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Help New to Android, some questions

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ProfsChimpo

Lurker
Hello all!

About a week ago I made a huge change in my life and finally ditched my iPhone 4 for the Galaxy S3. I am not a completely new Android user as I do work IT and have had (basic) android training and worked on repairing basic issues on phones and tablets, but this is the first that I've ever actually owned. So far I am loving it, but I do have some questions that I haven't really been able to find answers for (or found an overwhelming amount of different/dated answers).

First, and most importantly, what is the best e-mail app? I currently use the Gmail app since all of non-work e-mail accounts are through g-mail, but the issue I have is that all of the e-mails that are picture based are very zoomed in and hard to view. I was surprised by this, and even more surprised that you couldn't zoom out (by pinch zooming, etc...). Is there a setting I'm missing or do I just need a better mail app?

Second! I was huge in the jailbreaking scene on the iPhone. IMO, it is pointless to have an iPhone that isn't jailbroken since you miss out on so many amazing features. It doesn't seem like this is the case with an Android since most of these features are stock or easy to obtain through the play store, so what is the point of rooting an android?

And finally! A great friend of mine recommended that I download the "Go" apps such as launcher, keyboard, sms, etc... I did this and while some of them were nice I do want to see what else is out there. So from a mostly new user, what are the "must have" apps, themes, launchers, etc... that I should look into? I know this comes down to personal preference, but I'd still like the input!

Thanks all for your time, looking forward to hearing your answers!
 
Well, I use K-9 Email and it works great, probably the best for me: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.fsck.k9&feature=search_result

For what regards Android, it is indeed true that many of the features you can get on an iPhone through Jailbreaking, can easily be obtained from the Play Store. But that's not what android only offers. In fact, there are many applications, such as Titanium Backup, which require you phone to be rooted. Also, if you want to do a complete nandroid backup of the system, you need a custom recovery, and that as well needs your phone to be rooted.

Many people say rooting an Android is the same as jailbreaking an iPhone, but that is only partially true. That aside, it doesn't concern rooting if you want to flash custom roms, although most of them are pre-rooted by the devolpers.
 
Although a little advanced, I would play with an app called Tasker. It will blow your mind what is available to you. In essence Tasker makes all phone events/alerts/notifications/timers/clocks/... available to you so you can run Macros that do things like turn on your Wifi, Turn off Bluetooth, Turn off GPS and turn the volume for ringer and notifications to a certain level all of this because you set up a GPS point in Tasker that said I am home and do all these things.

Very cool, very powerful and kinda fun too.

It is the most expensive app that I have purchased though.

I would also recommend that you download the Amazon Apps store. They have a free app of the day and you can get some nice apps on occasion for free. They have even posted the $9.99 apps for free for a day.
 
Thanks for all of the answers guys. I haven't had a chance to look at most of these yet, but the ones I have are amazing. I'll be sure to come back if I have any questions!
 
Welcome back from the dark side! I too moved from Jailbroken iPhone 4 to the S3.

I use the stock email package as I find it does all I need.

I have haven't yet found the need to root as I can do all the tweks I need without.

Good luck and enjoy
 
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