Repair-It

My V30 was shoved into the mailbox when I got home (USPS). Of course I brought it right in, plugged it in and turned it on.

A few quick notes on the used aspect:
- Came with a Samsung wall brick (lol) and USB-C cable (my first USB-C device ever). It charges the phone quite well.
- The phone was double bubble wrapped but otherwise loose in the box. This would be fine for any phone but given the MIL-STD-810G, not an issue whatsoever.
- The phone appeared to be in mint condition. It did not have any plastic on the screen as you would be able to satisfyingly peel off on a new phone, but it otherwise appears to have zero imperfections at all. Considering this was $220 and was among the cheapest non-broken used V30 I found on eBay, I am quite satisfied. I think the "seller refurbished" did pretty much suggest this would be my outcome. Also generally, I have found that the condition is always one notch above what is advertised, to keep the buyer happy. I.e. if it says "used phone, some scuffs and scratches are possible," you can basically count on it being mint. Many use a condition standard and again, "seller refurbished" or "manufacturer refurbished" should be about the same as mint or at least excellent.
- It booted up in "as new" reset type conditions. It also came with the original shipping OS, 7.x.x whatever it was.

Side note, here is a rundown of what MIL-STD-810G is.
https://www.ubergizmo.com/what-is/mil-std-810g/

It was created as a shipping/transport standard but does convey some durability conclusions about the material (device). I don't know if every 810G test is invoked or just a subset. I will have to dig more and see how thoroughly compliant the V30 is. 810G is NOT "military hardened" the way a Panasonic Toughbook is, for example.

Some quick words based on less than 24 hours of ownership (and even less of actual usage).

This hardware is absolutely beautiful, well designed, and feels great in hand. I am very impressed. It is surprisingly thin, and the screen to bezel ratio is one of the industry's highest. The 18:9 (i.e. 2:1) display is very wide/tall. It is 2880×1440. This has several implications worth mentioning:
- My 1520 was 15:9 which was actually more square than 16:9. This means it was a very wide 6" phone. The V30 is quite a bit narrower.
- My 1520 also had dedicated capacitive buttons along the bottom, meaning none of the actual screen was wasted for soft buttons. Contrasting to the V30 where there is some number of pixels high worth of back/home/multitasking buttons so some of that height (and thus diagonal) is not typically usable, though you CAN hide those buttons so I guess it gets a pass.
- 16:9 video content has bars on the sides though the Youtube app will let you zoom in to fill the screen (and crop a little of the top and bottom in the process). This means for video viewing, the actual display image is smaller than what I had on my 1520.
- Overall the screen "feels" smaller than my 1520. But as a result, it is probably the smallest form factor currently on the market for a 6" screen. People are going to be surprised this is a 6" phone when they look at it and hold it. One hand usage is generally less clumsy than my 1520 as a result, even if I do feel like I downgraded to a little smaller screen. I am OK with this.

Other hardware commentary:
- So as I mentioned, it is premium. Large screen, little bezel, glass back, aluminum sides.
- Yet, this is one of the lightest 6" phones available (maybe the lightest). I actually love this. I hear Samsung artificially weights their phones since some people sort of expect heavy even while admitting lighter is almost always better for a portable device. This thing in my pocket is barely noticeable.
- The screen appears to be free of any of the aforementioned issues. It IS a high color temp and I have not fooled around with OS settings to make it warmer. I may not bother, even if I do use the night mode where it shifts to red since blue is bad for your brain before bedtime. The contrast appears to be infinite, which is kind of the point of OLED.
- Speaking of OLED, while it has pros and cons, the pros are worth mentioning specifically. Since each pixel (actually subpixel) is individually controlled, it has an always-on display (Nokia may have pioneered this way back in the day) which you can't do with back/side lit LED panels since the whole backlight would have to be on. I don't know how much battery it actually uses but it is probably practical to leave on all the time (hence "always on"). OLED is similar to plasma in that higher brightness and specifically more white on the screen means more power usage. Contrast to LED and, aside from the backlight intensity, dark or light colors make no difference to power consumption. On OLED, you actually get a pretty significant energy use reduction from using dark themes. A byproduct is they look amazing since the contrast ratio is so ridiculous. No backlight bleed on this, since there is no backlight.
- Love the placement of the fingerprint reader. Well, love is a strong word, but it is apparently placed far better than any Samsung which wedges it right next to the camera for some dumb reason. You'd probably end up constantly smudging the camera lens, too. This is a very fast reader, as well. I registered both index fingers, and as you pick it up, it's pretty easy to just rest the top of an index finger on the sensor and the phone just wakes up. Don't even need to press the button. I sort of miss the side power button but I will get used to it. This is the first personal phone I've ever had set to lock, believe it or not. It double taps to wake but this is pointless with locking (EDIT: it goes to the lock screen which may be useful when playing music, so not totally pointless). I wonder if it has a setting to not lock until x minutes after power off like the iPhones do. I would set it to 15 minutes, but I think I checked and there was no setting for that. Probably just as well. It means the operation will be more consistent (no guessing as to whether it has auto locked yet when I pick it up) and no worry of Ian getting into it even if I just put it down.
- I wish for a dedicated camera button. I will have to experiment with the volume key stuff to trigger the camera. EDIT: Double tap volume down with phone off. That's something, though obviously doesn't do that when the phone is on.
- I did try the quad DAC in the STS last night. Without doing an A/B comparison, I could not really tell much of a difference from my 1520. Might have had a bit better definition on the higher frequencies, which I guess makes sense. Need to try my Sony MDR-V6 headphones as I think that will be more noticeable, though those are fairly low impedance...

Just got the 6S in the mailbox. Just opened it. A few notes:
- It has no blemishes though I think the screen had fingerprints on it
- Actually there was what looked like the remants of a little dirt around the camera area, and some stuff on the frame that mostly scraped off with my fingernail. They could have spent more time detailing it I guess. Not a huge deal. It presents as new overall.
- Came with a no-name power brick
- When I plugged it in, it actually powered right on. It was NOT in a first-setup type condition. I just initiated a full reset.
- Before I reset I checked the battery health and it showed 94%. That is a bit less than my work 6S but totally serviceable I think. Not sure why Android has no "battery health" thing unless it is an app I need to install.

I will go through setup and make Jamie an Apple account. I will also swap her SIM today once she checks her last VM on her Lumia 640. More to come.

So far, these used phones were both in outstanding condition, with the V30 being better than the 6S. I could have spent less on the 6S and probably gotten equivalent condition but it is an older phone (design) so I did not want to mess around. I think I could have paid $165 or somewhere down there, which is more appropriate given the age of the 6S. I am not sure paying extra for Excellent was a good value.

- It came with iOS 12.0 but updating now to latest.

Here is the note that came with the iPhone: Go get 'em!

EDIT: Decided to swap the SIM. But wait, Jamie's old Lumia 640 takes a microSIM. So I poked around for a while and remembered that you can just cut these down with a good pair of scissors. I have cut a few SIMs in my time, and each time I get less precious about it. This time I didn't even measure or trace. I just cut. I had to recut a few times until it fit. Slid it in the tray, slid the tray in the phone, turned it on, bam, AT&T service just like that. A nanoSIM is basically just 100% gold contacts. Actually, they cut a small amount off the top and bottom of the contacts. That was a little nerve wracking but it works just fine. The edges are right up to the contacts. Don't forget to cut the angle in the top corner.

It took a while to fully setup the phone but I think I got her all going now until I activate the Mint service and have the numbers ported over.

Here are some phones. I think these are all the phones in the house. Ian has retrieved some of them so I figured why not take a lineup shot. This does not include previous work phones such as the iPhone 5S and Blackberry 9930 or whatever it was. All that is missing is my first smartphone which I may try to charge and power up if I can find a mini-USB cable... Here we go. From the left in some kind of vaguely logical order:
LG V30, my new phone, 6", 537ppi, Jan 2019
iPhone 6S, Jamie's new phone, 4.7", 326ppi, Jan 2019
Nokia Lumia 1520, my previous phone, 6", 367ppi, April 2015-Jan 2019
HTC Titan, previous phone prior to 1520, 4.7", 199ppi, Nov 2011-April 2015
HTC Touch Pro, first smartphone and last Sprint phone, 2.8", 286ppi, late 2008-Nov 2011
Nokia Lumia 521, a T-Mobile trial phone I bought, 4", 233ppi, Nov 2013
iPhone 8, new work phone, 4.7", 326ppi
iPhone 6S, old work phone, 4.7", 326ppi
Nokia Lumia 640, Jamie's previous phone, 5", 294ppi, Aug 2015-Jan 2019
Blu WinHD LTE, Adam's old phone to try WP10, 5", 294ppi


So my first smart phone, which at the time was still sort of a glorified PDA with a cellular modem (with slide out keyboard and stylus), was the HTC Touch Pro running Windows Mobile. I got it in the late 2008 timeframe and it was on Sprint. Fun fact: it had no headphone jack and required a dongle. So ahead of its time. Prior to that, my mobile device (mainly automotive use) was a Compaq iPAD 3970 PDA which did the following in the car for me:
- Music (SD card storage)
- Navigation (via external GPS antenna)
- And it did connect to WiFi with a sleeve and compact flash WiFi adapter

It was also a universal TV remote that could be programmed, sort of like a Harmony. Will update when I get a decent charge in the HTC...

But anyway, my history of phones looks like this:
LG V30, my new phone, 6", 537ppi, Jan 2019
Nokia Lumia 1520, my previous phone, 6", 367ppi, April 2015-Jan 2019
HTC Titan, previous phone prior to 1520, 4.7", 199ppi, Nov 2011-April 2015
HTC Touch Pro, first smartphone and last Sprint phone, 2.8", 286ppi, late 2008-Nov 2011

3 phones got me from late 2008 until Jan 2019.

For microSDXC, there are a few things to know.

Video speed is a thing, so some cards are rated for 4k or even 8k video recording/playback. I'd need 4k compatibility. This is captured in the "V" rating. V30 does 4k. V60 and V90 does 8k.

Then there is the UHS speed class, I, II and III. I am not sure UHS-III is even available in microSD yet. UHS-II is crazy expensive depending on brand and size. So UHS-I I think is fine.

Then there is an application rating, which refers to using the cards as disk drives. This is useful for many reasons but also in case you want to install apps on the card in Android. Side note, I am not sure my phone supports this. But there is A1 and A2.

Here is some info from wiki:

Speed classes 2, 4, and 6 assert that the card supports the respective number of megabytes per second as a minimum sustained write speed for a card in a fragmented state. Class 10 asserts that the card supports 10 MB/s as a minimum non-fragmented sequential write speed and uses a High Speed bus mode.[34] The host device can read a card's speed class and warn the user if the card reports a speed class that falls below an application's minimum need.[34] By comparison, the older "×" rating measured maximum speed under ideal conditions, and was vague as to whether this was read speed or write speed. The graphical symbol for the speed class has a number encircled with 'C' (C2, C4, C6, and C10).

UHS-I and UHS-II cards can use UHS Speed Class rating with two possible grades: class 1 for minimum read/write performance of at least 10 MB/s ('U1' symbol featuring number 1 inside 'U') and class 3 for minimum write performance of 30 MB/s ('U3' symbol featuring 3 inside 'U'), targeted at recording 4K video.[48] Before November 2013, the rating was branded UHS Speed Grade and contained grades 0 (no symbol) and 1 ('U1' symbol). Manufacturers can also display standard speed class symbols (C2, C4, C6, and C10) alongside, or in place of UHS speed class.

Video Speed Class defines a set of requirements for UHS cards to match the modern MLC NAND flash memory[19] and supports progressive 4K and 8K video with minimum sequential writing speeds of 6-90 MB/s.[17][38][46] The graphical symbols use 'V' followed by a number designating write speed (V6, V10, V30, V60, and V90).

Application Performance Class is a newly defined standard from the SD Specification 5.1 and 6.0 which not only define sequential Reading Speeds but also mandates a minimum IOPS for reading and writing. Class A1 requires a minimum of 1500 reading and 500 writing operations per second, while class A2 requires 4000 and 2000 IOPS.[49]

UHS memory cards work best with UHS host devices. The combination lets the user record HD resolution videos with tapeless camcorders while performing other functions. It is also suitable for real-time broadcasts and capturing large HD videos.

This looks like a good choice:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... 12K87D2501

SanDisk 128GB Extreme microSDXC UHS-I/U3 A2 Memory Card with Adapter, Speed Up to 160MB/s (SDSQXA1-128G-GN6MA)

Also does V30. $42, which is reasonable. I was considering 256GB, which is $65 and is cheaper per GB actually. I can always upgrade later as it usually just gets cheaper...I think the phone will support 512GB.

Eh I did the 256GB since it is fulfilled directly from Newegg. That should last a long while. It would be mainly for photos, videos and music I guess. Still need to find out about apps.

Handy link comparing my V30 to Adam's V20:
https://www.gsmarena.com/compare.php3?i ... #h932,h918,*

It is shorter, narrower, thinner and lighter but has 0.3" more screen.

What to Know About Adding Storage

First, not all Android devices allow you to install portions of an installed app to the microSD card, but for those that do, it’s just a quick trip to the application manager and a button press away. Most flagship phones have moved away from support for this feature, with the LG G4 and Samsung Galaxy S5 among the last to support it; it is more commonly found in midrange to low-end hardware, but these are often devices that could use the extra storage.

MORE: 22 Top Features of Android Oreo

Unfortunately, even if your smartphone supports the feature, not all apps do. Large apps such as games leave most of their data on the internal storage. For example, Asphalt 8 puts just 64MB of data on the microSD card while leaving the remaining 1.4GB to fill up your phone or tablet. That said, you can save some space this way, particularly if you have a lot of apps installed and move as many as possible to a microSD card.

Yeah. So I guess no installing apps on microSD. Too slow for the speed of the phone, and the phone is 64GB anyway.

Already missing Windows Phone. I could come up with a pretty healthy list, and I already talked about the keyboard. But here are two for now that sort of both have driven me nuts trying to get back to what I had before:
- Podcasts. No built-in podcast app?? Seriously? And the Google one from the Play store kind of sucks. I guess Play Music and Youtube might support podcasts but it's not even worth talking about. No offline support anyway. iOS has one. My Windows Phone had one. I ended up with Player FM which seems decent though I haven't really used it much yet. It was absolutely annoying to have to hunt around for something the OS should just have an in-box solution for.

I felt this irritation as I was having to do keyboard research. Guys, the stock keyboard should be excellent. That is a fail. This is what I meant when I said Windows Phone was a great combination of iOS and Android.

- Live tiles. I miss these. Live tiles are a simple, non-interactive version of the widget. It sucks that my choice is some overly complex widget which I really have no intention of actually interacting with, as I just want SOME information since the app icons have no info other than maybe a number. I really could glance at the home screen of my 1520 and get all kinds of info that I don't have on a single screen on my new phone.

Fortunately I am able to mostly pin things to the home screen, which addresses the remainder of what was on my home screen in WP8.1 (a combination of static and live tiles). When I say pin, I mean pin individual OneNote pages, webpages, and things like that.

Fun fact: Edge on Android is great, but I knew this from when I used to listen to Thurrott. In fact I have installed quite a few Microsoft apps which helps me with that ecosystem. At some point maybe I'll try the microsoft launcher.

Still trying to figure out how I can have weather on my always-on display (EDIT: not sure it is possible, more disappointment). And how it can tell me the number of unread e-mails and texts I have, along with my next appointment, just like I had with Windows Phone...

kevm14 wrote:- I did try the quad DAC in the STS last night. Without doing an A/B comparison, I could not really tell much of a difference from my 1520. Might have had a bit better definition on the higher frequencies, which I guess makes sense. Need to try my Sony MDR-V6 headphones as I think that will be more noticeable, though those are fairly low impedance...

Trying headphones now. It is too bad you can't tweak the EQ to a custom setting but honestly the presets seem sort of abritrary and are worse than the flat/normal setting. Anyway, it sounds very good. Pandora has a high quality setting and I detect no obvious compression artifacts even through this DAC with high quality headphones.

I like the 75 discrete volume settings (queue the "it goes to 11" references).

Really annoyed that when I tap a volume button it doesn't bring up simple transport controls with a pause button like Windows Phone since 2011...but I can pull down the notification shade and get it. I can also double tap on the screen and control music from the lock screen. Tapping volume to get the music/audio controls is 7 years of muscle memory that will be hard to break though.

Can you use windows phone in 2018?

https://youtu.be/iLYuRWQiE_I

Well... I used one continuously until a couple days ago....

So he used one for a week.

https://youtu.be/z2yzrZvZU6E

Apple guy apparently. But he had some good things to say about the OS, some of which I've mentioned in this thread.