Share your experience with TouchWiz discussion - T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy Note 3

If you love TouchWiz tell us why.
If you don't like TouchWiz tell us why.
I look forward to hear your thoughts.
Cheers

I really don't mind TouchWiz myself. Since I came from an LG G2 which had a godawful stock interface this phone felt like a breath of fresh air. I use Nova Launcher so I'm not exposed much to a lot of TouchWiz but I think it is fluid overall. If Samsung would cut down on the bloat apps like Google has it would be great. I also miss the quick settings of AOSP, the implementation on this phone gets the job done though. Overall I'm alright with it but I hope we see improvements.
Sent from my SM-N900T using Tapatalk

alone-together said:
I really don't mind TouchWiz myself. Since I came from an LG G2 which had a godawful stock interface this phone felt like a breath of fresh air. I use Nova Launcher so I'm not exposed much to a lot of TouchWiz but I think it is fluid overall. If Samsung would cut down on the bloat apps like Google has it would be great. I also miss the quick settings of AOSP, the implementation on this phone gets the job done though. Overall I'm alright with it but I hope we see improvements.
Sent from my SM-N900T using Tapatalk
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I hear you there.
quick settings of AOSP is awesome

What I noticed was the large storage consumption and not good for battery life. I remember reading one of the comments here in XDA that TW slow downed his beast phone GN3.

Lorettaa said:
What I noticed was the large storage consumption and not good for battery life. I remember reading one of the comments here in XDA that TW slow downed his beast phone GN3.
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TW isnt an issue for me though i do use Nova Prime. Before I put Nova on the Note 3 was supremely fast without any lag that i could notice. I then activated the developer options and i set all 3 animations to x.5, with that, no root needed and the Note 3 is probably the fastest phone out there. At least until there are SD 805's out there. once Nova is on the phone, forget it, it's as smooth as butter.
I'm really not a fan of ASOP anymore. I used to use it on my Bionic but with S4 and now the Note 3, I have enjoyed TW mostly. I just cant stand how ASOP just looks like a old and dated UI. It's so basic and boring (like settings and the toggles) that it just looks like something a 10 year old would make. lol to me it's like watching an old 70's or 80's TV show today. You look at it and you can tell it's not current. I just like how a UI looks, not like a fisher price look like the S5 but not bland like ASOP either.
Battery life on stock rooted and debloated i was still getting like 8 hours of screen time. So the battery wasn't an issue for me from the get go.

USBhost said:
I hate TouchWiz with all my mind.
I hate apple with all my mind and soul.
Well the reason why I don't like touchwiz is because it reminds me of apple
And its just so hard to work with and I'm bound by it because I need WiFi calling.
I grew up with the Google version of Android
Its so nice and fun to use. it looks complex but it's simple and in a nice format.
But TouchWiz looks too simple/complex and in a bad format.
Also TouchWiz is full of stuff I don't even know that its for and it takes so much
Room 1.5g+ but in Google version of Android its 150mb+ now that's a big difference.
It almost seems like TouchWiz ROMs are built with apps there are like 300+ apps in a
TouchWiz ROM, but in a true android rom its like 50+ apps. If your like me who deletes
Apps that I don't need that will be a problem with TouchWiz roms. The apps are the firmware that will make deleting apps with a lot more consequence. And with all those apps it will bring down the performance of your phone.
writing this down helped me relieve my frustrations with TouchWiz.
Share your experience with your TouchWiz experience so we can all suffer together.
If you love TouchWiz tell us why.
I look forward to hear your thoughts.
Cheers
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Click to collapse
Wow...there are a lot of misconceptions here.
First you do not need a Touchwiz phone to have wifi calling. The Xperia Z1S, the HTC One M8, LG G2, Flex, Optimus and other phones support wifi calling...Google phones do not because they get their software from Google without the carrier files. So you are not stuck with Touchwiz.
The amount of apps on your phone do not impede performance. It would be the amount of apps running and syncing that would do that.
Touchwiz is a UI...not just apps or the launcher as someone mentioned using Nova...you are still on Touchwiz..just not the TW launcher.
So it is true that a UI sitting on top of a base OS can only slow things down a little...think Windows on top of DOS for us old folks.
As TW phones are made for the common folk, there are a lot of included TW tied in apps for the general consumer so they do not have to spend hours searching Play for that perfect Sticky note app, or music player, or whatever...These apps can certainly be removed or frozen.
Also included in the 1.5GB of OS is all the carrier support files and all the Google Apps...that 150MB you mention for AOSP has no Gapps included.
I, too have tried AOSP ROMs...and found them to be no different with how they operate except all the nice shortcuts are gone and all the TW apps and widgets too. All are very Apple-like to me. I always got the best battery life on ROMs based on stock (TW).

KennyG123 said:
Wow...there are a lot of misconceptions here.
First you do not need a Touchwiz phone to have wifi calling. The Xperia Z1S, the HTC One M8, LG G2, Flex, Optimus and other phones support wifi calling...Google phones do not because they get their software from Google without the carrier files. So you are not stuck with Touchwiz.
The amount of apps on your phone do not impede performance. It would be the amount of apps running and syncing that would do that.
Touchwiz is a UI...not just apps or the launcher as someone mentioned using Nova...you are still on Touchwiz..just not the TW launcher.
So it is true that a UI sitting on top of a base OS can only slow things down a little...think Windows on top of DOS for us old folks.
As TW phones are made for the common folk, there are a lot of included TW tied in apps for the general consumer so they do not have to spend hours searching Play for that perfect Sticky note app, or music player, or whatever...These apps can certainly be removed or frozen.
Also included in the 1.5GB of OS is all the carrier support files and all the Google Apps...that 150MB you mention for AOSP has no Gapps included.
I, too have tried AOSP ROMs...and found them to be no different with how they operate except all the nice shortcuts are gone and all the TW apps and widgets too. All are very Apple-like to me. I always got the best battery life on ROMs based on stock (TW).
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Yes it's true there are misconceptions but that's how it see things.
But When you said I don't need a TouchWiz to have wifi calling sns/mms that's true but I don't have those phones
And what did you mean about "carrier support files"
So wifi calling uses a Giga of Space

USBhost said:
Well the reason why I don't like touchwiz is because it reminds me of apple
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No offence but this is the dumbest thing i have ever heard. Please do tell how vastly different and inferior TW reminds you of anything that apple puts out. Do tell.
Sent from my HTC One_M8 using Tapatalk

nohcho said:
No offence but this is the dumbest thing i have ever heard. Please do tell how vastly different and inferior TW reminds you of anything that apple puts out. Do tell.
Sent from my HTC One_M8 using Tapatalk
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No offence taken but I just want you to understand
Every one has there different feelings
TW is different to Apple that's a given
Its just TW is closer to apples ui
I'm just Apple hater that's me
So if something is close to Apple I just don't like it

USBhost said:
Yes it's true there are misconceptions but that's how it see things.
But When you said I don't need a TouchWiz to have wifi calling sns/mms that's true but I don't have those phones
And what did you mean about "carrier support files".
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nohcho said:
No offence but this is the dumbest thing i have ever heard. Please do tell how vastly different and inferior TW reminds you of anything that apple puts out. Do tell.
Sent from my HTC One_M8 using Tapatalk
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lol sorry but i have to ask as well. You say "inferior" to Apple, I'd have to say that's inaccurate but subjective at best. If you mean inferior to an OS that is basically nothing but an app drawer, then ok I guess.

USBhost said:
Yes it's true there are misconceptions but that's how it see things.
But When you said I don't need a TouchWiz to have wifi calling sns/mms that's true but I don't have those phones
And what did you mean about "carrier support files"
So wifi calling uses a Giga of Space
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Carrier support files are all those wonderful things you guys like like CIQ, and can't speak for T-mobile but Sprint adds things like Sprint Zone, Sprint Connection Optimizer and many more..so T-mobile has their own brand of similar files.
You complained about Touchwiz...is this your first Touchwiz phone? You stated you had to have it..I guess if you are stuck with this phone then yes..even the Nexus 5 does not have wifi calling and there is nothing they can do about it..so at least you have a choice. If this is not your first Touchwiz phone then...why?
Wifi calling does not use a gig of space...however Google apps and Touchwiz apps and support files together do. Samsung is lazy...if you ever decompile one of their apps you will see 1000's of icons that are never used...because the same TW app works on the other carrier phones as well as many other models so the icon packs included have to cover many resolutions so there are redundant folders. It is not cost effective to them to trim down all these apps and custom tune them for each phone they include them on...and then they would have to do the same for each update. Regardless, they do steal a little less than a GB of internal storage space. If you were to take an AOSP ROM, add gapps, and also download an equivalent app from Play for what is included in Touchwiz ROMs you would start nearing the same size. Debloated TW ROMs are about half the size of full stock.

Don't like the idea of being stuck with TW. I actually prefer AOSP but on the note3, TW is just so much smoother and has everything I need and there aren't any problems. I love how I can use the full function of the phones (s-pen and things affiliate with it) without worrying to find good working apps that would be as remotely easy to use).
Even before my root and custom rom installation, my stock note 3 was as smooth as butter. So all in all, TW doesn't bother me as much as it does some people.

I don't see why you don't just flash a Aosp theme if you don't like the look of touchwiz. I'm all for AOSP but there are just things that touchwiz has that makes me want to stay like Pen window.

Techniques said:
I don't see why you don't just flash a Aosp theme if you don't like the look of touchwiz. I'm all for AOSP but there are just things that touchwiz has that makes me want to stay like Pen window.
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Click to collapse
Dose Aosp theme change the look of settings to aosp

I am actually a major HTC fan and since I have owned my note 3 I have enjoyed the TW experience except for the fact that it is a ram hog
Sent from my SM-N900T using Tapatalk

R187J said:
I am actually a major HTC fan and since I have owned my note 3 I have enjoyed the TW experience except for the fact that it is a ram hog
Sent from my SM-N900T using Tapatalk
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I know

Well in my experience , touchwiz isn't all that bad at all. It does lag here and there but with the right kernel and rom, it is very much usable and fluid. I used to use Nova exclusively but after going back to touchwiz these past fewweeks, I realized it's pretty good.

messiahfreedom said:
Well in my experience , touchwiz isn't all that bad at all. It does lag here and there but with the right kernel and rom, it is very much usable and fluid. I used to use Nova exclusively but after going back to touchwiz these past fewweeks, I realized it's pretty good.
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OK...again...Touchwiz is a UI. Nova replaces the TW Launcher...not Touchwiz itself....the slide to call or message, settings options, the apps that are TW exclusive and much more is Touchwiz.

Oh my bad. You meant the touchwiz as a whole. Well, as a whole. Anyway touchwiz for the most part is simple enough. It takes some playing with in order to realize it's features, but for the most part it is alright. It's more simple than what the iPhone offers, at least in my opinion.

New Touchwiz
The new Touchwiz on GS5 is acceptable, closer to flat design, i like it.

Related

What is it about TouchWiz that is so bad?

I'm just curious about why Stock TouchWiz releases or TW custom ROMs get such a bad rap here at xda?
I do love AOSP or CM custom ROMs and all their customizability but I do also like some of the TW features and layouts, etc...
I'm just curious if I'm missing something here and if there are inherent bugs, flaws, etc with TW ROMs that make them rather unpopular?
Or is this simply personal preference again and one that has a big consensus majority here for whatever reasons?
Thanks
Sent from my SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
I think it's mainly preferences. I prefer mess gimmicky functions so I flashed cm10. It feels like I'm using less battery regardless if I actually am or not.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app
Deoxlar said:
I think it's mainly preferences. I prefer mess gimmicky functions so I flashed cm10. It feels like I'm using less battery regardless if I actually am or not.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app
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The camera is the only reason why I refuse to leave TW, it's simply better. TW itself isn't that bad at all either.
I agree on this one and it's better stock features. But I hated cm intill I gave it three days now I love it snapper more basic features customizable and support now there are things that I hate speakerphone doesn't work can't find task manager I don't get why it's not there like touchwiz but I'm a noob so I think these issues will resolve themselves over time with me understanding how to use root explorer nova launcher etc.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app
Yea... i'd have to say the camera is my biggest draw towards sticking with a TouchWiz based ROM. Touchwiz has a nice camera.... yet CM/AOKP seem to have far superior battery life.
I wouldn't exactly say that Touchwiz ROM's get a bad rep here. I mean... look at how many there are.
Its strictly preference. Tw doesn't offer as much user customization, whereas most aosp based roms do. I've tried both, i like both.
megagodx said:
The camera is the only reason why I refuse to leave TW, it's simply better. TW itself isn't that bad at all either.
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elementaldragon said:
Yea... i'd have to say the camera is my biggest draw towards sticking with a TouchWiz based ROM. Touchwiz has a nice camera.... yet CM/AOKP seem to have far superior battery life.
I wouldn't exactly say that Touchwiz ROM's get a bad rep here. I mean... look at how many there are.
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I just restored back to stock ICS after running CM10 for 10 days. I really dig the camera on TW.
Another thing I like about TW is the Contacts integration with Swiping Left to Text / Right to Call. I noticed this was the biggest thing that I was missing when using CM10.
Other than that, I don't use any of the Social integration, so I wouldn't know about that.
elementaldragon said:
Yea... i'd have to say the camera is my biggest draw towards sticking with a TouchWiz based ROM. Touchwiz has a nice camera.... yet CM/AOKP seem to have far superior battery life.
I wouldn't exactly say that Touchwiz ROM's get a bad rep here. I mean... look at how many there are.
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I was getting 5 hours of screen time using LTE for most the day and almost 6 hours (5.58) using just Wi-Fi. This was on TouchWiz with the standard 2,100 mAh battery on a TW JB leak ROM. Not to mention a bunch of widgets on my home screen. CM10/ASKP really tops that?
megagodx said:
The camera is the only reason why I refuse to leave TW, it's simply better. TW itself isn't that bad at all either.
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Same here! I have tried many ROMS in the past week. I loved many of them..AOKP...CM..but the one thing that kills it for me is the camera. The stock camera is great. Cant even find anything comparable in the play store to use with another ROM
only thing i hate about TW is that it is BUTT UGLY. It still looks like gingerbread still... I understand that green uses less power than blue, but the rest of the UI is just really bad. I am staying with stock only because of camera quality, dock compatibility, and allshare cast compatibility. If it werent for those things, I wouldve stayed on my Galaxy Nexus
megagodx said:
I was getting 5 hours of screen time using LTE for most the day and almost 6 hours (5.58) using just Wi-Fi. This was on TouchWiz with the standard 2,100 mAh battery on a TW JB leak ROM. Not to mention a bunch of widgets on my home screen. CM10/ASKP really tops that?
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Well.... i didn't really use my phone heavily today..... but about 17.5 hours on battery with about an hour and a half of screen on time, and it's still at 47%.
elementaldragon said:
I wouldn't exactly say that Touchwiz ROM's get a bad rep here. I mean... look at how many there are.
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i tried to do a search over in the Android Dev section on 'TouchWiz', but i didn't see too many.
the one that stood out to me was JellyBean747 Milestone 7 Graystone Edition.
i would like to switch back to TouchWiz, but only if its JellyBean. either 4.1, 4.1.1, or 4.1.2, any suggestions?
edit: also found FrostyJB_4.1.1-v3~[10.24.2012]
Uh... EVERY Rom in the android dev section is based on Touchwiz.
As for a recommendation... drewgaren's Serenity Rom is quite nice... haven't tried his Milestone 7 Rom yet, but I used previous Milestone versions and also had no issues. Difference between the Milestone roms and Serenity is that Serenity is built off of the stock Galaxy Note 2 Rom, whereas the Milestones are based on GS3 leaks.

First Android phone that I've preferred stock launcher...

As title states...every Android I've had (and I've had a bunch), first thing I do is install Nova Launcher. I did that with my Note 2 immediately and kept it that way for a couple days without ever playing with touchwiz. However, a few days ago I figured I'd give TW a try and found that I actually prefer it to Nova! I was shocked, but pleased nonetheless. I find it (for the first time) every bit as smooth as Nova and I like the idea of Pagebuddy and the s pen utility icons that pop up in the notification tray. I have also found that the stock launcher seems to use less system resources than Nova...at least from what I can see by available ram.
Anyone else experience the above, or have I lost my mind?...haha
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2
My exact same experience from nova prime to the default launcher. Having the S calendar widgets is a bonus too
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2
I really like the app drawer and folder animations.
i just hate tw icons.....and the placement of the app icon! they should allow us to at least chnage those childish looking icons!
powerwagon said:
As title states...every Android I've had (and I've had a bunch), first thing I do is install Nova Launcher. I did that with my Note 2 immediately and kept it that way for a couple days without ever playing with touchwiz. However, a few days ago I figured I'd give TW a try and found that I actually prefer it to Nova! I was shocked, but pleased nonetheless. I find it (for the first time) every bit as smooth as Nova and I like the idea of Pagebuddy and the s pen utility icons that pop up in the notification tray. I have also found that the stock launcher seems to use less system resources than Nova...at least from what I can see by available ram.
Anyone else experience the above, or have I lost my mind?...haha
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2
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I agree wholeheartedly. I'm still using Touchmywiz after a full two weeks now. that's amazing. Me changing themes all the time with Go Launcher or Nova got boring...every theme had at least one ICON or something I didn't like to sticking with stock launcher is kind of a nice. Especially since it's so smooth.
powerwagon said:
As title states...every Android I've had (and I've had a bunch), first thing I do is install Nova Launcher. I did that with my Note 2 immediately and kept it that way for a couple days without ever playing with touchwiz. However, a few days ago I figured I'd give TW a try and found that I actually prefer it to Nova! I was shocked, but pleased nonetheless. I find it (for the first time) every bit as smooth as Nova and I like the idea of Pagebuddy and the s pen utility icons that pop up in the notification tray. I have also found that the stock launcher seems to use less system resources than Nova...at least from what I can see by available ram.
Anyone else experience the above, or have I lost my mind?...haha
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2
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Same. Totally stock everything here and can't find any lacking options. Samsung nailed the software on this device.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using xda premium
I totally agree. TW is finally nice to have for once. The only additional thing i would like to have is quick reply for text without having to use go sms or sms popup.
Count me in too. I love it as-is. Which is a bummer, as I enjoyed flashing all the time, but for now, no-more. I had to root it, but that's it.
I cant believe how much I like tw I just wish it had force close any thing. Miui built in feature. Any one know a solution?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using xda premium
I respect all of your opinions here. I hear what you guys are saying and understand it at a logical level. But, no. Just, no. Every skinned version of Android should be nuked and destroyed. Every carrier or OEM that tries to add to the Android experience should be forced to spend time for crimes against humanity.
As soon as mine gets here on Tuesday: Root and flash to the closest thing to AOSP.
bmstrong said:
I respect all of your opinions here. I hear what you guys are saying and understand it at a logical level. But, no. Just, no. Every skinned version of Android should be nuked and destroyed. Every carrier or OEM that tries to add to the Android experience should be forced to spend time for crimes against humanity.
As soon as mine gets here on Tuesday: Root and flash to the closest thing to AOSP.
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Click to collapse
Interesting opinion considering you haven't even used it yet...haha
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2
powerwagon said:
Interesting opinion considering you haven't even used it yet...haha
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2
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I certainly have. I just don't own one yet. Had a day on the Verizon one yesterday. Used the T-Mobile for a few hours the day before. My personal AT&T one is coming in the mail. And my original Note is running CM10.
I have to agree, the TW launcher and Note 2 software are spot on. I love CM/AOSP but the stock rom is going to give CM/AOSP a run for the money. Now, if CM/AOSP can integrate the S-Pen features (note, memo, calendar and gestures) then will definitely be moving over, but for now stock (with root) is staying put. Well done Samsung!
Keeping in mind we are all sharing opinions and everyone is very velcome to voice there own. Mine is a torn one. Im very aware of the sweetness custom launchers and roms offer. My conflict is the TW launcher has so much proprietary and necessary fuction in direct relation to the phones core features I feel I woild be missing out on some potential with anything else loaded. I have been useing a modified TW launcher since day one and feel its the best experience. Considering all I have done is removed all bloat and added all the features everyone else has. Then wave around the middle finger to whomever is responsible for ATT borking it in the first place.
As its been mentioned before. If a CM or other shows up with all the TW apps and SPen compatible I would dive right in. Considering Samsung had a good lockdown on anything document related to the chipset I dont see that hapening anytime soon. The CM team has already stated they are not happy about samsungs lockdown and have suggested they might drop it all together to focus on other phones. :banghead:
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2
Wow. First I've seen of CM thinking of dropping support. I might just return the Note and not even open it then. Where is the best place to go for CM news?
Stock was great and all, but this is the first phone i actually ran a different launcher on it instead of stock. I was just way too annoyed about the icon size and the space between them. Got nova launcher to fix that.
bmstrong said:
Wow. First I've seen of CM thinking of dropping support. I might just return the Note and not even open it then. Where is the best place to go for CM news?
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Click to collapse
Says the brainwashed "AOSP OR NOTHING IT PWNZ0RZ" Nazi. Seriously of you're gonna load CM and ultimately kill one of the 3 main selling points (spen) why the hell would you even consider the note 2? Seems like the Droid DNA, where running CM/AOSP wouldn't cost you a single feature, would be a MUCH better choice for you.
As for CM: drop the Note 2. I don't care as ill never use it. All CM does to the note 2 is remove features. Want a "stock" look? Get apex or Nova launcher. Looks like CM and still gives you full spen support.
The note 2 is *****ing fast. It has killer battery life. Those were two main selling points of flashing cm/aosp. What do you gain by flashing cm/aosp? You lose features and can almost exactly replicate the look via a launcher. Its simply not needed on the note 2.
Sent from my Galaxy Note 10.1 GT-N8000 using xda premium
Err0xx said:
Says the brainwashed "AOSP OR NOTHING IT PWNZ0RZ" Nazi. Seriously of you're gonna load CM and ultimately kill one of the 3 main selling points (spen) why the hell would you even consider the note 2? Seems like the Droid DNA, where running CM/AOSP wouldn't cost you a single feature, would be a MUCH better choice for you.
As for CM: drop the Note 2. I don't care as ill never use it. All CM does to the note 2 is remove features. Want a "stock" look? Get apex or Nova launcher. Looks like CM and still gives you full spen support.
The note 2 is *****ing fast. It has killer battery life. Those were two main selling points of flashing cm/aosp. What do you gain by flashing cm/aosp? You lose features and can almost exactly replicate the look via a launcher. Its simply not needed on the note 2.
Sent from my Galaxy Note 10.1 GT-N8000 using xda premium
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Click to collapse
You lost me when you wrote the words “feature" and “S-Pen". I'm also really not keen on being compared to a Nazi.
Obviously, this can get into another pointless forum thread where we waste time and effort and energy posting back and forth. The OP asked a question and I answered with my opinion. You are certainly entitled to yours. And good for you, I'm glad it works for you. I'll move along.
Totally agree, bone stock here. Not even rooted. Haven't found a need to. The device is aces. Samsung nailed it.
Sent from my SGH-I317M using xda premium
The main reason I flashed a ROM was multi-view. Once the AT&T version gets the multi-view I will probably jump to a rooted stock ROM. The other thing I would miss on stock is the ability to choose the notification toggles.
I am running Nova just because I like a tighter icon layout. Right now I'm on 5x8 (including the dock). Samsung loves adding in little features, I wonder why choosing more layouts wasn't one of the things they added to such a large phone.
I loved AOKP on the S II. Sorely missed a stable build with decent battery life on the One X. But, the Note is a wholly different stock experience.
I chose the Note for the TouchWiz stuff and S-Pen. It really isn't that much bigger than the S III (my coworkers S III + case is bigger than my naked Note). I knew I wanted stuff like smart stay and smart alert. All the stuff I would lose on AOSP bases. Even multi view is coming to TouchWiz JB update to the S II. Samsung has this software down, really brought their A-Game. If I stretch I can only think of two things I would have wanted stock: more freedom in row/column in the launcher, and ability to select and order the notification toggles. Nothing like the laundry list I can come up with about Sense 4+.
Sent from my Note ][

Perofrmance difference between AOSP roms vs Touchwiz roms ?

I just picked up my brand new Note 2 in white from ATT this week, running on Straight Talk. Rooted it before I took the plastic stickers off it, easiest and fastest root ever for me, and I am not a smart techie guy.
Anyways, I wanted to first try out a stock Touchwiz ROM, and found a very popular ROM here, installed it, and then installed Nova launcher with Jellybean theme, and I also installed a few ismc mods to give the phoen a pretty close to stock AOSP Nexus look, while still keeping the good Touchwiz S-Pen apps and widgets.
My last few phones have been One X running CM10, Galaxy Nexus, Nexus-S, Nexus-One. As you see, I am a fan of the pure vanilla look and feel. But it seems to me, that Jellybean has really made non Nexus phones really good, and with a launcher like Nova, and themed like Jellybean, it is darn close to the real nexus deal to me.
My question.
What are the performance numbers or at least your personal feel and opinion if you have used both on the Note 2 ? How does a good AOSP ROM, like CM10.1 run on the Note 2, compared to a stock Touchwiz ROM like cleanROM or JediX. Does the feel feel faster & smoother on AOSP over Touchwiz ? Battery life I am sure better on Tocuhwiz ?
Thanks
Running on JellyBeer, which uses CM10.1 as the base, it feels so much faster than stock. In fact, the battery life is also much much better.
I have to say I am pretty happy with cleanROM and my themes + Nova. Looks just like a Nexus now.
I do love AOSP, and sure it would be faster than Touchwiz ROM's, but I think I will hold off on those till next month, just reading there are few little bugs or minor issues still in these AOSP ROM's. I think another few weeks or month they be ironed out, and good to go.
I would switch to AOSP if its like crazy faster performance over Touchwiz ? If benchmark shows like night and day faster. Is it ?
Zorachus said:
I have to say I am pretty happy with cleanROM and my themes + Nova. Looks just like a Nexus now.
I do love AOSP, and sure it would be faster than Touchwiz ROM's, but I think I will hold off on those till next month, just reading there are few little bugs or minor issues still in these AOSP ROM's. I think another few weeks or month they be ironed out, and good to go.
I would switch to AOSP if its like crazy faster performance over Touchwiz ? If benchmark shows like night and day faster. Is it ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I wouldn't call out timelines, but I guarantee you that in a matter of a little over a week, the developers made giant strides to how it is now, which is near perfect. Sure, there's minor bugs, but nothing people can't live with. They're very minor, and most people who complain about certain supposed quirks either complain just to complain (I see them as people who can never be pleased), or haven't explored their settings long enough to realize what they're complaining about, whether something seems missing to them or isn't adjusted to the way they want, is right in front of them.
You are tempting me to try out AOSP Sorry I didn't mean to put a timeline out there, I am sure the good ones are stable and good enough as daily's.
I really am tempted by all these AOSP ROM's. But then with AOSP I lose the S-Pen features. Are the AOSP that much faster and smoother than Touchwiz ROM's, or not really ? Right now with Nova launcher mods + themes my phone looks almost like a Nexus already, is it worth it going to full AOSP ?
Zorachus said:
You are tempting me to try out AOSP Sorry I didn't mean to put a timeline out there, I am sure the good ones are stable and good enough as daily's.
I really am tempted by all these AOSP ROM's. But then with AOSP I lose the S-Pen features. Are the AOSP that much faster and smoother than Touchwiz ROM's, or not really ? Right now with Nova launcher mods + themes my phone looks almost like a Nexus already, is it worth it going to full AOSP ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As I recall, some of the ROMs have Nova Launcher included. I'm not sure how a Nexus looks, but I would say it's not too different.
And yes, as I said before, AOSP (and even AOKP) is faster than stock. It's because it gets rid of the bloatware. As for S-Pen features, it depends on you and what you like. Apparently airview and the like won't be available unless someone ports it over, but S Notes can be replicated with another app.
Why not do a nandroid backup and flash a CM10.1 ROM and take it for a spin. You can always go back to your backup. I prefer running CM10.1. simple powerful interface and great performance. Touchwiz is to bulky and if you want spen apps pypirus is a great option
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using xda app-developers app
I get better battery life and performance out of TW ROMs. I'm running JediX9 with the provided kernel with amazing results. Plus it has the spen features.
I try CM10.1 once in a while and always go back to Jedi.
Sent from my SGH-I317 using xda app-developers app
My biggest gripe on CM right now is audio. Incall audio and speaker volume are poor opposed to TW. I talk on the phone quite a bit and I can tell the difference noticeably. It will get ironed out, and I will be on CM for good.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2
I'm running the asylum aosp ROM and I'm having the best performance of any ROM I've tried to date, but on both in benchmark and subjective feel. I do find myself missing touch work tremendously though with some of its features. But I so love that my group messages workwwithout having to install a crappy third party messaging app.
As far as battery life, for me, the difference is negligible.

For those who moved from TW to AOSP: thoughts?

Got my S4 a couple days ago and flashed AOKP within an hour. I thought the TW bundled with the phone was pretty damn smooth, but AOKP is just insane. It's like something out of a commercial where there's zero lag, but it's not a commercial, it's the actual phone in your hands. When I hit voice search, it pops up INSTANTLY. I've had a couple soft reboots when hitting recent apps from a frozen app, but I'm sure those will be ironed out. I'm not sure the camera pictures I've taken have looked as nice, though. It's hard to tell.
For those of you who made the move from TW to an AOSP-based ROM, what are your thoughts? Has anyone moved back to TW?
I've never used anything but aosp on any phone. Be it cyanogen or aokp or pure aosp.
With my previous HTC devices it was a no brainer to dump Sense ROMs and replace them with anything else. Even my Samsung tablet that came with TW didn't last long but that was because I wanted Jelly Bean on it before the official upgrade came out so TW was gone within 2 days on my tablet. So I've been using aosp for a year and a half without interruption.
When I first turned on my S4 I was shocked at how cluttered everything was. Having been used to aosp I didn't understand how anyone could use this phone as it comes out of the box. There was a new alert every 8 seconds. The notification window was constantly filled with stuff I couldn't have cared less about. Status bar was filled with icons that had no meaning to me. The only feature I thought was really cool was the T Mobile account monitor in the notification window. Everything else was just clutter. Granted, much of that was carrier bloat.
It took me 20 minutes to test all the hardware and make sure the device was not in. Need of an exchange before I rooted it and ever that was kind of painful with the TW interface. I flashed Cyanogen and am not looking back.
Oh, and despite all that about TouchWiz that I didn't like...its about a billion times better than HTC Sense.
I will say that on my unbranded Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 tablet that is WiFi only and there for completely unbranded with no bloat, the pure TouchWiz interface it came with was very nice. It was much less cluttered and more usable. Just not as configurable as aosp.
Sent from your phone. You should be careful where you leave that thing.
I guess its universal AOSP are always smoother to bloated TouchWiz. I personally prefer TW (yes call me crazy ) Either you love TW or you hate it there's no other option TW with all its goodies is lot cooler than what it used to be..
Sent from the state where marijuana is not illegal !
I've also noticed AOSP feels much faster... virtually no lag to be found. One thing that I have noticed though, and it may be something I'm not doing right with my settings, but TW seems to get better battery life than AOSP. I like TW for certain features such as the camera quality and one or two of the gimmicky features; but halo, unbridled speed, and customization possibilities with AOSP makes it a hard decision of which to stay with.
Overall i find most of the touchwiz features just unnecessary bloatware that you really dont need, thats more for showing off that your phone can do it over actually being practical to keep on all the time. I really like the general smoothness of AOKP much better than touchwiz, but in some areas such as the camera, AOKP really lacks in that department compared to the stock camera app, and i find 3D applications don't perform quite as well as they do on Touchwiz either, and i think most of these issues are probably more driver related than anything.
I used aokp on my s2 and loved it because it doesnt have any samsung goodness like s3 and s4 but on this devices I use TW to utilize full function.
Sent from my SGH-M919 using xda premium
For those of you who uses AOSP/AOKP/w.e else ....what do you use as alternative camera/gallery? What i love about Samsung is their gallery and camera. I have found mods that transfer AOSP camera / gallery to TW but never vice versa.
I tried Aosp roms on my s3 and s4. I always end up back on tw cuz aosp roms are never 100% stable. The last time I actually stayed on aosp was with my Motorola Triumph and that's because the triumph was stuck on froyo and Cm7 was pretty stable.
Sent from Flip's Galaxy S4
Okay, the big question:
Is it possible to use Watch ON (or smart remote, etc) on AOSP/AOKP/Cyanogen/etc? or is this limited to touchwiz only?
As for camera quality, I expect that to start changing for the better once the Nexusized GS4 gets released
adventure_of_link said:
Okay, the big question:
Is it possible to use Watch ON (or smart remote, etc) on AOSP/AOKP/Cyanogen/etc? or is this limited to touchwiz only?
As for camera quality, I expect that to start changing for the better once the Nexusized GS4 gets released
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Probably TW only
Sent from my SGH-M919 using xda app-developers app
adventure_of_link said:
Okay, the big question:
Is it possible to use Watch ON (or smart remote, etc) on AOSP/AOKP/Cyanogen/etc? or is this limited to touchwiz only?
As for camera quality, I expect that to start changing for the better once the Nexusized GS4 gets released
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is in the Play store so I would think so. Try it out and let Us know
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Phone: Tmobile Samsung Galaxy s4 m919
Rom: Wicked v2
Kernel: Stock
Radio: Stock
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
YouCreateGaming said:
It is in the Play store so I would think so. Try it out and let Us know
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Phone: Tmobile Samsung Galaxy s4 m919
Rom: Wicked v2
Kernel: Stock
Radio: Stock
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm pretty curious about this myself. From what I've heard AOKP/AOSP doesn't have the software to utilize the IR blaster, but I could always be wrong. I use TW , but will almost always run Nova launcher for customization.
Sent from my SPH-L720 using Xparent BlueTapatalk 2
Skipjacks said:
Probably TW only
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that's what I thought. thanks.
Oh well, just another reason why I said once before on how I'm happy with my phone's OS as/is.
adventure_of_link said:
Okay, the big question:
Is it possible to use Watch ON (or smart remote, etc) on AOSP/AOKP/Cyanogen/etc? or is this limited to touchwiz only?
As for camera quality, I expect that to start changing for the better once the Nexusized GS4 gets released
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
According to Cyanogen, the source code for that isn't proprietary. He wants to see what other devs come up with.
Sent from Spaceball One.
blackknightavalon said:
According to Cyanogen, the source code for that isn't proprietary. He wants to see what other devs come up with.
Sent from Spaceball One.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The source code for the software might not be, but I think it is for the IR hardware. I know on the Samsung tablets that have an IR blaster they don't work in CM because the hardware drivers are proprietary.
Sent from your phone. You should be careful where you leave that thing.
Ive been running CM10.1 and just switched to SlimBean. I never once missed the new features of TW. The abilities of AOSP far outweigh them in my opinion.
Tw all the way..
I have no issues or lag... I was a big fan of liquid smooth for a bit but I went back to stock
Sent from my SGH-M919 using xda premium
for the people that switched
if u change to custom roms do u get any more space out of the sd card?? also does cyanogyn get better battery than stock cus i have ****ty battery life unrooted atm with stock
the67ace said:
if u change to custom roms do u get any more space out of the sd card?? also does cyanogyn get better battery than stock cus i have ****ty battery life unrooted atm with stock
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No to the extra sd space.
Possibly yes to the battery life. It greatly depends on how you set it up and what features you do and don't activate. Also the cm builds are nightly builds, which means any given one of them could have randomly crappy battery life due to a glitch or something. These have been great builds lately but that can always happen with nightlies. That aside though...yes you should get better battery life
Sent from my SGH-M919 using xda app-developers app
thanks, i will get a custom rom soon and try it out. this whole thing is just boggling my mind haha. at one point it was draining at around a percent a minute and i just came back from the gym, was listening to music the whole time on my headphones and using voice to control it and in those 45 mins i didnt lose a single percent of battery smh

Why can't Samsung make Touchwiz smooth?

Even on a super fast device like this one, Touchwiz is still garbage in terms of fluidity and smoothness compared to Sense. 6
I just switched from HTC One M8, and it was smoother than Touchwiz in almost every respect. Sure, some scenarios are nearly indistinguishable on both devices in terms of smoothness, but some are really bad on Note 4.
For example, whenever something happens in the background that requires storage access, the Note starts to chug.
Do this test on your device. Start updating 5-10 apps in the Play Store, then go and scroll in some other app. You will see immediately that the scrolling becomes jerky and sometimes stops completely for half a second when a new app starts updating. Sense doesn't do that. If you've never played with Sense 6, I suggest you go to a store and check it out - it's completely smooth regardless of what happens in the background.
It's as if Sense can utilize only idle cpu cycles for background processes, so everything remains smooth and fluid at all times, while Note 4 appears to give full real time priority for certain routines of background processes. For a modern flagship devices, this is unacceptable.
I really hope we can get root very soon, so developers can possibly fix this travesty.
How do we get Samsung to care about this? I took their survey from the email I got. I focused on speed and performance. How else can we alert Samsung? That people who care about speed and performance should have a voice?
Touchwiz is sorta like windows vista lmao
I doubt anyone on XDA uses Touchwiz versus Nova and the other choices.
chamberc said:
I doubt anyone on XDA uses Touchwiz versus Nova and the other choices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Touchwiz here refers to the entire Android "skin, " not just the launcher. You will have jerky performance of the kind I described in the op with Nova and any other launcher.
I have used Nova for years and the performance blows TW out of the water. No "jerkiness" at all.
chamberc said:
I doubt anyone on XDA uses Touchwiz versus Nova and the other choices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Tons of people use the TouchWiz launcher. Nova is nice, and I used it on my g3, but I need the stock widgets that can't be replicated.
OP. I agree to a point. Touchwiz is much more fluid that in the past. It has hiccups, but it's a trade off for feature rich software. It's odd, because the g3 lacked features and lagged worse than any phone I've owned. The m8 is buttery smooth, but it's also boring.
chamberc said:
I have used Nova for years and the performance blows TW out of the water. No "jerkiness" at all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You didn't even read what I wrote did you?
Rippley05 said:
Tons of people use the TouchWiz launcher. Nova is nice, and I used it on my g3, but I need the stock widgets that can't be replicated.
OP. I agree to a point. Touchwiz is much more fluid that in the past. It has hiccups, but it's a trade off for feature rich software. It's odd, because the g3 lacked features and lagged worse than any phone I've owned. The m8 is buttery smooth, but it's also boring.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't think it's a trade off. It feels like there's a fundamental problem with the way the skin is programmed by Samsung.
But I'm not an expert. It would be nice if a developer could chime in.
nabbed said:
You didn't even read what I wrote did you?
I don't think it's a trade off. It feels like there's a fundamental problem with the way the skin is programmed by Samsung.
But I'm not an expert. It would be nice if a developer could chime in.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You bet... Nova is far less laggy than touchwiz.
chamberc said:
You bet... Nova is far less laggy than touchwiz.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Please stop derailing the thread. Touchwiz is an android skin, not just the launcher. You can't use Nova while scrolling in a web browser, can you?
nabbed said:
Please stop derailing the thread. Touchwiz is an android skin, not just the launcher. You can't use Nova while scrolling in a web browser, can you?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOLOL he is just not getting what you're saying dude... give up on him... the rest of us understand exactly what you mean... cannot wait for root.... hopeful after reading the last few posts of this thread ---> http://forum.xda-developers.com/note-4-verizon/general/talk-root-t2908919/page18# we may be getting somewhere...
nabbed said:
You didn't even read what I wrote did you?
I don't think it's a trade off. It feels like there's a fundamental problem with the way the skin is programmed by Samsung.
But I'm not an expert. It would be nice if a developer could chime in.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not an expert either, but it's obvious, at least to me, that the more you cram into an OS..the more it taxes the hardware/software.
It is a tradeoff because everyone who has owned a Samsung device knows it will be this way..so we trade off butter smoothness for software features. Maybe Samsung will figure it out one day, maybe they won't.
HTC was the same way until they stripped Sense down to barebones. While it is nice to scroll on the m8, it is also boring for me to have such a generic feeling device. It's all about preference.
My N4 is very smooth. Especially compared to my G3. Only thing that lags is the recent apps button up, which is a bit disappointing as I use that all the time.
I agree with the issues with tw. Part of it has to do with the work on the Java threads which is why the choreographer process always drops frames which is the jitter. The kernels are also tuned differently and more for stability than anything else.
Rippley05 said:
I'm not an expert either, but it's obvious, at least to me, that the more you cram into an OS..the more it taxes the hardware/software.
It is a tradeoff because everyone who has owned a Samsung device knows it will be this way..so we trade off butter smoothness for software features. Maybe Samsung will figure it out one day, maybe they won't.
HTC was the same way until they stripped Sense down to barebones. While it is nice to scroll on the m8, it is also boring for me to have such a generic feeling device. It's all about preference.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Since you've made it abundantly clear that the launcher is a separate issue, how is sense boring, not counting the launcher?
Just about every Android Ive ever used gets herky jerky when apps are installing. Thunderbolt, GNex, Note 3, etc.
Samsung should be able to tune the response in things like recent apps though. I was using a DROID RAZR M recently and recent apps pops up instantly on that old thing. The Note 4 takes a good second or three to bring up recent apps depending how many recent apps are in there.
deefster said:
Since you've made it abundantly clear that the launcher is a separate issue, how is sense boring, not counting the launcher?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually. Where did I make it abundantly clear? May want to pay attention to what you read. Wasn't me.
Sense is boring to me. It's generic, doesn't offer a fraction of the software features and customization that samsung/LG offer. That's the tradeoff for being so smooth..and that's what I was talking about. Not the launcher.
I'm enjoying touch wiz. I don't see how u guys don't like it. If u don't like it then just don't buy a Samsung phone.
It's more of a fundamental issue with android in general. Here is an older article, but it explains the issue pretty well.
http://techland.time.com/2011/12/07/is-android-doomed-to-lag-more-than-ios/
Maybe lollipop will change how the UI is rendered , maybe not. But I don't think the lagginess is the sole product of touchwiz. Touchwiz does not modify the deep level coding that controls CPU access prority, ISR behavior, etc. Seems like Samsung is trying to do the best with what they got.
Here is some follow up on the guys original post where google developers comment.
https://plus.google.com/app/basic/stream/z13fzt2wrwaxwjqxc04cdx0jsve5hhl4b04
While I'm not a software engineer, I am an electrical and computer engineer. I quit my full time job and went back to school at 30 because I was tired of not being educated enough to understand the things I had questions about.
It's funny.. the more I learned the more I realized how astonishingly difficult it was/is to build the technology we have today. The amount of engineering that goes into designing today's modern processors is incredible. Now that I am "in the know" with exactly how these things work, it's a lot easier for me to understand the milestones and why things are the way they are (heat dissapation in modern multicore CPUs is one of those things that is hard to solve and even harder to explain to the layman why it's hard to solve, a commanding grasp of quantum physics and modern microscale transistor design theory is needed) and I don't get bothered by it, I realize that it's being worked on and I can identify the subtle improvements and I recognize the significance of those improvements.
The point is, it's easy to "blame" samsung or Google for the stuttering you are experiencing, but it's better to recognize the progress that's being made. The problem is not trivial to solve and to think it is or that "it should have been fixed by now" is really naive.
crazed_z06 said:
Just about every Android Ive ever used gets herky jerky when apps are installing. Thunderbolt, GNex, Note 3, etc.
Samsung should be able to tune the response in things like recent apps though. I was using a DROID RAZR M recently and recent apps pops up instantly on that old thing. The Note 4 takes a good second or three to bring up recent apps depending how many recent apps are in there.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is really the thing that bothers me the most. Bringing up recent apps is SO SLOW. There is a huge delay when you press that button. It really makes that feature useless for the stuff I use most, because I can just hit the home button and the app shortcut faster than using recent apps.

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