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As many of you have likely already seen, the Nook Color is available for 179.99 today only (factory refurbished) at http://1saleaday.com/
I've been looking into getting a tablet lately, mostly for play - things like games, reading, and netflix. It seems like the Nook is a great "bang for the buck", and the devs have done some amazing work on it. I have a few questions before I take the dive though...
1. Battery Life.
How is the battery life while watching Netflix? While watching a movie on the SD-Card (let's assume 720P encoding). I notice that the Nook is rated at 8-10 hours with WiFi off, does that mean Wifi kills the battery, or just shaves off an hour or two?
2. Speed.
I understand that the Nook wasn't supposed to be a full fledged tablet, but the Devs have gotten some great ROMs for it that make it so. How is the speed? I want to make sure I'd use the tab over my phone when I'm at home, but my phone is actually quite fast (Atrix 4G, rooted, unlocked, running Alien2 with the OC kernel). Videos of the Nook with CM7 making it look very smooth with everything which is a huge plus (MotoBlur sucks, all animations on my phone are clunky... waiting for CM7 which is in alpha right now).
3. Gaming
I use my phone for moderate gaming, but it kinda sucks. I think that this will be my main focus on the Nook. Using emulators on my Atrix is a lesson a patience... The touch screen times out after 30 seconds of a finger being on the screen, so in games where you have to hold buttons a while, the screen becomes non-responsive. Because my phone's screen is small, it also makes playing a lot of emulators difficult as the buttons are on the screen itself. How do emulators run on the Nook? It looks like games from the market run just fine, which is great.
4. Shared Google account
My google account is tied into my phone right now, if I use the same account on the Nook, will I be able to install all of the same apps / games off of the market automatically?
5. Text Messaging
The Nook is Wifi only, so I know that Gtalk will work. What about SMS style messaging? Is there an app (or native in a ROM) ability to send / recieve text messages from the Nook while its on? This would make it so that I don't have to switch between devices at home in order to play games / watch a movie / whatever and talk to my phones.
Lastly.. what do you use your Tablet for? I know that I will play with this thing non-stop for a while, since its a new "toy". But other than running "old school" console games for a while (and Heroes of Might and Magic), I'm not sure what else I'd use the Tablet for considering that I own a very high end PC for gaming / programming, a MacBook Pro which sits on the coffee table in the TV room, an XboX for netflix streaming to the TV, and my much loved Atrix. I know that the tablet will be awesome while I'm playing with it and flashing ROMs, but from the experience of others... is it a passing fad for fun, or do you get a ton of use out of your tablet? If so, what do you use it for?
Any comments / questions are greatly appreciated. I've been looking into this for a few days, but now I'm on a time limit to buy the Nook on sale today, or wait for the next sale of a tablet.
DK
1) Battery life is amazing with the newer releases of CM7. I'm running 7.1 RC and left the wifi on when I finished charging it. After 24 hours in sleep I was only down 5%. After an hour use to update apps, browse online, etc, I was only down a few more percent.
2) Speed is great and just seems to get better with releases. Most people clock theirs to 1200 or 1300 (stock is 800) and run it daily like that. There is a lot of room to adjust for what you need/want.
3) I don't do a whole lot of gaming, but running something like Pocket Legends isn't a problem. I know some people are able to get Honeycomb only games running without problems. I think some require Tegra 2, so it shows how well this little thing performs.
4) Yes google account is shared. You purchase an app for your account and you can download it to both devices. The new market is device aware, so you may be able to purcahse and download to your phone, but not the Nook (if, for example, the app requires GPS), but there are ways around this.
5) I know SMS can be done, but I've never done it. Can't help here.
I love this little thing. For the price I don't see how you can pass it up. I use it for a little of everything: media, web, email. Probably the most use for me is having a nice little device to carry around documentation for work when I need to reference it.
If you have the money, thought about getting a tablet, and can do without camera, cell connection, it is definitely a great device to have.
I already have a NC but I went ahead an ordered one for the wife. She is a little jealous of mine so I figured why not for the price.
I use google voice to sms (can't call though without network), if you don't have a google voice account already, you can set it up, and connect it to your own phone number.
OK I play order and chaos. My tab burns through everything else ( even Nova 3 with no hiccups at all). But order and chaos, I'm getting at best 15 fps and nothing I do changes that. I've OC,ed this thing up to 1600 with no change whatsoever. I've tried multiple roms with different options and kernals. Has anybody found a fix or work around? I know the tab can blow this game away.
Wow, talk about a terrible experience. The MOJO is absolutely NOT ready for production. I was able to find maybe 10 games that were even compatible with it, and only ONE game that actually used the controller as advertised. NOVA 3 almost worked but even then there were some functions that didn't work (like swapping weapons, sorta important). The list of compatible games is misleading; many of those games will load, but they will not function with the controller (meaning: not at all).
Madcatz claims that the TegraZone games will work with the MOJO - that is a lie. Only a handful of them actually work. A gaming console that only works with a handful of games is pretty useless.
I updated the firmware exactly as instructed, and after rebooting the wifi did not work at all (it did before the update). An Android console without functional wifi is a paperweight.
I am going to return this unit and try to get a Nvidia Shield instead. I got the MOJO for my kid for Christmass. Talk about a disappointment. Luckily he also got a PS4, so it wasn't a total disaster.
The MOJO is an interesting concept, and if they ever get it working right it might - *might* - be worth the money. But as of now, no, not even close. Stay FAR away from this thing for now. You've been warned.
I'm starting to agree....Out of the 372 apps I've purchased, only five were compatible and able to download. I've sideloaded a couple, but cannot map the controller properly.
I'll give it a few more days and some tinkering.
I wished to read this before I buy it back to ouya without developer MOJO = 0 with all respect
ExtremeRyno said:
I'm starting to agree....Out of the 372 apps I've purchased, only five were compatible and able to download. I've sideloaded a couple, but cannot map the controller properly.
I'll give it a few more days and some tinkering.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Interested in selling it?
Not just yet..I've been sideloading apps all day. Watching some streaming movies on it right now. It's a very capable machine, but fairly annoying having to sideload anything useful.
Well so far little disappointed but I like it just waiting until root which hopefully we can mod the build prop to show apps in store. Don't side load much using a aptoide. . From what I understand the tegra 4 still pretty new so I'm guessing that's why some of these games not playing. Patience it will get better
Yeah...Updated the firmware and now the Wifi is dead. Unable to "Turn On." WTF....
Yea the way I've mostly gotten over the No apps work issue is by sideloading. Its annoying though because if there's feature updates you have to backup from my other devices, transfer and install again to get the updates. The power is nice though. Nova 3 and Dead trigger look good even though their not a very good games its still a good showing of what the Mojo can do. And if you're into emulators most of them out there work great with the controller and have no trouble doing kool stuff. Unfortunately at the moment the mojo is mostly making me excited for a Minix device with equivalent specs as Minix devices don't have the same app store issue.
What are you using for your backups? I tried AppMonster, but haven't had a chance to sideload the backups to the MOJO yet.
Titanium Backup on a rooted device. It just backs apks to a zip file. If there's extra data I just move the obb files over manually via an sd card.
ExtremeRyno said:
Yeah...Updated the firmware and now the Wifi is dead. Unable to "Turn On." WTF....
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This. When this happened, that's when I decided to return it. It's a paperweight without wifi.
fisterkev said:
This. When this happened, that's when I decided to return it. It's a paperweight without wifi.
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Yea that really sux. That's the kind of stuff that you never want to see happen.
To be honest this feels more like a developer/beta release. The hardware is there and is for the most part great, could use an off/off button and an otg port. But the way it interacts with the ecosystem that currently exists is much too, I hate to say it, fragmented. There are more apps coming to the play store and I've seen a few pop in the last couple of days but its still hasn't hit anywhere near that critical mass point where its useable for anyone without some android nerdery. Which begs the question why didn't Mad Catz support that nerdery with things like an otg port, pre root/root tools at launch etc. Though the pre-bootloader unlock is a good start.
Its also clear google really has no interest in this kind of product YET by the way that the play store is currently laid out and hides paid apps from the main frontend, you have to search for paid apps specifically or by type. Its really going to be a rough year of slow apps incoming and building up momentum about this time next year I think it might start to be a valid for some main stream gamers. I'm worried that Mad Catz might feel that's too long to support and update this new market product. Luckily the markets going to grow either way but I'd like to see this product along for the ride.
All that being said I use this product every day, really like it, and whenever I'm home its on and being used in some way. Be that gaming, local movies, streaming video, or music but I took a path to set it up that very very few will and most I fear will have the same experience with '**** don't work then I updated It and less **** works. Return'. And that really sux.
So, I purchased from Amazon on 26th Dec. (Note, I'm REALLY trying to like this device because I really like the hardware). As an update to the OP info, mine came with firmware 0110 and NOVA 3's weapon change works fine, but the buttons are mapped really stupid - the trigger is not the fire button, the shoulder button is. Trigger changes weapons.
NFS MW installed from backed-up APK, and it detects controller and says you can set it up in the config menu, but you cannot get to the config menu with either controller, keyboard, or mouse, so it is unplayable.
I got a Real Racing 3 APK from a bad place and it does not seem to support controllers at all, and also does not seem to recognize the Tegra, so it is terrible looking and unplayable.
Shadowgun works great and you can assign all functions to buttons on the controller. This was also a backed-up APK. You cannot install the THD version; even if you could get the APK on there it won't let you dl the THD data.
Overall, my experience has been terrible. Yay! I'm so excited!
defectivedonkey said:
So, I purchased from Amazon on 26th Dec. (Note, I'm REALLY trying to like this device because I really like the hardware). As an update to the OP info, mine came with firmware 0110 and NOVA 3's weapon change works fine, but the buttons are mapped really stupid - the trigger is not the fire button, the shoulder button is. Trigger changes weapons.
NFS MW installed from backed-up APK, and it detects controller and says you can set it up in the config menu, but you cannot get to the config menu with either controller, keyboard, or mouse, so it is unplayable.
I got a Real Racing 3 APK from a bad place and it does not seem to support controllers at all, and also does not seem to recognize the Tegra, so it is terrible looking and unplayable.
Shadowgun works great and you can assign all functions to buttons on the controller. This was also a backed-up APK. You cannot install the THD version; even if you could get the APK on there it won't let you dl the THD data.
Overall, my experience has been terrible. Yay! I'm so excited!
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I find the controller works better if I switch it do mouse mode or PC mode, depending on the game.
It's the game developers who must designate that a controller can be used for their game. If they don't, then no dice. Can't blame them tho, how could they have seen devices like these coming. I'm willing to bet almost EVERY new game becomes controller compatible. Hang in.. Still brand new device. Developers will adapt. And besides, unlike a ps2, it won't become outdated as fast. Games will just continue to improve!
Mojorising said:
I find the controller works better if I switch it do mouse mode or PC mode, depending on the game.
It's the game developers who must designate that a controller can be used for their game. If they don't, then no dice. Can't blame them tho, how could they have seen devices like these coming. I'm willing to bet almost EVERY new game becomes controller compatible. Hang in.. Still brand new device. Developers will adapt. And besides, unlike a ps2, it won't become outdated as fast. Games will just continue to improve!
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Aww, we can blame the developers a little bit. I mean, come on, ANDROID developers? They often hang out on this very site where people have been hacking their butts off for years adding controller support to games. It might be a big deal to add controller support to a finished game if it wasn't developed with that in mind but I'm with you, it will be expected in the future.
In the mean time I would really like it if we could install one of those apps that lets you map buttons to touchscreen presses. That would help a lot!
defectivedonkey said:
Aww, we can blame the developers a little bit. I mean, come on, ANDROID developers? They often hang out on this very site where people have been hacking their butts off for years adding controller support to games. It might be a big deal to add controller support to a finished game if it wasn't developed with that in mind but I'm with you, it will be expected in the future.
In the mean time I would really like it if we could install one of those apps that lets you map buttons to touchscreen presses. That would help a lot!
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Yes, but developers have been working on gamepad support. The MOGA supposedly has 230 games which work with their controllers, which happens to be a great feat because often developers are not likely to upgrade their older stuff (gameloft is notorious for this where their old games are "not compatible" with newer devices, even if the resolution is the same and the hardware more powerful.
solsearch said:
Yes, but developers have been working on gamepad support. The MOGA supposedly has 230 games which work with their controllers, which happens to be a great feat because often developers are not likely to upgrade their older stuff (gameloft is notorious for this where their old games are "not compatible" with newer devices, even if the resolution is the same and the hardware more powerful.
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I think I got distracted writing the post you replied to. When I was talking about "controller support" I really meant to say something like button mapping. You know? Essentially, you let android handle the input device, and just have a method to map input signals to your calls. Like, how the emulators let you map each button press of a controller to an action in the emulator. By abstracting away the interface to the actual controller, ANY android supported device could be mapped. You would never have to worry about someone building a new controller that you have to write non-reusable code for. This MOGA nonsense just seems dirty, but then again, I'm not an Android dev, so there may be something more to it than I realize. I just can't put together in my head how I'd even write something that didn't abstract the input -- what if I wanted to change it later? I don't know....I hate the idea of "Support the MOGA!" "Support the CNTRLR!" No -- support everything! It SHOULD be easier!
defectivedonkey said:
I think I got distracted writing the post you replied to. When I was talking about "controller support" I really meant to say something like button mapping. You know? Essentially, you let android handle the input device, and just have a method to map input signals to your calls. Like, how the emulators let you map each button press of a controller to an action in the emulator. By abstracting away the interface to the actual controller, ANY android supported device could be mapped. You would never have to worry about someone building a new controller that you have to write non-reusable code for. This MOGA nonsense just seems dirty, but then again, I'm not an Android dev, so there may be something more to it than I realize. I just can't put together in my head how I'd even write something that didn't abstract the input -- what if I wanted to change it later? I don't know....I hate the idea of "Support the MOGA!" "Support the CNTRLR!" No -- support everything! It SHOULD be easier!
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Click to collapse
You mentioned the mapping but as an app. And I wasn't talking about MOGA versus CNTRL either. I was thinking more along the lines like with Windows PCs they have generic controller recognition (sure, you can install apps and drivers for better compatibility) where you normally get at least basic functionality. But yeah, one could avoid those problems if they had the same functionality of emulators where they map functionality based on the readings when buttons are pressed. It would make things quite a bit easier in general for them (a little but more work for us but only when playing a game for the first time).
The next app I'm gonna rip from my tablet is the Sixaxis app that allows you to map the buttons for the PS3 controller. I use it on my tablet for any possible game. You can assign buttons swipe actions, too. Very handy. There are a few other apps out there that do this with generic BT controllers, so we might just have to start trying them out. MadCatz surely should have created one for the MOJO before it was ever released. This was a big stupid on their part.
Hello All,
This is Nathan from Mad Catz. Our apologies for the inconveniences you've been facing. I unfortunately could not replicate your wifi problem. One note is that most MOJOs that have been made available should have already been on "MO0110-WW", so this step could be skipped if you don't need it.
Before any update, you can also go into your google account settings, choose your account, and then choose "Sync now" from the menu in the top right. If wifi is not working, you can use a wired ethernet connection to at least do this step. If you're forced to do the "factory reset" option to fix the wifi, when you do the initial setup again, choose to "restore" from your google account. Outside of apps that have been sideloaded, this should start downloads of everything that was downloaded from the google play store shortly after the initial setup is finished. You can check which ones are being re-downloaded by going into the Play Store and then checking your "My apps".
I'm on the T-Mo s7 Edge, and, for the most part, I love the phone. However, it REALLY slows down from time-to-time, and it's driving me bonkers. It has crashed three times (rebooted) while using Google Maps, in fact.
The performance issues seem most common while listening to Google Play Music. I don't seem to have issues on other devices, and I'm not sure what is going on. Is anyone else having similar trouble?
QMaverick said:
I'm on the T-Mo s7 Edge, and, for the most part, I love the phone. However, it REALLY slows down from time-to-time, and it's driving me bonkers. It has crashed three times (rebooted) while using Google Maps, in fact.
The performance issues seem most common while listening to Google Play Music. I don't seem to have issues on other devices, and I'm not sure what is going on. Is anyone else having similar trouble?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not having any issues here man I listen to Google play music every day. Not sure single problem. Everything is great with this update. I'm getting a hour more of SOT
when we face our problems, they dissappear. So, learn from failure and let success be the silent incentive
Poo...I wonder if I've got something going on in the background that's killing it. I guess I'll investigate further. Thinking of disabling Lookout, as it's one of the few things I have on my phone that's doing things in the background a lot . . .
Lookout needs to be killed with fire.
Have you tried safe mode? If it works fine in safe mode then it has to be software related and so an app has to be responsible. Try package disabler from Google play. Mine flies though. It's literally the most satisfying product I've ever purchased. Sorry if you're having problems.
Software Section
Performance/Power Setting
I have been intrigued with the "performance/power" section of the settings on the Shield k1. I only got my tablet just a few days ago but have already found some things I didn't see mentioned on XDA. I'm sure this stuff is all over the forum buried somewhere, but I didn't see it mentioned so I figured I would post it for those interested. In this section I am going to show the minimum and maximum processor states for each mode under "Performance/Power" in the settings app. Before posting I would like to point out that whatever you choose for these settings are system wide and override EVERYTHING else that you try to use, such as app optimization or even gltools. If you set "Limit Frame Rate" under custom to 20, nothing will get you more than 20 fps in any game. Even if you command it higher with app optimization or some other way. This also applies to watching videos or anything system wide, so be aware.
Max performance
Min = 1224 mhz
Max = 2218 mhz
Optimized <------------ Most people should use this
Min = 204 mhz
Max = 2218 mhz
Battery Saver
Min = 204 mhz
Max = 1530 mhz
Custom **
Min = 1122 mhz
Max = 2218
**Custom turns out to be the worst choice of the bunch. First off the "CPU Cores" setting does absolutely zero. You can set the cores to 2, 3, or 4, and no matter what, 4 cores will always run. It does nothing to disable the cores. One thing to note here is that when you start disabling cores, there WILL be an impact on benchmarks even though the cores aren't turning off. I am not sure exactly what's happening here, but something is going on with the frequencies or something that I cannot detect. Next is the "CPU Frequency" which does work, however setting it to the lowest possible setting will only net you a minimum processor state of 1122 mhz, much higher than you can get in the other options. So this would not help you in any way for battery life. The max processor speed doesn't go any higher than the others either, so there is no advantage (battery life or performance) to using custom. The final section of custom is "Limit Frame Rate" and it works as well. However, limiting the frame rate is something that is usually done to conserve battery life, but since you are stuck with a rather high minimum processing speed (1122 mhz), then any battery life you may gain from the lowered FPS will be lost with the processor drain. Your best bet is to set the processor state to "optimized" as it has the lowest AND highest achievable clock speeds (for best battery life and performance) and then turn the FPS down under app optimization if needed.
App Optimization Setting <------------ Most people should leave this setting untouched (disabled)
All settings under app optimization work as expected except of course the Max CPU cores again. It does nothing. The Frequency limit does work as well as the frame rate limit. All options works as expected except turning off the cores. For the most performance and battery life it would be best to use the "optimized" power plan from above, and then go into the app optimization and turn down the Max CPU frequency as far as you can without experiencing lag. You can also adjust the resolution if the loss in quality doesn't bother you. I personally don't touch anything in app optimization. I play pretty graphic intensive games so need my processor cores to run at 100% because I hate lag. I also don't like running LCDs at anything other than native resolution so I don't adjust that. Frame rate limit is a waste as the panel automatically caps it to 60 (the max it can display) and I want to see as many frames as possible.
That leaves "Optimize System Memory". This has been a hard one to benchmark, but here is what I've noticed. With this setting enabled it seems that I lose 2-4 frames when the tablet gets loaded up. If you run an FPS monitor you will notice that occasionally the FPS will dip when too much is going on. Well when these dips happen and "Optimize System Memory" is enabled, I find that it dips lower by a few frames.
I almost exclusively do not touch app optimization. The only time I would use this is for a game that took very little resources to run (PVZ2). I would turn the processor clocks down to 50% to conserve battery, but that is about the only use I see for it.
GLTools
This is what I use to monitor FPS. I have been unable to squeeze any extra performance out of any game using this. The only thing this app can do to help frames is reduce resolution, but you can do that with the "app optimization" section in the main settings. This app does many other things for compatibility, but they aren't useful to me at this time. I just use it to monitor FPS, as FPS METER crashes the tablet in both the rooted and non-rooted versions. I was really hoping that forcing anti-aliasing to off in the games would help with the frames, but it appears to do nothing. I suspect that most of the games for android don't have anti-aliasing to begin with, which is why turning it off doesn't seem to help. Bummer.
Gamestream
I have figured out a way to get gamestream to work with zero lag. It's as if my PC was connected directly to the TV and sitting on the floor below it. I cannot tell that the PC is in another room and broadcasting over wifi. I have a decent home network, but nothing special. When I first set it all up there was so much input lag that I considered it unplayable. I have since figured out why and it's perfect. I can't even believe it every time I use it, it's almost too good to be true. The trick is that you need to pair your controller directly to the PC and not the tablet, this will eliminate the lag. When I paired the Xbox One controller directly to the Shield K1 over bluetooth, the controls would work, but there was noticeable input lag if too many inputs where happening in a short time. I then bought the wireless adapter for the controller and paired it directly to my PC via wifi and the problems were solved. This is another great thing about the new Xbox One controller, it has both wifi direct and bluetooth so you can use either.
Zero lag setup:
Mid-high grade AC router
Comcast 30mbps cable internet connection
Router connected to PC via cat 6
5ghz signal to the Shield K1
Xbox One controller paired directly to the PC via wifi
"Game mode" enabled in TV settings
With the above setup I have a 1ms delay which isn't detectable to my eye. Gamestream works better than I expected and I plan on using it quite a bit. Geforce Now looks interesting, but I have no intentions of doing any testing with it. I don't like monthly fees and I have tried streaming services in the past; there is just too much delay for me.
Hardware Section
Dual Shock 4
What a mess. This is one of the best controllers money can buy. It's comfortable, it has a touch pad, the analog sticks are amazing, excellent d-pad, it has the highest quality build, it's rechargeable, and it just doesn't work with android.... If you try to connect the controller directly through the bluetooth section in settings, it will connect and then within 30 seconds be lagging like crazy. I then installed "sixaxis controller" (requires root) and connected that way. Controller worked almost perfect with this app and it let me totally customize the controller. However some things were still broken. For example in the game Half-Life 2 Episode One, the d-pad doesn't function correctly. No matter what I try to do to the mappings, it just won't work right. It works in some menus, but not most. Too bad because this is a really great controller. One last thing to note. I connected this to my S7 Edge running Nougat (hoping that the new native gamepad support would do something) and it connected right away. However the controller did absolutely nothing. I could see that it was connected and it showed up in the bluetooth menu, but no buttons would respond and games wouldn't detect it. Too bad.
Nvidia Shield Controller (1st gen)
I did not test this controller for a very specific reason; it does not use bluetooth. All of the big-name companies have moved over to bluetooth. Sony has always used it, Microsoft just added it, and even the next Nvidia Shield controller is bluetooth. The bluetooth option has lower bandwidth and less range than the wifi controllers, but is more power efficient. Who needs a controller that can stay connected at 200 feet when you can't even see the TV from that far? LOL There also seems to be zero difference in latency between the wifi and bluetooth variants, so I would pick a bluetooth controller for the energy savings.
Amazon Fire TV Controller (1st gen)
Well this thing sucks. I got this when I purchased my first Amazon Fire TV and use it occasionally. I hooked it up to the Shield for testing and I was not impressed. The d-pad likes to click multiple directions at a time (even when you are extra careful), I literally had it register an up and a down at the same time LOL. Not only this but the trigger buttons for some reason have compatibility problems with a lot of games, sometimes the controller randomly loses connection and you have to pull the batteries for 30 seconds to get it reconnected, the thing just sucks. It's something you use when you just want to play a quick game on your Amazon TV or hand it to a little kid to play some games for a bit, it's not to be taken seriously. Oh and the "dead zones" on the sticks are way to wide. You can move the stick about 25% in any direction before anything responds on screen. And sometimes for no reason at all there will be delay between button presses. Just stay away from this one, seriously.
Xbox One S Controller (bluetooth)
Well this controller comes in at a close second to the Dual Shock 4, but has one major advantage; it works. You power this thing on, hit the connect button, and connect it straight to the tablet in the settings menu under bluetooth. That's it. No special apps or mapping problems, or lag, or stutters. It works exactly like it would on an Xbox. You hold the home button and it auto connects to the tablet and when you are done you hold the home button and the light goes out and it powers down. All mapping is done for you and everything works perfectly (new info below). The analog sticks are great, the new d-pad is a ton better than the old 360 one, it's nice and clicky now. This is a great controller and it's on sale right now everywhere for $49.99 so you should pick one up. Also, if you plan on gaming a lot you may want to get the rechargeable battery unless you like buying a ton of AA batteries and swapping them out. These new controllers charge with a standard micro USB cable, so it's super convenient to get the charging pack.
**update**
Turns out this setup isn't exactly perfect either. It may be an Android 6.0 problem though because it doesn't act like this on my s7e running 7.0, who knows. Everything works as described above, but if you reboot the tablet, toggle bluetooth, or enter console mode (VERY annoying) the controller will need to be deleted and paired again. It wouldn't be such a big deal if console mode didn't trigger it because you can avoid rebooting and toggling bluetooth, but the console mode thing is a huge inconvenience. I really hope this gets fixed, either by android or microsoft updates because it really messes up an almost perfect controller experience. Also, to properly pair the controller you have to use the pairing button at the top. When you first power on the controller with the xbox button it will try to pair with the tablet, don't let it and instead hold the connect button on top of the controller to enter pairing mode (the light will flash fast) and then select the controller from the bluetooth list to pair. If you don't do it this way, the controller will never actually talk to the tablet.
Dual Shock 3
It's a Dual Shock 4 without a touchpad so it has the same issues.
Nvidia Shield Controller (2nd gen)<------------------ Buy this controller
I just purchased the new Shield TV and it came with this controller. What a great controller this one is, definitely rivals the Xbox and Sony controllers for quality and performance. However this has one major advantage over the other two, it works perfectly with the Shield Tablet, Shield TV, and any other bluetooth device that you want to connect it to (as long as it isn't a PC lol). This brings me to the one single problem with this controller, it doesn't work right with PC, yet. When you connect it to a PC via bluetooth, it connects just fine and actually does work, however the mappings are wrong so when you push up on the left analog stick it registers as a trigger pull or something. I have a ticket opened to get this controller fixed for PC so I'm sure it won't be long before they fix it or I fix it myself. I am trying to find the config file on my PC that generates when you install this controller, then I could fix the mappings myself. Unfortunately this makes Gamestream unusable as the input lag is just too much for me when connecting straight to the tablet. Once the mapping is fixed this controller will be flawless for any Shield device, Android device, or even as a full time PC controller. Even though this controller has the mapping problem, it does eliminate the bluetooth glitch that the Xbox controller has (where if you toggle bluetooth it has to be re-paired to the tablet), so that effectively makes it the number one choice for controllers at this time. It also has a capacitive volume slider built into the face of the controller and is rechargeable right out of the box as well. So far the battery life has been insane. I never even charged it when I took it out of the box Thursday and have been using it multiple times a day for at least an hour each time and it still has over 50% charge. It doesn't look like it has lost a percent honestly lol The controller also powers down automatically after you don't touch it for five minutes and then when you pick it up it auto powers up and reconnects for you.
Game Specific Section
Order & Chaos 2
O&C2 is a beast of a game, it's like the Crysis for mobile. The game doesn't even look that amazing, I think it is just poorly optimized (just like Crysis), at least Crysis is beautiful though. The game has a hard cap at 30 fps, so don't expect any more than that no matter what you do to the settings. I have found through my testing that the best mix of visual and performance is the following:
In game settings:
Graphics profile = Optimal
Render scale = 100%
Frame rate limitation = 30
Crowd control = slider all the way up
Dead Effect 2
This is one of the best looking mobile games to date and is optimized for Nvidia, which is great for us. This game actually looks almost as good as Crysis, but doesn't run as poorly. It has been optimized very well. There also happens to be a lot of graphical adjustment in the settings which allows for fine tuning. Through testing I have found the game to look amazing and run 45-60 fps (no matter how much action on screen) with the following settings:
In game settings:
Visual Quality = Custom
Shader Quality = Medium
Effect Quality = Medium
Model Quality = High
Texture Quality = Full
Shadow Quality = Low
Bloom = Low
Plants Vs Zombies 2
Pvz2 also has a hard cap of 30 FPS and there is no adjustment of the graphics in the settings menu. I have found that the game runs at a locked 30 FPS even with the processor at 50%, so this is where I leave it to conserve battery life.
App optimization settings:
Performance Setting = Custom
Max CPU Cores = 4
Max CPU Frequency = 50%
Frame Rate Limit = Off
Resolution Rendering = Native
Optimize System Memory = Off
Real Racing 3
Real Racing 3 runs pretty well. Most of the time the FPS stays locked at 60, but when there is a lot going on it can dip to 30 or just below. There are no in game graphics adjustments and I wouldn't turn the processor down at all because you will need full power when there are 10+ cars on the screen.
Do not adjust.
Doom 3
It's funny I remember 10 or more years ago when Doom 3 came out and I was upset that my PC couldn't run it LOL Now we can play it on a tablet that fits in our pocket. Anyway, I couldn't do much testing with this game as GLTools wouldn't show the FPS, it glitched out when I enabled it. The game has no graphical adjustment in it's setting as well and I wouldn't reccommend turning the processor down in app optimization without being able to confirm the impact. Game runs great though. The only issue I found was popping through my bluetooth headset, that could have been the headset.
Do not adjust.
Oceanhorn
What a great little game this is, really reminds me of Zelda. This game is very well optimized and never misses a beat. It looks and plays fantastic. I would like to see more quality games like this come out in the future, this kind of stuff can give consoles a run for their money. I have the in game settings turned all the way up and the processor set to 50% in app optimization and the FPS never dips more than a couple frames. This is a game that everyone should check out.
App optimization settings:
Performance Setting = Custom
Max CPU Cores = 4
Max CPU Frequency = 50%
Frame Rate Limit = Off
Resolution Rendering = Native
Optimize System Memory = Off
Pretty useful information, thanks bro
Good to see your reference to order and chaos 2, it's the only game I enjoy playing. I have bought a shield basically to stop hammering my Galaxy S7's battery all the time.
crash_194 said:
Good to see your reference to order and chaos 2, it's the only game I enjoy playing. I have bought a shield basically to stop hammering my Galaxy S7's battery all the time.
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That's my main game, I play every day. You can squeeze a lot more performance out of the game if you start to reduce the graphics quality, but I'm big on visuals.
I have in my possession an Xbox One S controller, Dualshock 3, DualShock 4, and an Amazon controller. I will be doing a comparison in one of my reserved posts above. I also just downloaded Half-Life 2 episode 1 and was doing some testing with gamestream last night as well. I will be adding information about all of that as soon.
seh6183 said:
That's my main game, I play every day. You can squeeze a lot more performance out of the game if you start to reduce the graphics quality, but I'm big on visuals.
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O&C2 is a very good looking game, I hate to reduce the visual quality too much. I do think crowd control needs a happy medium though as it can get rather chaotic when loads of people start letting off AOE attacks.
I tried playing the game on a 2013 nexus 7 which I also own, it just doesn't have enough grunt though unfortunately and is an absolute lag fest. Can't wait for the K1 to land hopefully later this week.
crash_194 said:
O&C2 is a very good looking game, I hate to reduce the visual quality too much. I do think crowd control needs a happy medium though as it can get rather chaotic when loads of people start letting off AOE attacks.
I tried playing the game on a 2013 nexus 7 which I also own, it just doesn't have enough grunt though unfortunately and is an absolute lag fest. Can't wait for the K1 to land hopefully later this week.
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I couldn't squeeze any more frames out with crowd control, where do you suggest I test to do this? Also would you mean by wait for the K1 to land?
seh6183 said:
I couldn't squeeze any more frames out with crowd control, where do you suggest I test to do this? Also would you mean by wait for the K1 to land?
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I only just ordered one the other day mate and I'm waiting for it to arrive! Lol I'm a bit slow on the uptake I'm just speaking from experience of O&C2 on my Galaxy S7 at the minute.
crash_194 said:
I only just ordered one the other day mate and I'm waiting for it to arrive! Lol I'm a bit slow on the uptake I'm just speaking from experience of O&C2 on my Galaxy S7 at the minute.
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Gotcha, I just got mine the other day too. I would root it immediately if I were you because it wipes the device and I had to download all my games again. It took me like 3 minutes to unlock the bootloader, flash custom recovery, and root it. Great device. I use an s7 edge and the performance is comparable, but the k1 edges it out. However you won't be playing on your s7 much anymore lol. Once you get used to the 8 inch and the speakers, your phone will feel like a joke, I laugh when I pick it up haha. I only use it as a last resort. The k1 fits into my back pocket so I have it with me most of the time.
seh6183 said:
Gotcha, I just got mine the other day too. I would root it immediately if I were you because it wipes the device and I had to download all my games again. It took me like 3 minutes to unlock the bootloader, flash custom recovery, and root it. Great device. I use an s7 edge and the performance is comparable, but the k1 edges it out. However you won't be playing on your s7 much anymore lol. Once you get used to the 8 inch and the speakers, your phone will feel like a joke, I laugh when I pick it up haha. I only use it as a last resort. The k1 fits into my back pocket so I have it with me most of the time.
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That is good to hear! At the risk of going off topic, are you using a case and screen protector? If so, what sorts?
crash_194 said:
That is good to hear! At the risk of going off topic, are you using a case and screen protector? If so, what sorts?
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Nvidia folding cover and stylus on the way.
I have been using the stylus and the flip cover for over a week now and they are both great. The cover is necessary really as there is no way to prop the tablet up without it. I usually yank it off when I am gaming or holding the tablet with one hand (that's what's great about magnets), but leave it on as protection when moving around and to prop it up for viewing. The stylus isn't nearly as good as a Wacom stylus, but works well enough and I definitely find it useful for web browsing or editing a picture.
Also, I have purchased both the Microsoft Folding Keyboard and Logitech Ultrathin Touch Mouse for when I need to do some serious editing or school work. Every human being should buy that mouse immediately at the very least. The keyboard is optional as Googles voice dictation works nearly flawless, almost negating the need for a keyboard, but that mouse, buy it. The top surface of the mouse doubles as a touch pad and works great for android. I can control the entire tablet 5 feet away at work with one finger or at home 15 feet away when it's connected to the TV. Check out the reviews for it, it's definitely worth it.
Anyone play sky force reloaded?
_-..zKiLLA..-_ said:
Anyone play sky force reloaded?
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No but that looks like some good Ole fashioned fun right there lol
seh6183 said:
No but that looks like some good Ole fashioned fun right there lol
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It's amazing. It's gets very hectic though and can be laggy on some devices. I get my k1 tomorrow so my fingers are crossed lol
_-..zKiLLA..-_ said:
It's amazing. It's gets very hectic though and can be laggy on some devices. I get my k1 tomorrow so my fingers are crossed lol
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The k1 is a fricken beast and you have nothing to worry about lol
Guide updated with core information and Shield 2017 controller addition.
Really informative post seh6183.
Thank you. I also bought the new controller (kept the NSTV V1 as for now it's the same as the V2)