"never used, or owned a Focus/Focus S" - nope.
does the Focus have audio controls (even basic base and trebble) ?
ATIV S - 6 weeks later.
- Thread starter anon(5571020)
- Start date
"never used, or owned a Focus/Focus S" - nope.
does the Focus have audio controls (even basic base and trebble) ?
bigkevbosky
New member
Could you sell your Ativ S locally for $550? I doubt it. I bet you could get $500 on Ebay for it, but after fees, Paypal charges, and shipping costs, you're down to about $425 or so.
My Nexus 4, plus tax, plus bumper, was about $365 total. So, yeah, if someone who had an Ativ S said something like "you throw in $50 cash and we'll do a trade", that's reasonable.
I have an interested buyer who will be thrilled to save about $110 taxes included on the phone he wants, especially since it already has an SD card in it and he knows firsthand from the current owner that he'll get one that is problem free.
The price is agreed upon already. So yeah, I will get $550 locally if I sell it. Somebody without the luxury of a buyer might need to negotiate, but I don't.
The final straw. This piece of sh#t Ativ S has just stopped working. Won't turn on. Initial symptom was the screen displaying a lightening bolt and config wheel (like it had been powered up with the volume key depressed).
Battery is charging, but phone will not switch on. It did boot all the way into Windows Phone once in the last 4 days, but then as soon as the screen went off, it wouldn't come back on.
Typically its whilst I'm away from home for two and a half weeks. I have no love left for this device. Once repaired/replaced its going.
If I could walk into Mobile World Congress in Barcelona tomorrow and buy an unlocked Nokia Lumia 920 I would.
Battery is charging, but phone will not switch on. It did boot all the way into Windows Phone once in the last 4 days, but then as soon as the screen went off, it wouldn't come back on.
Typically its whilst I'm away from home for two and a half weeks. I have no love left for this device. Once repaired/replaced its going.
If I could walk into Mobile World Congress in Barcelona tomorrow and buy an unlocked Nokia Lumia 920 I would.
Last edited:
Been trying to power it up a couple of times a day . . . it came back to life last night! Go figure.
Coolknight1968
New member
Mine's working again after having the system board replaced. I can live with the buttons, as irritating as they are. the thing that remains a major irritation is the lack of audio controls. I just don't get it. And god knows the audio needs a bit of boosting.
I will agree, the volume/lock button is in a rather annoying place, and the back comes off a bit too easy. But as for the rest of the phone, its awesome! Switched from the 8x and I'm not regretting it at all.
Just stumbled across this thread and can't believe how churlish some of the criticisms are.
Cons
buttons -
Volume control is a good 1-1.5mm proud of the case on my Ativ S and I have no trouble locating it.Plenty of other phones are more flush, including Nokias and HTCs. If it was any more proud you'd be complaining it was too easy to operate accidentally. Oh, hang on...
buttons -
Firstly, the volume control is lower down, not directly opposite, the power button. That means there is a space for the supporting digit on the top left hand side of the phone. When holding in my left hand my thumb naturally rests above the volume control. When holding in my right hand, my index finger is also above the volume control or resting on the back. Even if my thumb or finger slips it'll hit the top edge (volume up) not down. If you're pressing the volume down button then you must have strange shaped hands or just holding it wierd. Also side mounting the power button on a large screen phone is good ergonomics. It's just awkward for many people to reach to the top of the phone when the screen size is 5" or more.
headphone socket -
YMMV. Bottom placement may be preferable for trouser storage, but doesn't work so well for short or jacket pockets. I also prefer it to be on the top so I can use standard USB docks and desk stands without fouling the headphone socket.
no audio DSP -
Hardly a 'glaring' omission. Plenty of phones, including some WP Nokias, don't have 'tone' controls. Personally I like mike music as it is intended and not mashed up by some artificial DSP. 'Flat' audio from the Ativ, paired with decent headphones, works fine for me.
no offline navigation -
Can't have looked very hard as there are a number of off-line navigation apps available, including CoPIlot.
SD-card problems -
Not had any problem with my Transcend or Kingston Class 4 cards. The only cards I have ever have had problems with are Sandisk and that's not just on Samsungs.
Slippery! -
Not a con if you've solved it. Personally I don't like Zagg as after a while the edges get dirty or start peeling and it starts to look like your phone is wrapped in Sellotape. A couple of bucks on a gel or other case is another simple and cheap option and gives more protection.
Camera lense -
Agreed, the Note has the same problem. But slip on even the slimmest of cases and problem fixed. Or cut an old clear screen protector to fit over the lense, like you get with Martin Fields'.
Overall, I'll take the smaller, lighter, more expandable, removal and bigger-batteried, bigger screened, less fault-prone, better camera [1], and much cheaper (especially with recent price drops) Ativ please.
[1] Noting the soft daylight pictures, overly compressed artifacts and noise, unnatural color balance, and make night-looks-like-day gimmicks of the 920
phonohead
New member
So, ok guys! I bought the ATIV S for my mom about a week ago. I've been testing it since then, and what I love about this device is the fact that;
It looks incredibly attractive. Not that looks matters, or should be the most important thing to go for when picking a device, but this just is a pure joy to look at.
Its weight is light, yes, but that kind of makes the device more of a pleasure to hold. It may - I must admit - make the device feel a bit more "toy-ish" and easy to break.
And it has caused me to take the phone out of my pocket in the fear of having it break when sitting down. But, one should take care of ones device, and a heavier phone could encourage one to be more careless or take the strength of the phone for granted. So, light and fragile has become a positive thing for me.
I've had a Lumia 820 before and - just like the ATIV S - it had removable battery and it supported micro-SD cards. This is crucial for someone with a rather large collection of music/movies.
A spare battery must be quite outstanding. I've yet to experience the need, or having one for that matter.
The screen and its colour generating is so deep and it really fills the colours. The 920 gives an impression that there are tiny, white, pixels merged into the colour you've chosen, and that makes it look a bit "washed out". Imagine light blue jeans (ATIV S), and acid washed jeans (920)
Another thing that pleased me was that I could actually turn off the haptic touch feedback on the buttons.
I am getting a bit fed up with all NOKIA-exclusives and the "join us to get a piece of this [software/feature]". They've pushed out three devices since I bought my Lumia in January, which makes me feel outdated. And, yeah, the future is inevitable, but feeling you're in the back of the buss after just 6 months is a bit of a let-down. No new Samsung devices, running WP8, that exceeds the ATIV S, make me feel I am in the front of the Samsung bus, with the rest of the ATIV S/Samsung users.
As a conclusion to my "6 weeks later", just think of my current phone, the 920, as an opposite to what I've mentioned above.
Now, can I make my mom fall for the 920...
It looks incredibly attractive. Not that looks matters, or should be the most important thing to go for when picking a device, but this just is a pure joy to look at.
Its weight is light, yes, but that kind of makes the device more of a pleasure to hold. It may - I must admit - make the device feel a bit more "toy-ish" and easy to break.
And it has caused me to take the phone out of my pocket in the fear of having it break when sitting down. But, one should take care of ones device, and a heavier phone could encourage one to be more careless or take the strength of the phone for granted. So, light and fragile has become a positive thing for me.
I've had a Lumia 820 before and - just like the ATIV S - it had removable battery and it supported micro-SD cards. This is crucial for someone with a rather large collection of music/movies.
A spare battery must be quite outstanding. I've yet to experience the need, or having one for that matter.
The screen and its colour generating is so deep and it really fills the colours. The 920 gives an impression that there are tiny, white, pixels merged into the colour you've chosen, and that makes it look a bit "washed out". Imagine light blue jeans (ATIV S), and acid washed jeans (920)
Another thing that pleased me was that I could actually turn off the haptic touch feedback on the buttons.
I am getting a bit fed up with all NOKIA-exclusives and the "join us to get a piece of this [software/feature]". They've pushed out three devices since I bought my Lumia in January, which makes me feel outdated. And, yeah, the future is inevitable, but feeling you're in the back of the buss after just 6 months is a bit of a let-down. No new Samsung devices, running WP8, that exceeds the ATIV S, make me feel I am in the front of the Samsung bus, with the rest of the ATIV S/Samsung users.
As a conclusion to my "6 weeks later", just think of my current phone, the 920, as an opposite to what I've mentioned above.
Now, can I make my mom fall for the 920...
Churlish? - Seriously?
as I said at the top of my original post - these are MY opinions as they relate to ME. YMMV etc etc - I posted my observations to perhaps give some insight to those considering a new phone. When I bought mine I didn't have all that info to hand and it may have helped inform my decision. Questioning my anatomical conformity and or suggesting I'm doing it wrong is hardly constructive.
Offline navigation - "Can't have looked very hard" again, seriously? You make comment like that on a post 7 months on? Do you think I just took it out of the box and made that observation without looking? - yes there are now offline nav options, including co-pilot, my preferred choice, but 7 months ago there were not. I had email conversations with co-pilot about if and when they were ever going to do a WP version - back then they had "no plans to develop for the Windows Phone platform". My criticism was that they don't provide it free like Nokia does. Of course Nokia have solved that by making here drive plus free for all . . . after I spent ?70 on Navigon.
Buttons - they're still as badly placed for left handed use as they were 7 months ago. Whether you think I "must have strange shaped hands or just holding it weird" is irrelevant; it doesn't work for me. 7 Months down the line it still irritates me. If it doesn't irritate you, then all the better for you, but telling me that I'm deformed or doing it wrong is pointless.
headphone socket - still in the wrong place for me, but the least of my niggles.
no DSP/audio control - in my opinion it is a glaring omission. As I said - I don't particularly want DSP, but a music playback device without tone and bass controls? That's a glaring omission in my book. If I pay ?500 for a phone, ?100 for headphones I expect to be able to tune the listening experience to the way I want. Again, if you're happy with what Samsung gives you, all well and good. I'm not. Quite why you believe that what you get out of a Samsung is "music as it is intended" is beyond me as every digital device plays back music differently because, by definition, it's processed sound and in fact what you're getting is already "mashed up by some artificial DSP" - the DSP that Samsung gives you in their codec chip.
Slippery - it is a con. Because I had to do something to remedy it doesn't mean it's not a con, the very fact that it needs fixing means its a negative.
camera lense - again, as with the slippery case design, they clearly assume that everyone will put a cover on their phones (which then begs the question - why even bother with the design of the thing if you expect it to be covered up? It is fixable - but it shouldn't have to be fixed. I've never put covers on any of my mobile phones and I'm not about to start; why buy an aesthetically pleasing, slim design device, then cover it up and make it bigger? Pointless.
SD-card problems - perhaps a sandisk issue, but problems were fixed by the system board replacement.
the two main features for buying it in the first place still remain - the removable battery and expandalble memory (on a top end WP8 phone) .
-Griz
as I said at the top of my original post - these are MY opinions as they relate to ME. YMMV etc etc - I posted my observations to perhaps give some insight to those considering a new phone. When I bought mine I didn't have all that info to hand and it may have helped inform my decision. Questioning my anatomical conformity and or suggesting I'm doing it wrong is hardly constructive.
Offline navigation - "Can't have looked very hard" again, seriously? You make comment like that on a post 7 months on? Do you think I just took it out of the box and made that observation without looking? - yes there are now offline nav options, including co-pilot, my preferred choice, but 7 months ago there were not. I had email conversations with co-pilot about if and when they were ever going to do a WP version - back then they had "no plans to develop for the Windows Phone platform". My criticism was that they don't provide it free like Nokia does. Of course Nokia have solved that by making here drive plus free for all . . . after I spent ?70 on Navigon.
Buttons - they're still as badly placed for left handed use as they were 7 months ago. Whether you think I "must have strange shaped hands or just holding it weird" is irrelevant; it doesn't work for me. 7 Months down the line it still irritates me. If it doesn't irritate you, then all the better for you, but telling me that I'm deformed or doing it wrong is pointless.
headphone socket - still in the wrong place for me, but the least of my niggles.
no DSP/audio control - in my opinion it is a glaring omission. As I said - I don't particularly want DSP, but a music playback device without tone and bass controls? That's a glaring omission in my book. If I pay ?500 for a phone, ?100 for headphones I expect to be able to tune the listening experience to the way I want. Again, if you're happy with what Samsung gives you, all well and good. I'm not. Quite why you believe that what you get out of a Samsung is "music as it is intended" is beyond me as every digital device plays back music differently because, by definition, it's processed sound and in fact what you're getting is already "mashed up by some artificial DSP" - the DSP that Samsung gives you in their codec chip.
Slippery - it is a con. Because I had to do something to remedy it doesn't mean it's not a con, the very fact that it needs fixing means its a negative.
camera lense - again, as with the slippery case design, they clearly assume that everyone will put a cover on their phones (which then begs the question - why even bother with the design of the thing if you expect it to be covered up? It is fixable - but it shouldn't have to be fixed. I've never put covers on any of my mobile phones and I'm not about to start; why buy an aesthetically pleasing, slim design device, then cover it up and make it bigger? Pointless.
SD-card problems - perhaps a sandisk issue, but problems were fixed by the system board replacement.
the two main features for buying it in the first place still remain - the removable battery and expandalble memory (on a top end WP8 phone) .
-Griz
Well we're obviously not going to agree but I was just making the point that what you see as major failings are to others either not an big issue or have simple fixes. No phone is going to suit everybody but I think you're exaggerating the importance of your 'cons'. Personally I think the Ativ beats the Lumia 920 in all key areas (screen, battery life, memory, storage, size, weight, camera, price).
And as for there not being any offline maps solution 7 months ago, Navigon has been available on WP since October 2011, and was updated for WP8 in November 2012.
As for your first post (on 7 Feb 2013) being 7 months ago as you repeatedly claim, I guess you must live in a different world to the rest of us, which does explain a lot!
"I was just making the point that what you see as major failings are to others either not an big issue or have simple fixes" - perhaps that was what you should have said then? Rather than, on the first line of your response, calling me churlish and then going on to tell me I must be deformed and I'm doing it wrong (to paraphrase). and as to "Exaggerating the importance"? if you read the original posting - it was a set of my personal observations; personal to me for heaven's sake. Are you a journalist by any chance?
My first post was after 6 week's ownership, ie I got the phone late (3rd week) December - we're in the 3rd week in July now, last time I checked July was the 7th month of the year, hence it's now 7 months on. The only erroneous reference to 7 months in my repeated claims in the above post, is reference to your response being 7 months after the original posting, all other references are to the length of time I've owned the phone.
Yes, Navigon was available - and I bought it (about 2 hours after the original posting) but a single, expensive option does not a choice make.
"we're obviously not going to agree" - and that's fine! My original posting was not to convince anyone they're wrong and I'm right (and I still am not trying to do that - as I said, if it works for you, all well and good.. They were MY observations about MY use and ownership of the phone.
As for living in another world - it's a better place!
My first post was after 6 week's ownership, ie I got the phone late (3rd week) December - we're in the 3rd week in July now, last time I checked July was the 7th month of the year, hence it's now 7 months on. The only erroneous reference to 7 months in my repeated claims in the above post, is reference to your response being 7 months after the original posting, all other references are to the length of time I've owned the phone.
Yes, Navigon was available - and I bought it (about 2 hours after the original posting) but a single, expensive option does not a choice make.
"we're obviously not going to agree" - and that's fine! My original posting was not to convince anyone they're wrong and I'm right (and I still am not trying to do that - as I said, if it works for you, all well and good.. They were MY observations about MY use and ownership of the phone.
As for living in another world - it's a better place!
courtneyg2013
New member
Does anyone have battery probs on the ativ s. It's wonderful on standby, the minute you use an app it drinks juice like a fish. loses about if i do 10-20mins browsing in the morning on the way to work it will lose about 10-15% does that seem about right?
Re Navigon, an expensive option is an option nevertheless, your original claim was that there none. With that and the other stuff, I can only take what you actually wrote as a basis for discussion, which, seeing as I (and others) had suffered none of the 'cons' you list, or had found easy ways to overcome them, it was in my opinion overly negative and at odds with my experience, even when pitched as a personal view. But as you say, YMMV - and enjoy whatever device you have, until the next one comes along!
phonohead
New member
How long have you had the phone? What background applications are running? And do you have WIFI/3G on at the same time? NFC on?
If the phone is brand new, or recently bought, you'd expect these kind of drainage issues in the beginning. The battery needs "learning period" to improve. This is common on most smartphones, even laptops.
vecera
New member
Does any one have problem when you shutdown device or restart that volume reset to 20/30 ?
I mean I have volume set to 30/30, and i noticed after reboot or power off that volume is 20/30 :angry:
I mean I have volume set to 30/30, and i noticed after reboot or power off that volume is 20/30 :angry:
John Wiskowski
New member
Mine seems to remember volumes well. i.e. 30/30 when I stream to various bluetooth speakers. 15/30 for my regular listening. If anything, it defaults to 15/30.
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