Gadgetory

are you happy with your Galaxy s4 but which you can get just a little bit more out of it I'm Taylor Martin this is PocketNow and these are a few apps to help enhance your experience with a samsung galaxy s4 the samsung galaxy s4 is finally available and we've reviewed it twice looking at it from every possible angle the verdict was very much the same both times it's a fantastic phone with very few compromises however the software while boasting many unique and useful features is also one of the few aspects of the s4 that can actually negatively affect the performance and user friendliness of the phone and while it may seem Samsung left no stone unturned the company did leave out some much needed functionality thanks to a few applications and services you can greatly enhance your experience for the s4 in no time one of the features Samsung introduced last year with the Galaxy s3 is s-voice it was meant to rival Apple's voice controlled assistant Siri and Google's own automated digital assistant service Google now but the initial take on s voice was that it really wasn't much of a match for either no less the service remains and believe it or not it negatively affects the responsiveness of the software it's turned on by default and accessed by double pressing the home button this means when you press the home button once the system doesn't immediately jump back home it pauses and waits to make sure you're not trying to double press the button if you never use s voice it's wise to disable it this is done by opening s voice pressing menu selecting settings and unchecking open via the HOME key this eliminates the hesitation after a HOME key press but there's no reason a double press of the physical home button should not still be useful by downloading an application called home - you can set Google search or any application of your choosing to open with a home key double press download the free application and open it set the desired application as a start application in step one in step two choose the double press interval and for step three choose the actual launcher you intend to use press the HOME key set home 2 as the default launcher and you're all set so for it is worked flawlessly for us and we're loving the hardware integration with Google now the Galaxy s4 comes with Dropbox sync enabled out-of-the-box but how can you make the most of Dropbox a seemingly basic cloud storage service we use Dropbox day in and day out and primarily we use it to transfer pictures and other files between multiple devices or even multiple Dropbox users one of the most important functions of the camera backup though is the ability to almost instantly access pictures taken from another device without ever having to lift a finger enable camera upload in Dropbox settings set it to upload over Wi-Fi only or also over cellular data and take a couple pictures if you have a tablet another phone or a laptop nearby those pictures will be available in no time from the other devices this doesn't take rocket science to figure out but it's an irreplaceable feature of Dropbox on virtually any mobile device Samsung is renowned for always fitting its mobile devices with notification LEDs this time around Sammy added some control over set LEDs and the Settings app but the options for the user can do with the notification lights or paltry compared to some third-party applications such as light flow priced at 249 light flow may seem a bit pricey for nothing more than adjusting the color or frequency of the notification light but it's definitely a neat tool that can greatly expand the usefulness of the blinking LED for example out of the box the colors are limited and preset meaning you have to learn through trial and error what each color means with light flow you can set each different notification to a separate color so that you know what type of notifications you have missed without ever turning on the display this one takes a bit of setting up as the settings are seemingly endless but once you get it just right is extremely gratifying a feature of the stock touch with keyboard that gained some attention after the announcement was Samsung's choice to use the Swift key flow technology sounds great right trust us when we say that the TouchWiz keyboard is nothing like Swift key even after learning from Facebook Twitter Gmail and other sources the prediction software simply does not work as well as Swift Keys native predictions the keyboard on the s4 is arguably one of the most frustrating soft keyboard experiences in recent memory we suggest either picking up the original SwiftKey keyboard from play for 399 or giving the latest non-beta swipe a chance for only 99 cents we've taken a keen liking to both over the last few months with Android 4.2 onboard the Galaxy s4 comes with the lockscreen widget functionality this is probably the most sock-like feature in the latest version of TouchWiz the only difference is Samsung included shortcuts to five of your favorite applications at the bottom of the lockscreen we're not complaining but the standard set of lock screen widgets are pretty useless and drab if you're looking for a plain and simple lockscreen widget that packs a ton of information such as missed calls I am text messages weather information battery info calendar appointments and lots more on your lockscreen in a single widget we definitely recommend downloading - clog it's free and made by one of Google's own best of all many applications come with dashclock extensions built in and dozens of other extensions are available in the Play Store lastly if you're already growing tired of the cumbersome home screen and App Store experience offered by TouchWiz you might want to try downloading a launcher replacement application Nova Launcher offers a strikingly stock like experience for free so if you want to extend it functionality you may consider paying four dollars for the prime version a holo istic launcher we've grown very fond of lately is action launcher Pro the developer has taken a new approach on the Android home screen with shutters or widgets that are accessed by an upwards gesture with your finger over the app and covers which are folders disguised as a single app icon the application drawer couldn't be any more simple either as it's an alphabetical list of all apps on the device that is opened by pulling the leftmost home screen to the right that's going to do it for this video so if you enjoyed it and found it helpful be sure to give it a thumbs up below and subscribe to the channel find us in all the usual places twitter google+ and facebook at pocket now you can find me on twitter at casper tech I'm Taylor Barton and I'll see you next time you