Why is there such an active community for the T Mobile Pulse?

[Guest garagemc]

What are the causes of the active community for the pulse?

This is the second biggest subforum after the HTC Hero. We are even larger than the HTC desire subforum, when compared by total number of topics.

[Guest Richard_Arkless]

Well back when the pulse was released the phone was probably the cheapest option for an android phone that you can buy from a shop, of course that has changed with the pulse mini but really the pulse mini is a rip off compared to what you get with the pulse

When I decided to buy an android phone I was looking at the htc and that was way too overpriced so I looked at the tmobile store and bam I saw the pulse, it had around the same specs but for 1/3rd the price so I chose that instead

Others probably were the same

Edited September 16, 2010 by Richard_Arkless

[Guest Azurren]

Well back when the pulse was released the phone was probably the cheapest option for an android phone that you can buy from a shop, of course that has changed with the pulse mini but really the pulse mini is a rip off compared to what you get with the pulse

Plus the fact that the stock pulse is crap :lol:

Who wouldn't google some speed-mods after a month or two of using a degrading pulse? (Gets slower everyday with stock)

And also XDA don't touch the pulse

Edited September 16, 2010 by Azurren

[Guest Richard_Arkless]

Plus the fact that the stock pulse is crap :lol:

Who wouldn't google some speed-mods after a month or two of using a degrading pulse? (Gets slower everyday with stock)

And also XDA don't touch the pulse

True but a lot has changed since then we now got loads of options

official december update 1.5 (kinda speeded it up but not by much), custom official 1.5, custom u8230 1.5, official 2.1, endless list of 2.1 custom roms and now the froyo development which is rocking my phone atm

The question is do I feel differently about the phone and do I wish I chose a different phone, NOPE :)

Talking of XDA, im surprised the community over there havent jumped on the band wagon and started making roms lol

Edited September 16, 2010 by Richard_Arkless

[Guest Speckles]

The Pulse was a brilliant introduction to the Android platform. I would never have bought my Galaxy otherwise. It was also the pulse that gave me a very cheap contract phone when T Mobile did the offer.

[Guest Fusion0306]

Plus the fact that the stock pulse is crap :)

Who wouldn't google some speed-mods after a month or two of using a degrading pulse? (Gets slower everyday with stock)

And also XDA don't touch the pulse

I was paying my phone bill today in T-mobile and saw Pulse in stock. I just had to touch it. Oh my God! Screen responsiveness fail, speed fail, ui fail :(

You can't believe how much difference there is. Having my Pulse 2.2 in my left hand and stock Pulse in my right hand... It really made me smile :lol:

BTW, im first on linpack Pulse scale (for now) :)

I had to brag :(

[Guest WallOfSound]

The low price and because there is a vacuum left by the official support for the phone.

I bet 99% of pulse buyers were lured in by the price. I remember when I was looking for a phone I wrote up a list of what I wanted and then looked for the cheapest phone that met the critera. Pulse was £100 on pay-as-you-go at the time, there was something from Motorola for £150 and then anything else was £200+

Anyway the price created a userbase that wouldn't have existed otherwise. Then once it became obvious official support was so crap (how long did the 2.1 update take and UK still won't release one that works) that creates pressure on the community to do their own thing and forces them to get active.

[Guest gusthy]

One more reason: pulse is very easy to mod. A real beginner can root it without s*cking with goldcards and similar things. just flash AmonRA easily and your phone is opened.

Other thing is that it is quite an affordable hw (good screen, acceptable battery etc) with that stupid low memory problem. It makes people thinl about how it is possible to tune it to its maximum.

[Guest arlindo.costa]

I was paying my phone bill today in T-mobile and saw Pulse in stock. I just had to touch it. Oh my God! Screen responsiveness fail, speed fail, ui fail :)

You can't believe how much difference there is. Having my Pulse 2.2 in my left hand and stock Pulse in my right hand... It really made me smile :lol:

BTW, im first on linpack Pulse scale (for now) :)

I had to brag :(

Were on top... :( :lol: :P :)

[Guest Simon O]

I bet 99% of pulse buyers were lured in by the price.

I was lured in by this forum. I wanted to get a cheap Android phone for playing around with and I was looking to choose between the Pulse, Pulse Mini, HTC Hero. I read about custom roms and found MoDaCo. Started reading the forums for each device to see what the situation was with custom roms and saw that the Pulse had quite a big community and that made me want the phone more.

Yeah I could have got a Hero and I could be running Cyanogenmod 6. But where is the fun in that? Hardware wise the Pulse is a good phone. Android can run happily on the G1/Dream which has small ram and an underclocked CPU when using stock rom. The Pulse has been crippled by Huawei who got an F in the "Optimizing Android for your device" examination at school. Then come along T-Mobile who stick their crap on the ROM and you end up with a not very nice experience.

So in comes the community. From the very start I was impressed by the work done by Paul O'Brien on the MCR custom roms. I was also impressed by other forum members who brought us tips, tweaks and fixes to make the experience even better. Then you have people like BigBearMDC who willingly sacrifices a phone with a leaked ROM that allowed us all to experience Android 2.1 for the first time. Then the first custom roms, kernel projects, multi-touch projects, one guy even crazy to try and port Froyo from scratch!

The point I'm trying to make is that this forum is a working, vibrant community, where people put their heart and soul into improving the experience of our phones every single day, no matter the skill level. I have seen so many other forums where the people with the brains often are unwilling to help the less experienced users. Simple questions are ignored, users are ridiculed. This doesn't happen here. This is why I'm a part of this community.

[Guest ambrozija]

i was searching for a smart-phone probably more then a year before i got pulse. i was first looking for a windows mobile phone (touch, touch2 etc.) but i was offended (really, offended!) by their price tags! and the price tags that t-mobile serves in our country - it is a robbery - really.

then i've got anxious to get some kind of smart phone with touch screen and wifi and stuff and then i saw the cheap (relatively) 5800 xpressmusic. i was really close to buying it, but i wasn't sure about symbian, and community around it. boy, i was lucky that i waited! pulse is a living proof that a good phone doesn't have to cost 400 euros!

maybe we should forward this thread to HTC.

and fib, i second your opinion that there are really nice people here, on this threads, which improves the whole experience.

long live pulse :lol:

[Guest flip360]

The point I'm trying to make is that this forum is a working, vibrant community, where people put their heart and soul into improving the experience of our phones every single day, no matter the skill level. I have seen so many other forums where the people with the brains often are unwilling to help the less experienced users. Simple questions are ignored, users are ridiculed. This doesn't happen here. This is why I'm a part of this community.

+1 Perfectly said.

[Guest mupra]

Let's touch each other's phone, weeeeee! :lol:

(after this, we run to the forest, naked)

[Guest scoobydoo99]

I was after an Android phone as I was curious to try Google's software.

I was watching all the new phones and when T Mobile launched the Pulse @ £179 it looked good value - then it dropped to £149.99.

I was close to buying the Acer Liquid when it launched but couldn't justify £380 on a phone I hadn't even seen reviewed.

Then T Mobile knocked 20% of all PAYG phones for a day in December and also reduced the the Pulse to £99 - a steal for an Android phone to get some experience.

I'm guessing that T Mobile have sold a few truckloads of the Pulse for this reason - hence the popularity and the need for a home.

Thought I'd keep it a few months but now on FLB 1.5 and see nothing better unless I fork out £400.

The developers on here seem to like a challenge and are very helpful.

Edited September 17, 2010 by scoobydoo99

[Guest de_shepherd]

I was after an Android phone as I was curious to try Google's software.

....

Then T Mobile knocked 20% of all PAYG phones for a day in December and also reduced the the Pulse to £99 - a steal for an Android phone to get some experience.

Same for me (n.b. it was 33% off that day + I "discovered" quidco at the same time that gave me another £15 - well £10 after quidco's £5 "membership") .... and it was also on my birthday that helped!

I saw the offer on the Pulse on hotukdeals and spent time then googling about it ... in the process of that I came across this forum and found lots of info (along with the news that Tmob would be releasing 2.0/1 for the Pulse in 2 or 3 months!)

Basically at £80-90-ish (after quidco) my view was it worth getting it to try out Android even if the result was either (1) Android was so bad I'd go back to my Palm Treo, or (2) Android was great but the Pulse wasn't so I'd have to take the plunge and pay more or get a contract for a better phone.

[Guest Azurren]

The point I'm trying to make is that this forum is a working, vibrant community, where people put their heart and soul into improving the experience of our phones every single day, no matter the skill level. I have seen so many other forums where the people with the brains often are unwilling to help the less experienced users. Simple questions are ignored, users are ridiculed. This doesn't happen here. This is why I'm a part of this community.

That's one of the things I love about this community too :)

True, there are some that would rather write "Search the forums" instead of just copying and pasting the link. But the most half are brilliant! I love you all! :lol:

[Guest ogiogi]

There were few things i was looking for when i decided to buy my first smart phone. Cheap, custom (speed my device) ROMs and THEMES. Well i got the first two right away but the THEMES part was driving me crazy. I mean all of my friend's had nokias and SE with tons of themes to choose from. And the pink T-Mo crap. Huh don't get me started on that. So with the help of the users at Modaco and the Home-Screenshots topic i started digging in to android framework and .9png's and lot's of other out of this world for me stuff. Finally i got the hang of it and i was glad to pass my knowledge to other users who were willing to give that a try. That's how i learned in the first place. So yeah we had to do what HUAWEI and T-Mobile failed to, but i enjoyed every part of it.

Edited September 17, 2010 by ogiogi

[Guest AJV]

I searched for ages for an android phone that would not break the bank or tie me into a long contract. The Pulse was inexpensive for the hardware, and could be bought in UK on Pay as you Go - I didn't know anything about the software then.

I absolutely love this community, I can't contribute much but opinions but here is why I think this community is so active:

1) As mentioned, the software on the phone was crap.

2) I would consider the Pulse to be one of the first affordable android phones, and one of the only PAYG android phones. It may have attracted the 'early adopters' who like to tinker with technology, and as it was not super expensive I suspect many more people were willing to risk it by trying things that seemed esoteric at first, like rooting.

3) XDA forums which would otherwise be the main hub of interest did not have a Pulse forum.

4) Paul O'Brien (who is the site owner I think) had a Pulse originally, or was at least developing for it. ROMS were created and they did not take too much skills to apply them to the phone.

5) The activity on the forum generated more interest, and led to more people trying things like themes modding and discussing apps/ settings/ homescreens that helped the poor Pulse more closely match more expensive phones.

6) T-Mobile and Huawei, though slow to do anything, did provide some updates and responses that kept people interested in the phone (Dec update, 1.6 due in march/april/may, 2.1 coming in august/september/oct/soon, T-Mo HU and Tre 2.1 releases, and finally the source code).

7) Finally the awesomeness of particular people whose names have become legend in this community, and anyone who takes the time to answer a noobs question.

These factors kind of led to a 'perfect storm' that helped create this community, and long may it continue!

[Guest Totyasrác]

In my opinion - MoDaCo Pulse community just... Kicks @ss big time!

Thanks a lot to Paul, flibblesan, Bobo, Tom G, ogiogi and many others to make our Pulses a decent, nice and usable phone. Respect to all of you!

:lol: :( :) :)

Edited September 17, 2010 by Totyasrác

[Guest Spikey001]

In my opinion - MoDaCo Pulse community just... Kick @ss big time!

Thanks a lot to Paul, flibblesan, Bobo, Tom G, ogiogi and many others to make our Pulses a decent, nice and usable phone. Respect to all of you!

:lol: :( :( :)

Amen!! :)

[Guest Spoke]

In my opinion - MoDaCo Pulse community just... Kick @ss big time!

Thanks a lot to Paul, flibblesan, Bobo, Tom G, ogiogi and many others to make our Pulses a decent, nice and usable phone. Respect to all of you!

:lol: :( :) :)

Agree entirely and checking the latest postings/topics just becomes so addictive.

[Guest TGWS]

Love you all for making my phone a better device then what it would be with if i stuck with T-mobile 1.5 or Even 2.1 With the horrible SMS Bug. but now its gone for me.

FLB 1.6 (L)

I think everyone has contributed in one way or another, either making roms or awnsering a question that nobody wanted to.

Thankyou all.

[Guest DanWilson]

Why? Because I can't stay on topic.

:lol:

But I got a Pulse because I wanted a HTC Hero, but my mum and dad said no (and later told me I could have got it...) but saw the Pulse as a brilliant alternative. Although T-Mobile called it an HTC... I was told not to flash it but erm, a week later was the best I could do. I really want a Desire HD, but I'd never leave the Pulse community. I don't know why but everyone here just relates. Like we were all family in a past life.

[Guest SA160N]

my last phone was the HTC Touch HD, now i have the Pulse because Android 2.2 on HTC Touch HD does't have video accelleration.

[Guest Rajit]

Although I don't own a pulse (happy owner of a liquid), I must say that the only two forums I see making the most splash on here are pulse and liquid (im always seeing a recent post about flb). I think the reason behind this could be that both the phone were underpriced for their segment and I think that this price segment is what is most favoured by devs and hackers and students who practice there new found skills on these not-so-expensive devices.

I really do like the pulse community and i would also urge you all to come and take a look over at liquid.modaco.com , we've got some pretty amazing development going on over there. Liquid orignally shipped with 1.6 but due to various leaks from acer, we were able to have multiple PRETTY amazing 2.1 roms before a Stable official rom was released by acer. We've also got 2 (almost fully working) froyo roms (1 of which came under development around time when google was releasing betas for 2.2 for n1). Multilple froyo roms are under development (from some SERIOUSLY talented cookers), and we'll soon (within a week) be having a fully working CM6 port as well (there is a current version as well, but it has some bugs). If things go as planned a dev is also attempting to get official cyanogen support for liquid (cuz its almost fully ported). Things are just great!!! and yeah, acer will also be releasing a 2.2 update soon with it's custom ui!

Edited September 17, 2010 by Rajit