GregHowley.com

I'm planning on buying a new Android phone in about a week. After a lot of research, I'm planning on going with the Samsung Galaxy S3. I've been following the Apple vs Samsung case closely, and I feel reasonably comfortable that there won't be a sales ban on the S3 within the next week.

I've checked to ensure that I'll still be able to use Swype with the new phone, and I'm clear there. It looks like the phone will have a dual-core 1.4gHz processor unlike the international Galaxy S3 which uses a quad-core, but I don't have much choice there. I'm also not sure whether the phone will come with 16 or 32 gigabytes of sd storage. I should find a case for the phone ahead of time, and determine whether the leftover screen protectors I have from my Droid X will fit on the S3. That would be nice - those things are overpriced.

So what am I looking forward to in the new phone? Let's see. For one, I'll be able to take screenshots, which is nice. I'll have a far faster camera, and that feature that lets you take a burst of rapid-fire photos and then select the best photo from the group. And of course, just the fact that the phone is teh new shiny. It won't have the physical damage that my Droid X has, it won't have the slow-ass GPS that always takes 10 minutes to turn on (I'm not exaggerating at all) and it will have a ton of new OS features that I'm not yet aware of.

The Galaxy S3 will have a front-facing camera, which will be nice for Google hangouts and Skype, and I'm sure it will have a far better battery life than my Droid X, which will die after about 3 hours of normal morning use if I don't charge it at work. And the thing I'm looking forward to most? Speed and responsiveness. It's amazing how slow a 2-year-old phone can be.

When I get the new phone, I'm going to be spending a good deal of time setting it up and customizing it. Looking through my apps now, I'll need to reinstall the Google Authentictor to aid in 2-factor authentication of my Google account, and I'll reinstall BeyondPod, which is becoming my primary podcatcher.

I've been using Dolphin browser for a while, and I do really like it, but with the new phone I may try out the Android version of Chrome. I'll reinstall Google Drive, which in addition to its Dropbox-like duties now functions as access to Google Docs. And ES File Explorer sees use on my phone almost daily. I'll hopefully be able to re-download ezPDF reader, which I purchased a while back. After trying a number of PDF readers, I determined that this one worked better than all the others. And I'll download Facebook and Twitter, even though I don't use either every day. I also make occasional use of the GameFAQs offline reader and IMDB.

Few of my apps see more use than GMail, Google Plus, and Google Reader. And the GTasks widget sits front-and-center on my center homepage. I'll also be sure to carefully migrate over my encrypted KeePassDroid password database. I've become much more careful and vigilant with passwords recently.

Llama is a must-have. Although I rarely open the app, it's running in the background constantly, turning off my ringer when I'm at work, lowering the volume after 11pm and raising it back up at 7am, and turning off my phone's bluetooth when I disconnect my headset. I'll have to make sure to migrate my Llama settings and check for anything new I'd like to add.

There are the essential Google Maps and YouTube apps, and the Moboplayer app, which is the best media player I've found. Its UI takes a little getting used to, but I like it. I'll probably install Skype and Spotify, even though I don't use them often, but I may decide to forget about Netflix. I've never once used my phone to stream a Netflix movie.

Mixology is a fun little app I use from time to time to find drink recipes, and OurGrocieries is the app Linda and I use to share grocery lists and check off items in the store. MyFitnessPal is an app we've both been using recently to track calories and try to lose a little weight. It's very well written, and I use it nearly every day.

QuickPic is an image gallery I use that's better than the stock gallery, and TeslaLED is the flashlight app I use when I want to go into my daughter's room while she's asleep without waking her and without stepping on any toy trains. Lastly, I use the Android TeamViewer app to remote to my home PC, and the Wordpress app to write blog articles on other blogs.

The last thing I need to think about is a custom launcher. The Galaxy S3 has the TouchWiz UI, which I'll likely play with for a bit. I've been very happy with LauncherPro on my Droid X, but I may try out the Nova launcher, as I hear some good things about it.