How is the L521 handling the 8.1 update??

[BrandonCormier]

How did you downgrade? Nokia care suite?

Sent from my magical toaster

I restored using the Nokia Software Recovery Tool. Worked like a charm.

 

[BrandonCormier]

Curious here.
Where is the lagging again.
The only real stutter I see is returning to the home screen (set up as third row) from say a heavy duty app like ProShot, OneShot, Fotor or one of my games.
Everything else looks smooth all round.

Just to check I went back to two rows "ugh" and the start screen pops up faster.
Evidently the third row feature is a bit intense...but I don't mind that it ever so slightly stalls.
I'm sure there are many variables between users i.e; live tiles, tile sizes, extent of home screen set-up etc.

I would say for a rock bottom phone which soars above quite few others it does quite well.

The lag I had was mostly in things like loading the app list and playing music. Had a lot of refreshes. Also like you said going to the start screen had some lag as well, even though I wasnt running the third tile. I might just switch back anyways though because I keep reading all the new cool features here on WP Central, and I miss the new start screen. Battery was my main issue. Maybe all I needed to to was disable Cortana?

Well, I went ahead and reset my phone. And while it did take a while for all my apps to download and all, once it was all done. 8.1 is running just as smooth as 8.0. So definitely give it a shot if your 521 is lagging a bit.

I might try this. I have heard a lot of good reports of this working.

 

[onlysublime]

the bottom line is... is the 521 better with it or without it? and the answer is it is definitely better with it. WP8 was great but limited. As for lag, it's weird. sometimes it's there and sometimes it's not there.

but there's something that people haven't written about (and I guess maybe they didn't think it was important). I notice it more with the Icon than the 521 (because the icon is faster). The animation when the tiles go away (after you hit a tile to load it, the tiles fly away) or lay down (going back to the Start screen). they cut the animation time in half. so the tiles lay down a lot faster. When i first got the Icon, I thought the tiles would drop faster because it's a much faster phone but the animation speed was the same. So I was disappointed that it animated at the same speed as the 521. You might not think the animation speed is slow on WP8 but after seeing it on WP8.1, you notice it. That split second adds up over time. it's no wonder I read reviews of WP8 and how reviewers wished they could set a "no animations" setting so that when you tap a tile, it just loads without showing any animation that delays the loading process.

 

[WINDOW LOVIN]

the bottom line is... is the 521 better with it or without it? and the answer is it is definitely better with it. WP8 was great but limited. As for lag, it's weird. sometimes it's there and sometimes it's not there.

but there's something that people haven't written about (and I guess maybe they didn't think it was important). I notice it more with the Icon than the 521 (because the icon is faster). The animation when the tiles go away (after you hit a tile to load it, the tiles fly away) or lay down (going back to the Start screen). they cut the animation time in half. so the tiles lay down a lot faster. When i first got the Icon, I thought the tiles would drop faster because it's a much faster phone but the animation speed was the same. So I was disappointed that it animated at the same speed as the 521. You might not think the animation speed is slow on WP8 but after seeing it on WP8.1, you notice it. That split second adds up over time. it's no wonder I read reviews of WP8 and how reviewers wished they could set a "no animations" setting so that when you tap a tile, it just loads without showing any animation that delays the loading process.

Thanks for your input man. I have restrained myself (though very strenuously) till I researched enough on how well it is doing. I find it less "glitchy" then the GDR3 update. And I feel this "preview" update is atleast 60% completed with the other 40% to come out by next month which is what I am hearing. I made a decision to updated but I can't due to a hotmail problem. I have been locked out for 30 days because I updated my security info meaning I cant access any other services except my email. Which sucks because dev preview and app studio requires that. So Now I have to wait till the 20th of May Im sure by then it will already be released officialy.

 

[eddieDOTexe]

the bottom line is... is the 521 better with it or without it? and the answer is it is definitely better with it. WP8 was great but limited. As for lag, it's weird. sometimes it's there and sometimes it's not there.

but there's something that people haven't written about (and I guess maybe they didn't think it was important). I notice it more with the Icon than the 521 (because the icon is faster). The animation when the tiles go away (after you hit a tile to load it, the tiles fly away) or lay down (going back to the Start screen). they cut the animation time in half. so the tiles lay down a lot faster. When i first got the Icon, I thought the tiles would drop faster because it's a much faster phone but the animation speed was the same. So I was disappointed that it animated at the same speed as the 521. You might not think the animation speed is slow on WP8 but after seeing it on WP8.1, you notice it. That split second adds up over time. it's no wonder I read reviews of WP8 and how reviewers wished they could set a "no animations" setting so that when you tap a tile, it just loads without showing any animation that delays the loading process.

I personally don't mind the animation. Apps start to load as soon as the animation plays so the whole "that split second adds up over time" statement is moot.

 

[WINDOW LOVIN]

After downloading the 2nd update are the spinning gears supposed to take long?? Its been like 10 mins maybe more now..

 

[eddieDOTexe]

yup, takes a while

 

[Harry Wild]

The T-Mobile version of the 8.1 update will probably be out sometime in June! I waiting patiently!

 

[jishnu#AC]

Texting no longer works over WiFi calling. The message center number gets erased and it is not possible to even enter it manually.

 

[mspace81]

For me it's been a mixed bag. The new features are working pretty well. Cortana is great fun to play with and actually pretty useful in terms of setting reminders, calendar updates, etc.

On the negative side, there is a definite performance hit, with lag that didn't exist before. It's not consistent, so no way to tell what the cause is. Sometimes Cortana will launch instantly, sometimes it takes several seconds. General navigation is spotty as well, with smooth buttery WP goodness at times and Android-like delays at other times. I've done a soft reset and don't want to go through the bother of a hard reset and reinstalling everything with the likely end result that nothing will change. It's not horrible and I'll live with it and hope that an MS or Nokia firmware update will improve it.

The biggest downside - which I haven't seen mentioned anywhere else in regards to the 521 - is that SMS is no longer working when using T-Mobile wifi calling. I can still place and receive calls using wifi calling, but attempting to send an SMS message immediately comes back with the phone telling me it couldn't send the message. And incoming messages never make it.

I knew it was risky installing 8.1 and although there are a few issues, overall I'm glad I did it.

Thanks for posting this!! I thought I was going crazy when I put my phone on WiFi and people were saying they were sending me messages but I wasn't getting them. I suspected it was a bug with running 8.1 and experimented and figured it out. It really sucks that I can't use WiFi at home though.

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