Samsung Galaxy S3: 5 Problems With The Device

Here are five compaints that have been reported since the phone's release:

Overheating

Overheating was a problem commonly reported in the Galaxy S3's predecessor, but it seems to be persisting in the Galaxy S3. This is most likely thanks to the phone's thin chassis and plastic back cover, which do not insulate the heat from the battery.

Battery Drain

The battery drain issue has been reported for the international model of the phone. Consumers have complained that the phone uses a lot of battery, even when its not being used in standby mode. Reports suggest that the problem is due to the fact that the phone calculates 50 to 70 percent more power consumption then it actually uses. The problem is being resolved by correcting the value through a software update that will automatically be pushed out onto to the phone.

Some U.S. users have reported battery drainage issues also, when trying to connect to LTE. Here's a report from a samsung Galaxy S3 forum.

"There is definitely some type of bug that is draining Samsung S3 batteries. I can have days where my battery lasts all day with really heavy usage, and there are other days where I start losing about 10 percent of battery life every hour or more.  You can tell when your battery is crashing because your phone will stay warm even if you close all open apps in task manager. . I am trying to pinpoint the cause, but it might be when the phone is struggling to connect to the LTE network. "

Microphone Problem

The Samsung Galaxy S3's biggest problem is a microphone malfunction, according to fix ya. Users have complained that the volume levels come out low on the receiving end and the call is not clear. Fix Ya suggests updating the firmware first, and if that doesn't work, restoring the phone's factory settings.

Charging

Samsung Galaxy S3 users have complained that the phone takes a long time to charge and can get stuck on a certain percentage for over an hour at a time.

Wi-Fi Connection

Some users have reported that the Galaxy S3 easily drops signal when connected to Wi-Fi network. The company is working on a fix.

Samsung Galaxy S3 Battery Lasts Longer than Apple iPhone 4S, HTC One X Batteries

We don’t hear much about the long battery lifespan of the Samsung Galaxy S3. After all, with its array of advanced features and specs, it’s easy to overlook the battery, that one feature that is responsible for making the device run in the first place.

According to a new test, the Galaxy S3’s battery is actually one of the best out there (but not the best – the Motorola Droid RAZR Maxx’s battery takes that honor), and better than that on the Apple iPhone 4S and HTC One X.

We’re not surprised about the Galaxy S3’s battery beating out the iPhone 4S’ battery. Many have criticized the iPhone 4S for providing unsatisfactory battery life. In Which.co.uk’s test, the Galaxy S3 was able to provide 726 minutes call time on medium 3G. Coming in second was the HTC One X with 635 minutes, then the Sony Xperia S with 520 minutes

The iPhone 4S was fourth with a decent 467 minutes among the devices featured on Which’s graph. This means Apple’s flagship device may not be that bad after all when it comes to longevity – we shall get to that in a bit. Rounding up the handsets featured on the chart were the HTC Sensation XL (272 minutes) and Motorola Gleam (135 minutes). All in all, 101 handsets were tested, and the average longevity was 315 minutes.

Based on these figures, it looks like the iPhone 4S is capable of above-average – not poor – battery life. And the Galaxy S3 is well above-average.

However, Which.co.uk is a UK site, and this means a lot of US-only devices were not included in the test, including the aforementioned Droid RAZR Maxx. Still, 726 minutes is a very impressive number for a phone many consider to be the best handset currently available on the market..

A Guide to Natural Interaction on the Samsung Galaxy SIII

When Samsung announced the new Galaxy SIII smartphone last month, it placed a big emphasis on nature. The design is inspired by nature – specifically pebbles – the software is called ‘Nature UX’ and there are many features that help you interact naturally with the phone.

These features may seem small and insignificant when lined up with the massive and colourful 4.8-inch display or quad-core processor, but if you learn to use them properly they can come in extremely handy. We’ve found the features to make everyday use of the S3 much easier and quicker, so we thought we’d share our thoughts on them along with some useful tips.

SMART ALERT

Smart alert is one of the best ‘smart’ features on the phone in our opinion. How many times have you taken your phone out of your bag or pocket, unlocked it and put in your password only to find that you’ve got nothing waiting for you? With Smart alert on, the phone will vibrate when you pick it up or touch it in your pocket to let you know if you have notifications waiting before you unlock.

Turn it on: Settings > Motion > Smart alert

Direct call

Direct call is extremely useful, cutting out several screen taps and touches. If you receive a text message and want to call that person rather than reply, simply put the phone to your ear and wait for the vibrate to tell you the call is being made. We found Direct call to work well most of the time, once you’ve mastered the motion at least. It requires a smooth sweep upwards to your ear, making sure that the proximity sensor (right of the Samsung logo) is covered by your ear.

Turn it on: Settings > Motion > Direct call

Tap to top

Particularly useful when in a long thread of text messages, Tap to top allows you to double tap the top of your phone to zoom up to the top of the thread or list. This works in Contacts, Email and Messages, but unfortunately not in third party applications or in the browser. A great feature that would be even better if we could use it for getting to the top of a webpage quickly in the browser – hopefully Samsung will add this in soon.

Turn it on: Settings > Motion > Tap to top

Palm swipe screenshots

Capturing screenshots on an Android phone can be a tricky affair, with a combination of buttons usually the necessary action. On the S3 you can simply swipe the side of your hand from left to right across the screen to get a screen grab. It’s really easy to do, but if you’re not sure then check it out in the video guide at the bottom of this page.

Turn it on: Settings > Motion > Palm swipe to capture

Smart stay

One of the most touted smart features; Smart stay uses the phone’s 1.9-megapixel front facing camera to track your eyes. For as long as you look at the screen, the brightness will not dim. Look away from the screen and the camera will know, dimming the brightness to save power until you return. In practice we found this feature to not work as well as the others, and would only really come in handy if reading on your phone. For everyday use, we recommend keeping Smart stay turned off and using a backlight timeout of 2 minutes instead.

Turn it on: Settings > Display > Smart stay

There are many more intuitive and ‘natural’ features on the Galaxy SIII – these are just the key features and our favourites. Dig into the Motion settings and you’ll find clever ways to mute the phone using your palm and interesting ways of zooming and panning using touch and motion together.

There is, of course, S Voice. Samsung’s answer to Apple’s Siri is decent, allowing you to speak normally to your phone to request certain tasks. This works well after a little bit of practice, and we’re going to cover it in an entirely separate video and guide soon.

New robotic legs may lead to more human-like robots

Engineers with the University of Arizona have developed a set of robotic legs that mimic the movements of humans,according to a report from Fox News. Theresa Klein and M. Anthony Lewis, both of the University’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, have described their project in a new paper. The pair’s robot models the “neuromuscular architecture of human walking,” according to their article in the Journal of Neural Engineering.

Their robot has been remarkably successful at achieving simple walking on a treadmill, a feat accomplished by incorporating a new model of neural networking in the limbs. The pair’s robot incorporates a “half-centre” neural network into the robots hips, which operates on simple signals from the limbs to produce the alternating motion of the walking legs. This network, which replicates the nervous network present in human legs, has never before been incorporated into a walking robot.

“We’ve tried various robot systems. But if we build special-purpose robots, when we modify trial procedures or switch to different projects, those robots become useless. Also, developing robots is very time-consuming. So, we wanted to develop a robot that can do what people do, using the same tools people use. That’s why we’ve developed Mahoro,” say scientists.