Samsung Galaxy S2 take 2
My new Samsung Galaxy S2 was working great, set up just like I like, and had a bunch of my un-backed up information on it.
Then it went through the washer, full cycle.
After learning how to take it apart, I started the process of drying it out. I knew enough to not turn it on at all, but I knew that it had been on when it had went into the wash. If the same thing has happened to you, take this advice that I read on a thousand forums. Wait, wait, forget about it and just wait. Put the phone in some dry, uncooked rice, in an uncovered bowl, and f#(king wait!
I waited for four days before even trying it. It seemed like forever. It turned on, but wouldn’t charge the battery. So I thought the battery had died when it hit the water. Good enough guess. Ordered a new battery and waited for a few more days. The battery arrived, and I plugged it in. Same deal, wouldn’t charge. Something got fried in the charging circuit. Game over. I will give a try at getting it repaired, but for now, I need a new phone.
So I went and got a new one. Yup, the exact same one. Even though the new Galaxy Nexus is coming out this month, it has a 5MP camera and that is not going to cut it. The 8MP camera on the Galaxy S2 rocks! I take better pictures on it than on my real camera. The Galaxy Nexus will apparently get Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich). That sounds great, but in a few months, that will not matter, So will the Galaxy S2. The Galaxy S2 is a good phone. Battery life is good, and it doesn’t run hot for what I do.
Hmm, so I start looking into this Android 4.0, and there is some differences, but nothing really game changing for what I do. I take pictures, play music, browse social media, surf and text. When it comes out, I’ll upgrade to it, sure. But does it matter, right now? If the things that I like the most are the theme and the live wallpaper, then I think it’s good to load those up right now. WidgetLocker is a replacement lockscreen, and after configuring it, it’s looking great and working better than the original.It cost a few bucks in the Android Market. Not essential, but I like it.
Second, I needed a theme. ICS Launcher from Syndicate Apps is a great, free launcher. There is a lot of settings, but now that it’s set up, I’m quite happy with it.
So the phone still runs Gingerbread, but now it’s looking really nice. Last I added the Live Wallpaper shown in these two screeners, ICS Ice Cream Sandwich Live from Eight-Soft. It was a buck or so. I could probably find some icon packs to replace this and that, and replace some of the apps to emulate ICS functionality, but I can wait for that. For now, I am just going to try and keep this phone out of the wash.
After messing around with widgetlocker for too many days and getting it set up right and such, I uninstalled it. It looks pretty and does some things nicely, but in the end it did not work as a lockscreen replacement for me. Too many issues. The default lockscreen “just works”. Function wins over fashion I guess.
After a month of leaving it on top of my computer, I tried charging the washed phone up and it worked! Now we have another mini-tablet for using around the house with wi-fi.