Hello everyone. This is "old" news but y'all should know that Box, cloud storage company, has a deal going on now through March 23. If you create an account through their app, then you get 50 gb free. I have always and will continue to be a firm supporter of Dropbox but there's no harm in taking this offer too. I'm not providing a link cuz its available in the Android Market/Google Play store.
i just signed up for this the other day, seems to work pretty well. the only problem I have with it is not android related, it is that my corporate firewall has blocked access to all online storage so i can't access the files on my computer. They block evernote and everything else useful too.
That's unfortunate, however I can understand why they would deny access to cloud storage sites. It's a necessary preventative step.
I signed up a while back when they were offering 50GBs for LG users using my Inc
Received a new Nexus 6P today, visited AT&T store and inserted SIM, phone works, all is fine.
Or so I thought...
While most apps appear to have installed automatically and I manually Un-Selected several Samsung apps so as to NOT install, there are a couple anomalies.
The major one is the Calendar as it appears to be missing many appointments and reminders previously setup on the Samsung S4 Active. There is no apparent Sync setting missing but out of 100 or so appointments about 20 or 24 are missing. That is just for April and May.,
Also, despite doing an AT&T Contacts Sync/Save before visiting the store, many contacts are missing. Is it a matter of manually pulling these from the AT&T Cloud storage ? If so, not clear where and how. The google contacts are visible in email and hangouts.
If I'm not mistaken, it sounds like you are missing this stuff because you are synced to services other than google. Samsung stuff and AT&T bloatware are not on the Nexus, so that could be why you can't access everything you had before. Sync all to google and you should be fine.
There are so many alternatives in the play store, but sticking to the question, what do you all use, or would you use if you had to choose between the two, on your Galaxy S8/+
Samsung Messages -or- Android Messages
Samsung Internet -or- Google Chrome
Samsung Calendar -or- Google Calendar
Samsung Calculator -or- Google Calculator
Samsung Email -or- Gmail/Inbox
Samsung Clock -or- Google Clock
Samsung Notes/Reminder -or- Google Keep
Samsung Touchwiz -or- Google Now Launcher
Samsung Health -or- Google Fit
Samsung Pay -or- Android Pay
The only Samsung apps I use are Internet, Clock and Phone. I prefer Google apps for sms messages, calendar, notes (Keep), and contactless payments. I use Nova Launcher with a Pixel theme. For email I prefer Blue Mail since it looks and works so much better than Samsung email or GMail.
Now that you put this in perspective, I just realized that I feel that MOST Samsung Apps are superior to the Google Apps, when I use a Samsung phone like I'm doing now with the S8+ I use ALL of them except Samsung Email and simply because they haven't added the option to be able to delete the emails from the Notification shade or the lockscreen, I have reported this a couple of times now and I hope they do it, I'm having sync issues with gmail from quite some time now (I'm not the only one as I can see on the forums), it comes and goes, but it's getting into my nerves already, and with the huge amount of emails I receive daily because of my work, I can't keep going to the app to delete them. But again, for the rest, I always use all that you mentioned here except email. When I use other manufacturer then I use ALL Google.
Internet - lightning fast, adblockers and Biometrics for passwords (I can sync my Chrome Desktop Bookmarks with their extension)
Calendar - Simply great, easy to use and even easier at some tasks.
Email - Even when I don't use it, I haven't had any issues with sync even when Gmail is, plus it reads my email just like a SMS when in my car. Great for their Ecosystem and Gear S3 specifically.
Notes - I use Evernote most of the time but when I don't want to, I've been passing my Galaxy Notes' Notes through the years and they sync perfectly even with Evernote.
Samsung Health - This one is just not fair, how limited Google and Apple's implementations are, sure they have a lot of connections with some apps, but SHealth out of the box and its own add-ons is simply a great and complete health tool.
Samsung Pay - In my case, with all my cards accepted by Samsung Pay, it can't be a single reason why I may choose Android Pay over Samsung Pay, Tap to Pay works basically the same PLUS the MST on the Samsung Pay is the *hit.
About launcher, I don't like Google Launcher and I've used Nova for years now, I've been giving the new Touchwiz a break in the past couple of days, and I like it but still miss my Nova Gestures a lot. One option I prefer Google over Samsung is the keyboard, currently using Gboard, Samsung keyboard is disabled.
All of the above of course are my opinions...Just in case
gestevez1213 said:
There are so many alternatives in the play store, but sticking to the question, what do you all use, or would you use if you had to choose between the two, on your Galaxy S8/+
Samsung Messages -or- Android Messages
Samsung Internet -or- Google Chrome
Samsung Calendar -or- Google Calendar
Samsung Calculator -or- Google Calculator
Samsung Email -or- Gmail/Inbox
Samsung Clock -or- Google Clock
Samsung Notes/Reminder -or- Google Keep
Samsung Touchwiz -or- Google Now Launcher
Samsung Health -or- Google Fit
Samsung Pay -or- Android Pay
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
erasat said:
Now that you put this in perspective, I just realized that I feel that MOST Samsung Apps are superior to the Google Apps, when I use a Samsung phone like I'm doing now with the S8+ I use ALL of them except Samsung Email and simply because they haven't added the option to be able to delete the emails from the Notification shade or the lockscreen, I have reported this a couple of times now and I hope they do it, I'm having sync issues with gmail from quite some time now (I'm not the only one as I can see on the forums), it comes and goes, but it's getting into my nerves already, and with the huge amount of emails I receive daily because of my work, I can't keep going to the app to delete them. But again, for the rest, I always use all that you mentioned here except email. When I use other manufacturer then I use ALL Google.
Internet - lightning fast, adblockers and Biometrics for passwords (I can sync my Chrome Desktop Bookmarks with their extension)
Calendar - Simply great, easy to use and even easier at some tasks.
Email - Even when I don't use it, I haven't had any issues with sync even when Gmail is, plus it reads my email just like a SMS when in my car. Great for their Ecosystem and Gear S3 specifically.
Notes - I use Evernote most of the time but when I don't want to, I've been passing my Galaxy Notes' Notes through the years and they sync perfectly even with Evernote.
Samsung Health - This one is just not fair, how limited Google and Apple's implementations are, sure they have a lot of connections with some apps, but SHealth out of the box and its own add-ons is simply a great and complete health tool.
Samsung Pay - In my case, with all my cards accepted by Samsung Pay, it can't be a single reason why I may choose Android Pay over Samsung Pay, Tap to Pay works basically the same PLUS the MST on the Samsung Pay is the *hit.
About launcher, I don't like Google Launcher and I've used Nova for years now, I've been giving the new Touchwiz a break in the past couple of days, and I like it but still miss my Nova Gestures a lot. One option I prefer Google over Samsung is the keyboard, currently using Gboard, Samsung keyboard is disabled.
All of the above of course are my opinions...Just in case
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yea man I feel torn apart by it all. This is what I use & feel about everything:
Samsung Internet: Much better than chrome with the included biometric scanning, ad block, and bookmark synchronization.
Samsung Email: Already integrates with Gmail should you decide to use your Gmail account. Meant for the S8
Samsung Calculator: Unit conversion and meant for the S8 with the infinity display
Samsung Clock: Meant for the S8
Samsung Keyboard: As much as I would like to use all-things-Samsung, I also swapped this out for the Google Keyboard. Gboard recognizes my swipes better. However Samsung recognizes that when I'm about to login into a site/app via email, it automatically populates my email as a keyword shortcut. Saves the time in typing out the entire email address.
Samsung Health: instant winner. No brainer
Samsung Pay: can be used basically everywhere. No brainer.
Samsung Notes/Reminder: I don't use this at all. I'm heavily invested into Google Keep, but there's no way to integrate Google Keep with the Samsung features, and the Samsung Reminders with Google Keep.
Samsung Launcher: I use the stock infinity launcher.
Samsung Messages: I love the unread notification icons and how the messenger is designed for the S8. I however don't like that voice recorded messages from the default app isn't supported by other Messengers, whereas Android messages has a couple more added features, that are support by more if not all phones and OS's, like gif images and location sharing.
I must be the only person that prefers chrome over the samsung broswer! I just think chrome looks so much better and its easier to use although admittedly i use chrome on my mac aswell so perhaps iam just so used to chrome that i find it hard to switch!! Not a massive fan of the stock email app but it does the job so its not a biggie for me! For the keyboard i use swiftkey simply because it knows me so well at this stage basically ha The samsung keyboard is great though. Stock messaging app is something i have never used on any phone and always opt for Textra but iam so far happy with the stock messaging app on the S8 and will continue using it for now!!
So, lets see...
Yup, contacts, browser, calendar, phone, messages, mail and lauuncher - all by Samsung.
From Google? I prefer photos over samsung gallery.
Bixby? Never, but also not Google assistant, not an ai person...
I think, the quality of Samsung apps has improved immensely, really like them now.
Two things to consider - the quality of the apps and how you feel about having your personal information sold to marketers for cash.
On the quality side I like Samsung's apps and they are well integrated with the UI and each other. I particularly like e-mail (I use Exchange), calendar, contacts, Internet, and gallery. All of those are backed up to Samsung Cloud which allows you to share them across Samsung devices (I have four besides my phone). You can get 50GB of storage for $.99 a month vs. the 15GB free provided. I like Samsung Cloud because of its tight integration. Your photos are virtually managed across all your devices so if I take a picture on my phone it appears in the gallery of my tablets. I love Scrapbook for grabbing business and personal things I want to save off the Internet and S Note for taking notes on my tablets and having them show up dynamically on my phone and PC. There's also a cool app called Cloud Together that allows you to have the files on your device shown side-by-side with all the popular cloud storage products. You can even have one cloud storage product shown side-by-side with another (EG: Dropbox<>OneDrive) to move files between them or your phone. Lastly, if you use a Gear (I do) you give up a ton of functionality when you don't use Samsung's native apps.
As for Google's apps, I'm not a fan. I don't think their designs and interfaces are that hot. But ultimately everything Google provides is done so for one reason only - to collect your data and sell it. Not only do I not use Google's apps I either uninstall or disable them. I'm kind of pissed because as of recently you can't use Android Auto without Google Music and Assistant enabled with all their location and awareness features active. Oh well, I need Android Auto more than I care about my data being harvested.
For some it's "pure Android" or bust and for others variety is good. To each their own.
This is a great thread, though admittedly I'm coming to it late in the game. I have long been a stock android kind of guy before coming to the Galaxy S8+. Suffice it to say, I stuck with the stock Google apps in the beginning. However, one week in, I'm slowly realizing that Samsung has done a really good job in some places. The browser is the best mobile browser I have ever used (chrome, brave, dolphin, link bubble, etc). The calculator is excellent. The alarm clock is fine, but I do prefer google's time selection method.
Meanwhile, I don't use Samsung or Google's keyboard; I use Swiftkey...and really miss Fleksy.
Google's calendar is vastly better. I love the way it populates locations.
Todoist is my task list. Their management is excellent but it's not free.
Evernote wines for a notepad.
Surprisingly mostly Samsung for me.
I use inbox for private mail and Samsung email for work mail. Switched from chrome to Samsung browser and am really happy with it.
I always use nova, because neither gnow not Sam's uh Ng provide the features.
All other apps I use stock samung. And they work really well.
BarryH_GEG said:
You can get 50GB of storage for $.99 a month vs. the 15GB free provided.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm also a big fan of Samsung's Cloud, but I haven't been able to figure out how to increase my storage above the 15GB. What's the trick? I'm using a Note 8 (and was using an S8 before), and have never been able to find the option enabled in my Manage Cloud setting. Thanks in advance!
If I wanted to use Android apps I'd have gotten a pixel...
Samsung apps also offer more features and conform to installed themes instead of their own bright whites and random colors.