Android 4.3 update for Galaxy S III causing major issues, might have been put on hold

[Archean]

Android 4.3 update for Galaxy S III causing major issues, might have been put on hold

Well, it looks like Samsung may have skipped properly testing the Android 4.3 update for the Galaxy S III in a bid to get it out there as soon as possible. The update, which started rolling out to unlocked international variants of the S III today and to Vodafone-branded handsets a few days ago, is causing all sorts of issues for users, and as a result Samsung might have pulled the plug and paused its rollout.

There seems to be issues with each available ROM, the most stable one seems to be "United Kingdom - BTU" (I.e. I9300XXUGMJ9_I9300OXAGMJ9_BTU). The only major bug (after complete wipe/format) has been lockscreen wakeup lag, which is pretty annoying.

Edit:
I also discovered that Wi Fi performance is not up to the mark.

 

[St1ckM4n]

Ew, lockscreen wakeup lag. The SGSII had that, and nothing could fix it.

 

[Archean]

update:
Well, performance isn't any better or worse than earlier, Wi Fi issued somehow fixed when I wiped the settings and reconnected.

Recharging seems bit slow/taking more time (my perception, since I never bothered to log how much time it took before or after).

Apart from lock screen lag, when the phone is woken up by pressing power button (and after a very long time when lock screen finally appears) sometimes it quickly disappears.

 

[Archean]

Update 2:

Generally the update seems to be alright, except for issue I stated in previous posts. Aside from that, I've had only one crash (though I needed to pull out the battery to make it boot). Battery life seems to be reasonably fine. Here is some screen shots:

Fixed !

Also, it seems that the battery drains a bit faster with the new update. Unless there are any other major issues which I can find out, whether to update or not to update (for now) is reader's choice.

 

[St1ckM4n]

Can't see pics.

Have you thought about running custom ROM? Because stock ROMS usually come from your carrier, not Samsung.

 

[Archean]

I haven't bothered with official sammy ROM for more than week or so when I bought S3 back when it was launched. Simply because it is sluggish, and just not fun to use. Also I always buy a factory unlocked smartphone, IMO it is a far better thing to do compared to getting a carrier locked one.

Until now, I've been using custom ROMs (mostly cyanogen / paranoid or ultima). But one thing is for sure, android somehow manage to get 'slow and sluggish' overtime, and then there are instability issues. Probably, the reason Google is now investing so much in memory / resource management of the OS.

 

[wholesalestunna]

This is a shame... I really liked the Galaxy when I had one briefly and would have picked the Galaxy S4 over the iPhone 5s if Samsung could get their reception issues worked out.

 

[Archean]

Update:

To mitigate extremely sluggish (and painful) wakeup of lock screen, I turned it off completely. However, it didn't make the problem go away, and it is more of an hit and miss, at times phone wakes up as it should, and for remaining instances the wakeup is just as painfully slow.

Another explainable crash, while idling, I needed to pull out the battery and restart it.

My conclusion is, it is an halfhearted attempt to update last year's flagship at best, which says a lot about the business model most of these OEMs follow.

 

[Archean]

For anyone still slugging along their S3, the 4.3 update has resumed with newer firmware:
XXUGMK6


This presumably fixes the wake up lag, camera, performance + memory related issues as well.

Link:
http://www.xda-developers.com/andro...e-resumes-for-the-international-galaxy-s-iii/