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Welcome to day 30 of my I switch to Android blog. I realized I haven't

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actually done as many updates as I did when I did my switch to Windows Phone 8.

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And there's a very good reason for this. So, I went from iOS to Windows Phone 8,

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back to iOS, and now to Android. And the reason I haven't really had much to say

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is I haven't really thought of anything to complain about. And in my first two

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videos, I really did cover most of what I thought was great about the platform

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as well as about the HTC1 in particular.

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So, I've been kind of sitting here thinking, what can I possibly say other

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than I'm switching to Android and this will likely be my permanent home for the

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foreseeable future. Now, with that said, there are some interesting competitors

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in the Android space. This right here is the Galaxy S4. So, I'm going to treat

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this video as my final thoughts on Android in general, as well as some of

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the observations I've made about the HTC1 while using it for 30 days and a

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little bit of comparison between the One and the S4, which I've now had my hands

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on for about 10 days. So, we'll start with the HTC1. Um, if I had to complain

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about something in Sense 5.0, it's the fact or 55 plus or whatever they're

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calling it now. Uh, it would be the inelegant implementation of the stock

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music player. So, the stock music player is media music. The stock music player

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is well integrated with the OS, but the navigation isn't that great. And what I

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discovered myself doing uh because it doesn't have a built-in EQ is I found

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myself uh trying to find an alternative music player. So, the ones that I tried

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were whoops, excuse me, Rocket Player as well as um Win Amp. So, these have the

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advantages of EQ settings, but they don't integrate with the Sense 5.0

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UI as well as the stock one does. So, for example, with the stock one, I can

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have a lock screen that has a music player. Whereas with the other ones, I

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can't have it on the lock screen, but I can implement it here. But even their

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their integrations here aren't that great, and they have some strange behaviors. Like for example, um if I

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plug in my headphones right now, you're going to see that it's just going to

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start playing music even though I don't necessarily want it to do that. Um give

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it a sec. Give it a sec. Yeah, it'll probably start doing that. See, there

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you go. So, I have to actually tell it to go away every time I plug something

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into the top of the device. So, I wish there was one that was as well integrated as the stock one, but sounded

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a little better and had better navigation. Um, the market, I wish it kind of had a

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convenient favorites list of apps. And this one right here, app backup and

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restore, is really cool. So, what it does is it just creates a file that you

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dump onto your computer. And then you copy that into the uh into the folder on

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another phone. And what happens is as soon as you launch it, you can restore

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and it'll install all the apps that you had installed on the device. So, I used

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this when I went from using the HTC1

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only to using the Galaxy S4 as well because it allowed me to just load my

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entire app load out onto it. Now, I remember in the tablet version of Android on Honeycomb in the market, you

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were able to just see all of the apps that you downloaded before and I wasn't able to find that, but that doesn't mean

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it's not there. And I found this was a little bit inelegant. So, I was I got

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prompted by every app. Are you sure? Yes. Are you sure? Do you agree? Yes.

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Yes. So, it took it took a long time to install all the apps even though I had

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the full list. So, um that's something that I that I wish Android had because

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with iOS it's simple. You back up your phone, you restore your phone, and

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everything's exactly the way you left it. I did find the People app a little

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bit confusing. So, I'm I still am not really using the stock Android desktop,

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and I'm not using Blink Feed. I'm just using this list right here, which is

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more like Gingerbread. So, I did find the People app Oh, I should probably turn that H. Yeah, nothing there that

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matters. I did find the people app a little bit confusing. a lot of the the

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links that it suggested weren't right and it didn't pick up on a lot of the

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links that I ended up setting up manually. But once I did set them all up

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manually, it's it's great except that it

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doesn't really allow me to pick. Do I want to pull that person's Facebook

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picture? Do I want to use my own picture that I took of them so that I know who

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I'm talking to because not everyone uses a picture of themselves for Facebook.

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So, for example, when my wife calls, it's a picture of my baby because that's

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what she uses for her Facebook picture. if I can't figure out how to change it.

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Uh, multitasking is still a highlight of the platform for me. I love this. I do

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not miss the hardware button. In fact, going to the S4, which is more like the

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button loadout that I'm used to, where you've got your context menu button

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here, you've got your hard home button here, and then your soft back button

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here. This is more like what I was used to with Android, but I didn't miss it at

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all with the HTC1. I found that back,

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home, and then multitask was really all I needed because that that context

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button has been replaced with these dots up here. And I actually find it a little

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bit easier to press. So, I mean, when I'm holding the device, I hold it like this. So, when I'm going to go back, I

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can reach back. Okay, that's fine. It's a little bit of a stretch, but I don't go back as much as I might want to

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access context because that's your your new tab, your bookmarks, all all those

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kinds of things, which I actually like having on the right versus having on the

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bottom left like that. So, yeah, I thought it was great. Uh, the camera is

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still awesome on the HTC1. I know I've talked about this before. I I played

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around with Zoe's or Zoies, which are those sort of 3 4 secondond clips that

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you take and then you can take some pictures during it. I used them a little bit at first, but then I really found

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myself not really bothering with it and just using video a lot more because it's

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so quick. You can go from you can go

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from lock screen to

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recording a video in that long. And so what I just found myself doing is if I

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wanted a 4- second video clip, well, I'm gonna take a four-se secondond video clip. That's what I'll do. So the the

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Zoies didn't really uh didn't really matter that much to me, but I do think

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they're a better implementation than Samsung's thing with the still photo and

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the audio recording that goes with it. I' I'd rather have the video and then I

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can capture a few still photos at the same time. Um I do on the other hand

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find myself watching highlight reels of previous days. It is so cool. Uh, if we

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go into my photos, I'm just going to pick a random day, such as, for example,

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this day. I think we were we did a video shoot. Um,

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so let's just see what it comes up with on its own. So, here's me dressing up the cat. Here's our actor as well as our

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film crew. Here's me and Diesel crammed into the back. It's a really cool way to

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look back at a day of of events.

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So, here's we did some behindthe-scenes footage of this particular shoot. So

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that's what a lot of it is. But yeah, it's just it's a it's just really cool.

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So yeah, I do find myself using this, but not not Zoe's at all. Uh the feeling

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of solidity with this phone is outstanding. It's really unlike any

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other device other than an Apple device that I've ever seen. So I want you to watch the pressure my thumbs are

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exerting on the phone here.

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As hard as I might press, I can't get the phone to flex, which is I mean, I

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kind of took it for granted a little bit going from iOS to this phone, going from

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an iPhone 4, which is also a very solid device, to this one. I was like, "Oh, yeah, well, whatever. No devices flex.

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Of course, they do." Uh, this is the Galaxy S4, and with this one, you can

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probably see that bend, particularly on

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my right thumb. I'm putting about the same amount of pressure on it. Is the S4

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a solidly built device? You know what? Probably. It's better than the S3. It

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feels better to hold than the S3 with the squared corners, but it without the

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metal backing, which Samsung sacrifices in order to get things like the optional

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wireless charging back cover as well as being able to integrate your cover, like

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the front case cover with the back cover and have it all be one piece in order to

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give you that micro SD upgrade as well as the removable battery. These are the

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sacrifices Samsung has made in order to um to bring you those those

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functionalities. But I I like the

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feeling of this and the honestly the finish on the aluminum is one of the best ones I've encountered in spite of

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the fact that it's a phone. It's still immaculate. Most br even brushed or

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anodized aluminum surfaces. Every time you put them down on something solid

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like a table, you put them on a table and they they slide a little bit, you go, "Oh no, I just scratched it. I'm

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sure I just scratched it." No, not with the one. I really didn't get that

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impression at all. Um she does get hot

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when she's under load. My hand got a bit sweaty the other day when I was sitting

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in the car with navigation running in the background and I was watching a

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video on it. So, navigation was running so that the driver could hear um the

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navigation things, but I was sitting watching a video. She got toasty. Whenever you uh whenever you share your

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wireless network with people, it does get quite toasty. But the flip side of

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that is at least it has the aluminum backing to help dissipate the heat. So,

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yeah, it's more hot to my hand, but that probably means my processors are

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actually running cooler. Um,

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you know what? Actually, here something I should have mentioned when I said I didn't miss the uh the hard button here

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is Windows phone probably helped a lot as a buffer to help me break that habit

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because I mean honestly the search button is pretty much useless. I never

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used it. The Windows button is good and the back button is good. So essentially

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I had two buttons. I had home and back which D home and back. So, it's quite

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possible that that was part of the learning experience there as well because I went from a platform with just

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a home button to a platform with a home button, a useless button, and a back

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button to this. And I haven't really used the S4 super extensively yet. HTC,

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actually, there's some leaked pictures that the HTC1 in China is going to have

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this back piece removable with a micro SD slot. You know what? I already find

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myself wishing I had a micro SD slot. My 16 gig iPhone, never used the whole

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thing. Never found that to be a problem. This is 32 gigs. I've already almost

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filled it. And a big part of the reason for that is I'm shooting so much HD

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video with it, so much 1080p video that I find myself filling it. Also, it's so

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much of a bigger screen. It's great for content. So, when I don't take something

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like a Seagate Wireless Plus out with me, um, it's nice to be able to load

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some videos on here. And with wireless AC, I can transfer things to myself very

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quickly. And, and there's all these good things about it that really mean I would

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love to be able to throw a 64 gig micro SD in there. So, I I wish HTC would

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reconsider and do an HTC1 plus or something for other regions where they

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implement the micro SD, but I really don't see it happening. Uh, widgets are

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cool, but honestly, I um as a user who

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who sees pretty well and is used to the iOS experience and has this great

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multitasking interface where I can see the last nine things that I've done, I

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didn't find myself really using any of them. It comes with a lot of stock

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widgets that you can uh that you can add just by going down here and you can add

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a calendar and bookmarks and FM radio

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and all that kind of cool. I just didn't find myself using it. I prefer the

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density of this interface with folders

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where I can take put almost everything I need and just put it here on one page.

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Um, and I'll just open up the app or

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instead of going back to the home screen. So, you know, like home screen, home screen to get back to the Google

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one, going like this to find my appropriate widget. If I just go like

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this, most of the things that I use a lot of the time, like my Gmail, my

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calendar, are within the last nine things that I've used. So, there's very

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few situations where I would need a widget in order to make it quicker for

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me to access it. So, there you go. Oh.

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Oh, and like compared to widgets, I'd much rather have things implemented into

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the drop- down menu here, like my power toggles. I just realized I had my Wi-Fi

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off. This I use all the time, and this

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is a very natural way for me to access it compared to click, click, left, left,

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right, right, or whatever else I happen to be doing. Try that one. So, this is

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something iOS users, I'm sure, will appreciate is how simple it is to set a

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song as your ringtone on Android. I'm sure every other platform has been

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taking this for granted for ever, but uh

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as a longtime iOS user, I was like, really? I just like long click it and

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then set to be my ringtone. Holy crap,

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that's the easiest thing ever. So, that was a really neat thing to uh to run

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into. And I think at the end of the day, here's what it comes down to. Um after

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my 30-day trial, yes, I'm switching to Android. I'm still going to be open to

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trying new platforms such as Ubuntu Phone or BlackBerry. Actually, there's a

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Blackberry in the mail. So, I might uh I might have to kind of cheat on my new my

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new love Android very very soon. Skype integration was much better than Windows

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Phone. Uh similar to iOS, so that's something that I realize I haven't

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talked about yet. But there you go, guys. Thanks for coming along for the

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ride. Um Oh, right. I just realized I

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never really did any of the talking about Galaxy S4 other than the

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ruggedness of it. So, I think the thing that I find most strikingly different

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between TouchWiz and Sense is that

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TouchWiz feels very um very bubbly, very

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happy. You know, it's all super bright colors and sort of big big friendly

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icons and sort of easy easy to uh easy

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to touch. Whereas Sense feels more um a

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little bit more more elegant, but maybe not as uh maybe not as easy to use. Like

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it's really cool the way TouchWiz already has this this implemented so you

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can switch things on and off. I think the easy mode on TouchWiz makes it the

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kind of thing where here I'm going to see if I can find uh see if I can find

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easy mode. I was playing around with it before and it's the kind of thing where

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I'd go, okay, yeah, I'm going to get an HTC1, but if I was going to get a phone

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for my mom, then I would just give her

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the S4 because yeah, I can't find it

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right now. Anyway, so easy mode just basically consolidates Android down to

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like a few buttons. Um, S translates really cool. Um, I did find that smart

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stay worked for me and was very helpful. The HTC1 is sort of just like every

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other phone where if you're reading something for a long time, um, it'll dim

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and it'll eventually turn off, whereas that doesn't happen with the Samsung

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phone. I personally didn't find the hovering above the screen and it

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detecting things very helpful at all in things like the browser. Um, it would

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just be zoomed in looking at stuff that I'm I'm just trying to move my finger

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closer to the screen. I just went, "No, just let me touch the touchcreen and I'm good with that." Um, what were some of

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the other things that I found myself I found myself turning off the um

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um yeah, those ones right away. NFC is good. Um, gesturing was kind of cool,

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but it's a very unnatural thing for me. Like for example, gesture gesturing to

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take a call. I was like, "Oh, well, you just do it like this, right?" That

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didn't work. And it wasn't just one. So, you have to go back and forth kind of

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slow. And I'm looking at it going, "Okay, so if I was driving and I had it

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in a cradle or something like that, yeah, that's very practical. But in

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everyday use, it's probably not the kind of thing that I would use unless I

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really wanted to use all the features that came with my new phone. So, thank

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you for checking this out. Don't forget to subscribe to Linus Tech Tips for more unboxings, reviews, and other computer

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videos. And uh the baby decided to join us because he woke up when we were

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filming and nobody was there to go get him. Sorry, sweetie. So there you go.