Orange San Francisco review

[Guest uouobb]

You can use 'MoreLocales' to switch it to German. I just tried it and it works. :rolleyes:

Hi,Paul.

I am Chinese. I want to konw can the 'MoreLocales' switch to Chinese.

The phone still in UK, not come to my hand, so i don't konw whether it canswitch to Chinese.

Edited November 17, 2010 by uouobb

[Guest amarko5]

@ paul

after unlocking u had that no service problem???as in that unlock video.....

how did u rectify it????

use the orange card and do the phone 0800 bit , this will enable the card and does some registration trick with the phone.

if you just go straight in and use non orange sim and unlock code then the phone won't see just any sim.

p.s. you dont need to use the orange card after this proceedure. B)

[Guest carkev]

hi,

my first posting since getting my first Android phone ....

for Paul,

your superb review led me to the San Francisco and I am mightily impressed with it !

however I cannot find the Touchpal keyboard you mention in any of the apps ...

if anyone can help here itwould be appreciated.

and for those folk strugging to link it to PC, the following worked for me after some 'googling'

1. download and install to your PC the Android SDK kit from here:

http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html

2. then use the SDK manager included to download the USB drivers to PC

3. Now go to your Android phone. Open Settings. Touch Applications. Touch Development.

Tap USB debugging to enable it … Then back out to the home page.

4. Connect your phone to the PC via the appropriate USB cord.

Windows will open its New Hardware Wizard,

Check that you will tell Windows where to find files, and browse to the usb-driver folder.

OK will ungrey and if you click it, the correct drivers will at last, be loaded.

5. Now disconnect the phone, and repeat going to Settings>Applications>Development.

Tap the debugger again to disable it. Back out to the Home Screen.

Now connect your phone to the PC.

It will be recognized, but in order to see and manipulate the SD card files, there's one more step.

Pull down the little white bar at the top of the Android Phone screen.

You will see a Notification "USB connected".

Tap it and you will be given an option to Mount the phone. Touch Mount.

any File Manager (Windows Explorer, etc.) will then see your phone SD card as a separate drive.

You can copy, move delete, whatever.

hope this is of some help.

regards,

Kevin

[Guest mitchgixer6]

First of all thanks to Paul for the review. Bought the phone last week and it really is as good as the review states. Rooted and flashed some themes and am really happy. Flying along quite nicely for now.

Just as a note on the last post, you don't need the drivers for Windows to recognise the SD card as it's own entity. Been using the phone from my PC with no drivers installed. Just carry out the very last step and pull down the notification bar, and choose "mount" for the SD card. It will now show on the Windows Explorer as a removable drive.

[Guest]

... however I cannot find the Touchpal keyboard you mention in any of the apps ...

if anyone can help here itwould be appreciated.

If you tap and hold on any text box that you enter text into, you should get an "Edit text" popup appear with "Input method" as an option.

Tap "Input method" to choose your keyboard.

I only found this by accident playing around after finding you could tap and hold on items like that..

Hope that helps.

Edited November 19, 2010 by Guest

[Guest blackversion]

Enjoy! :)

P

hey paul i so your video rotting the sf and i saw that you was rooting it on your computer not presing the volioum up button can you please tell me were can i get that pragram on my laptop B)

[Guest Blundell]

Great Review, yes I'm waiting on the white one as well!

[Guest Polythene]

Hello all!

I am almost certainly going to order one of these on Monday (sick to the back teeth with my INQ phone on 3, and in the last week of my contract). Been planning on moving to Android for some months now, and this seems almost too good do be true! Fantastic price (Aprox £99 and a £10 rolling contract from Tesco Mobile) with nothing else closer to the sprecs and revies of things like the Galaxy, and the Desires.

My main question is how does it handle 'smartphone' typical features. Is GPS as good as on a higher end phone, what about things like sensors all working as quickly as they should?

This may sound silly, but i hope you know what i mean!

My dad has a Galaxy S, so obvioulsy i'll feel a little annoyed if the Sf feels like a step backwards!

[Guest HMZX]

Great review paul

im gonna definitely get this phone

great specs for the price. i was considering the htc wildfire but everything on the net says that this is better

although i use orange, im gonna debrand it and root it. all the orange apps i need i can download from orange world.

but the only thing im actually gonna download is the account app. its about the only handy app orange have made after wednesdays B)

[Guest Polythene]

So what is generally thought of as the best sim only deal out there at the moment?

Calling up tmobile, or buying THIS from TescoMobile?

[Guest FrankieADZ]

Great review, got mine yesterday B)

Put clockwork and r4 rom on there too :) thought I'd messed it up a few times too lol

great phone for the money

[Guest BEKO-86]

Ordered mine earlier in the week from play, everything lined up to unlock for vodafone straight away and load up the R4.

My HTC magic is getting on a bit now and my contract isnt up until Feb.

Plan is to either take out a sim only deal or upgrade and sell straight away, tbh I have been happy with the Magic so the SF should be perfect.

Some of these newer android phones are a little on the large side! Would rather have a dedicated Tab and a phone not something inbetween!

[Guest froschke]

Hi,

this phone could replace my t-mobile pulse.

is the headphone jack better than the one of the pulse? static noises? is it louder?

kind regards

[Guest martynemail]

Got one for my wife on advice from a different forum, which incidently pointed me here as another excellent android read.

So got on Friday for my wife, next day back to Orange where my tight with money son also snapped one up...Rooted my wifes one yesterday with your r4 custom Rom...Brilliant bit of kit.

Thanks for the forum

Mart

[Guest Woshmistro]

I really want this phone! I found it on Play.com but they were sold out on the Grey version then removed it today, only the white one is available for pre-order, don't really want that one, far too Essex style, and could show up dirt.

Anywhere else that sells the grey version for just £99, possibly free £10 topup too?

[Guest insurgente]

I really want this phone! I found it on Play.com but they were sold out on the Grey version then removed it today, only the white one is available for pre-order, don't really want that one, far too Essex style, and could show up dirt.

Anywhere else that sells the grey version for just £99, possibly free £10 topup too?

http://www.prepaywizard.co.uk/orange-san-f...isco-payg-phone

use code SUB613 to get 10% off

no idea when it'll be back in stock however

Edited November 29, 2010 by insurgente

[Guest Woshmistro]

I decided to get it straight from the Orange site, it comes with a free gift box also my dad says he can get the VAT taken off so it's more like £90 instead of £109, also able to choose a delivery date for free. I can't wait!

[Guest t0mm13b]

http://www.prepaywizard.co.uk/orange-san-f...isco-payg-phone

use code SUB613 to get 10% off

no idea when it'll be back in stock however

Taken off prepaywizard.co.uk - ? what? are they not stocking it anymore.... :P

[Guest insurgente]

Taken off prepaywizard.co.uk - ? what? are they not stocking it anymore.... :P

eh? that link still works and it's on the front page of Pre Pay Wizard (?)

I e-mailed them and they said Orange had trouble sourcing them.... they'd been told they'd get more Q1 of 2011, but are trying to get some before christmas

[Guest liiloo]

Ohh and after reading the review i want one now :/

Sad thing that i do not live in UK

What bugs me is the camera and battery stand by, its so damn below of my standard.

Do you know that if you order a phone to another country not to UK, do they deliver it?

[Guest AlphaVision]

I just got my SF for 119 pounds with a christmas gifts pack. I don't know why, but they didn't want to sell the 10 up top, so I had to get the 20 up top. However it still is a great price :P Thank you Paul for the review it really removed any doubts from my mind about that phone :D

[Guest kaska_pt]

hey guys, can someone confirm to me if in the SF's original box, is written OLED ?

[Guest aleksb]

@Paul

Your review made me take the plunge and get my first Android device. So far I am very happy with the ZTE Blade.

I bought mine in store at £119 on the 29th Nov. They said I had to top up £20 but told them that on the online Orange store

you could get it with £10 top-up for £119 total. They then agreed to do it with the £10 top-up saving me a tenner on the in store price ;)

The xmas gift pack was not impressive tho, the outer cardboard packaging probably cost more than the contents :P

Cheers,

Aleks

[Guest SteveK88]

EDIT: Moved to another topic.

Edited December 7, 2010 by SteveK88

[Guest Nagromat]

Getting my OSF on Monday! Looking forward to upgrading from my HTC Magic - the severe lack of RAM in it has been so frustrating, as it will often have to reload the home application after I quit an app ¬_¬ Was great getting the 15% discount and free gift box! :) Thanks for the review - definitely made my decision final!