus, I used to receive these as multiple texts. On the new Vibrant, I get multiple texts all saying "<<Content Not Supported>>".
So what gives? This only happens with Verizon customers that I know of (I also tested from my mother's LG flip phone). Is anyone else having this problem? I have scoured the internet for the past few weeks trying to find a solution but haven't found one.
Any advice would be appreciated! I'm an intermediate to advanced Android user and have been debating rooting the Vibrant. I rooted my Nexus One and voided the warranty, and then found myself among the lucky early buyers with the defective power button. I'd prefer to keep the warranty intact however will do anything to fix this problem.
What's up guys! I got this pretty cool gig in Japan that I will start in mid-May that's going to last a year at the very least (the American working now with the company said they wanted him to come back for another year, but he had other things here he wanted to pursue.) Anyway, I have quite a few questions and concerns regarding my cell phone service here, as well as my future service in Japan.
Here in the US:
I am not one to resist change... hell, I'm moving halfway across the world (Hiroshima) in a couple of months... but if there is one thing I do not like doing it is most definitely getting a new cell phone number! I have a five week (paid) vacation in December, and I would like to come back to my good ol' T-Mobile HD2 for that month and if I am only on the job for a year, I'd like to come back to the same number. But that's not important, and I don't want anyone to focus on that (like I know some will initially), the question is what is the cheapest way I can go about keeping my current number? As I mentioned, I am currently with T-Mobile, so I'm thinking the cheapest and easiest way to go would be to switch to prepaid after my contract expires? Any other suggestions?
Over there in Japan:
This is the more complex situation. I'm still reading up on the wireless phone service in Japan, and it is quite a bit different from the system we have over here in the States, so if someone catches me saying something incorrect, please let me know!
Anyway, I want an Android phone. Keitai are unique and all, but when it comes down to it, I'd like to be able to keep sync my contacts to Google and use SMS (possibly) to communicate with my family and friends here in the US. The next time I'm in contact with the American who works for the company I'll be with, I will ask him what service he and his co-workers use... though I suspect it's SoftBank, because I believe he has an iPhone. If that's the case, the question of my service provider will (reluctantly) be answered as, and someone correct me if I'm wrong, SoftBank users can talk to other SoftBank users free while being charged when talking to people on other providers no matter what time of day? That being said, for those with the experience, how important is it to use the same provider as the majority of the people you talk to? According to subscription numbers, SoftBank greatly trails docomo in number of subscribers, however I have read online that most people I would likely be communicating with will have SoftBank... very confusing.
The next major question is, of course, which Android phone should I purchase? This is a difficult question because if I am only over there for a year, I would like to be able to bring the phone back to the US and use it. I also would prefer buying a phone that has a decent-sized developer community... Obviously the Galaxy Nexus and the Galaxy S II HD LTE come to mind. The international versions of the phones are able to run on UTMS 2100, which (correct me if I'm wrong) means I should be golden for 3G use with AT&T/T-Mobile AND docomo/SoftBank (I don't really care about LTE at this point of its life.) If all that is correct, then it comes down to which phone to buy... the Galaxy Nexus is sweet and all, but the Galaxy S II HD LTE is better equipped... and I'll be running CyanogenMod 9 on whichever one I buy anyway, so software is not an issue. Decisions...
Last, but certainly the most important question I have (in my opinion), is what will be the cheapest way to communicate with my family and friends in the US while I am away for a year? I haven't done much research into this yet, but what are your opinions... Skype, Google Voice... there are some Internet texting options available on the market that may give me the ability to text back and forth, but some of those apps are proprietary. Does anyone know any apps that will give me the ability to text people who don't use the app or have dumbphones? I have no problem spending a bit of money, but I'd like to find the cheapest way possible to keep in contact with loved ones.
I know this is super long, but I want to be thorough in my research and understanding of the environment I will be moving to within the next couple of months. Thanks for taking the time to read and response!
I think the cheapest way to keep your number would be to buy a dumb phone and get the most minimum plan you can. I would buy a nexus because you can use it on t-mobile when you get back. I am not 100% sure, but i think gosms is free texting that can text anyone, regardless of app use. For people with smartphones, a great voip app is viber.
Get your new number and keep your old one. then quickly blast out the new number via SMS to all your contacts. You can use something like what's app to keep in touch for free. All you need is a 3G phone while you are in Japan.
WhatsApp is great, but it's only really good for sending messages to people that have smartphones and data plans. If someone has a smart phone and data plan, you can easily convince them to install the app, because it's unobtrusive and the messages act like text messages. But it won't help you communicate with everyone.
lowandbehold
I think the cheapest way to keep your number would be to buy a dumb phone and get the most minimum plan you can. I would buy a nexus because you can use it on t-mobile when you get back. I am not 100% sure, but i think gosms is free texting that can text anyone, regardless of app use. For people with smartphones, a great voip app is viber.
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I use GO SMS right now and they have a proprietary messaging feature called GO Chat that only others with the app can use. Viber sounds almost exactly what I'm looking for, except I won't be able to use it with my mom, as she has a dumbphone.
My gripe with the Galaxy Nexus is the lack of a microSD card, another reason why I'm considering buying the Galaxy S II HD LTE, which apparently AT&T will be bringing to us over here as the Skyrocket HD. That would make purchasing one easier and cheaper than buying from overseas.
androidapk.net
Get your new number and keep your old one. then quickly blast out the new number via SMS to all your contacts.
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Click to collapse
By new number, do you mean my Japanese phone number?
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Set up a google voice account. That's a simple way to be texting anyone you know. Just make sure they have that number. As far as keeping your stateside number, I believe Tmob has a service where you can have your line lay dormant for some period of time. I don't know how long for or what the cost is or anything like that. I think I remember that being an option when I had them.
Jesushaxyou said:
Set up a google voice account. That's a simple way to be texting anyone you know. Just make sure they have that number. As far as keeping your stateside number, I believe Tmob has a service where you can have your line lay dormant for some period of time. I don't know how long for or what the cost is or anything like that. I think I remember that being an option when I had them.
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I've done a ton of reading on Google Voice today and I may have come up with a solution, though I don't know if it will work, as I've never used Google Voice before.
It's my understanding that when a number is ported to Google Voice, it ends the service with whoever the provider is, and I do not have to renew service with another cell phone provider in order to keep my number (correct me on this if I'm wrong.) Ironically, my contract with T-Mobile ends a couple days before I am supposed to fly over to Japan.
So when my contract is up, all I simply need to do is port my current number over to Google Voice and I will have the ability to send and receive texts to and from (and here's an important question) anyone... or... only those who have data plans? Someone with a dumbphone or without Google Voice will be able to text me, right?
As for making and receiving calls, I'm look at GrooVe IP as a way to accomplish this while being able to keeping my current cell phone number. Does anyone have any experience with that app?
You can text anyone with texting on their plan from GVoice. A buddy of mine has a feature phone and he receives them just fine.
Hi everyone,
I just bought a Galaxy S3 this morning (first Android phone ever!) and for some reason, I haven't been able to send/receive any pictures to/from any one of my friends who has an iPhone. I went into At&t earlier tonight and several people without iPhones sent me pictures and received pictures from me with no problems, but everyone with an iPhone couldn't receive my pictures. The techs there told me to try and use the lowest camera resolution and I was able to get one picture to send but still wasn't able to receive any pictures. I'd appreciate all the help I can get :good:
ag91 said:
Hi everyone,
I just bought a Galaxy S3 this morning (first Android phone ever!) and for some reason, I haven't been able to send/receive any pictures to/from any one of my friends who has an iPhone. I went into At&t earlier tonight and several people without iPhones sent me pictures and received pictures from me with no problems, but everyone with an iPhone couldn't receive my pictures. The techs there told me to try and use the lowest camera resolution and I was able to get one picture to send but still wasn't able to receive any pictures. I'd appreciate all the help I can get :good:
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Click to collapse
About resolution, your phone should convert a image to MMS standard when sending it.
you could check to see if AT&T have a manual MMS setup guide
krankdroid said:
About resolution, your phone should convert a image to MMS standard when sending it.
you could check to see if AT&T have a manual MMS setup guide
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Click to collapse
I figured the phone should be able to convert the image to the right size if needed but every setting I've tried including the lowest one, I get a little note that say "image too large, compressing". I'll have to look into the manual MMS setup guide. Thank you!
My sister was receives about 50% of the pics I sent her. She's on a windows phone though. Turns out the pics I was sending were too big but after I switched to go SMS pro, she recieved every picture.
My advice is to try other SMS apps
-type R blood-
ag91 said:
Hi everyone,
I just bought a Galaxy S3 this morning (first Android phone ever!) and for some reason, I haven't been able to send/receive any pictures to/from any one of my friends who has an iPhone. I went into At&t earlier tonight and several people without iPhones sent me pictures and received pictures from me with no problems, but everyone with an iPhone couldn't receive my pictures. The techs there told me to try and use the lowest camera resolution and I was able to get one picture to send but still wasn't able to receive any pictures. I'd appreciate all the help I can get :good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have had my Galaxy for about 5 months & always been able to send without setting anything. However, this week, it doesn't want to send to any phone or to email addresses either! I'm with ATT as well...
I am hoping someone can come up with a solution for us.
I can't send pics either this week, started 2 days ago, I'm on sprint.
Rooted GS3 rockin' the Wicked
Has anyone noticed if the LG V30 can detect spam calls like a stock Android experience such as a Nexus 6P?
This is a big deal for many users as over the past 6 months spam calls have become a major issue for everyone and my stock android does a good job of alerting me when those spam calls come rolling in. So much so that I don't think I can live without this feature in a new phone. I know LG uses their custom interface which I assume uses a custom dialer, so my fear is that it will not alert me to those irritating spam numbers like my existing Nexus 6P does today.
Well, I'm fairly disappointed in how it handles "Private and Unknown Callers"...I set it to block them and it never does. They always continue to ring through. When I set that up on my GS8 it worked perfect. Not so much on the V30.
My V20 did. No idea about the V30 yet. I only get about 2 phone calls per month. (Everyone I know knows to just text me.)
I'm with AT&T w/my v30 and they have the "Call Protect" app preloaded, which does the same thing as the stock android dialer for identifying telemarketers, etc.
Just wondering how do you turn this on? Weird thing is brought my S6 over to T-mobile. This started to work on my phone. It is not working on my Wife's S6. If I get the V30 I want to make sure this is on.
New gal to this group, y'all seem to know your ****, so I signed up to ask questions as I get issues.
Ever since I got my LG V30 through T-Mobile (october 24 birthday for my phone), MMS (pic with text) has been a pain in the ass to send.
Is there any way to fix this? I've had T-Mobile re-do the APN thing for the phone, I've rebooted endlessly, deleted apps I don't use that MIGHT
have hogged RAM in the background (paranoid from Galaxy S4 years STILL).
I wonder if it's T-Mobile or just the phone? Mom and dad have Galaxy S9 through Military plan, and theirs send pics fast but barely send little 1 minute videos of things like ducks playing in rain puddles, dog chasing the cat, stuff like that. MY PHONE CAN send video faster, but sucks at pictures.
T-Mobile was supposed to have that rumored 5G LTE thing out by now, we just got upgraded from Nougat 7.1.2 to Oreo 8.0 IN JUNE.
There's also a shortage of emojis other Oreo users have that we don't.
So.
1. How to fix the taking forever to send PICS WITH TEXT in one message? Pic will send up to 5 mintues after the text that would be attached on other devices (how to keep picture and text in one message bubble?)
2. How do I get the vomit emoji, middle finger emoji, duck, and more onto my Oreo OS phone?
3. Is the 5G thing REALLY happening?
T-Mobile support can only do so much, apparently. They're not devs, coders, programmers, computer people. My PC repair husband can do things they can't on the phone, which is sad.