Hot Samsung Posts


How To: Remove the Black Bar Under Your Galaxy's Keyboard
Back when Android used navigation buttons, there was a large black bar at the bottom of every screen to house the back, home, and recent apps buttons. But after switching to full-screen navigation gestures in 2019, there was no longer a need for it — however, a vestigial black bar still shows up when you're using your keyboard.

How To: PIN-Protect Mobile Data & Wi-Fi to Prevent Procrastination & Unwanted Charges
Normally, "restricted access" is something you despise. No one likes to be told they can't do something, especially when it comes to the Internet. Unfortunately, having web access at all times can not only eat away at your wallet, but make your day less productive overall, so some sort of moderation is needed.

How To: Play Your Favorite Retro Video Games Right on Your Samsung Galaxy Note 2
I grew up on SNES. Super Mario, Final Fight, and Contra were just a few of my favorites, and most of my collection is still intact—all I have to do is reach under my bed and pull out all my old games. As proof, I present my original Donkey Kong Country cartridge: Now that I'm older, I don't have as much time to play my SNES as I used to. Hell, I barely have time to play my Xbox. Most of the games I play these days are on my Note 2, but no mobile game can compare to those classics collecting d...

How To: Auto-Change Keyboards on Your Samsung Galaxy Note 2 Based on the S Pen's Position
Got a Samsung tablet with an S Pen stylus? Then you might be one of the many people irked about having to manually choose a different keyboard layout after pulling the S Pen out of the device. For instance, if you have a Samsung Galaxy Note I or Note II, when you pull the S Pen out, the keyboard layout stays the same. But if you'd like it to switch to a different keyboard, say, from the stock Samsung keyboard to something like SwiftKey, then you're out of luck.

How To: Activate Your Samsung Galaxy's Vault to Keep Your Apps, Files, and History Safe from Prying Eyes and Hackers
One UI has an exciting privacy feature that lets you lock apps, photos, videos, and files on your Galaxy device behind Samsung's defense-grade Knox security platform. Only you can unlock it using a pattern, PIN, or passcode, or with biometrics like fingerprint and iris locks. It's like having a safe built right into your smartphone, and it couldn't be easier to set up.

How To: Secretly Call & Message Contacts Using an Innocent-Looking Android Calculator
Whether you're a secret spy or just a regular person with a few secrets, you may want to keep certain information on your smartphone private, and it's totally possible on Android to do so.

How To: Set Rotating Lock Screen Wallpapers on Samsung Galaxy Devices
Say what you want about Samsung's TouchWiz UI being cluttered or overbearing, but one thing you can never complain about is a lack of features. In fact, it's been almost 8 months since I first took my Galaxy S6 Edge out of its box, but I'm still discovering features to this day.

How To: Carrier Unlock Your Samsung Galaxy S4 So You Can Use Another SIM Card
Unlocking your Samsung Galaxy S4 so you can use a different SIM card isn't the easiest thing in the world. In the states, unlocking cell phones was actually illegal, despite the White House's disapproval, though, a recent bill has making its way to the House floor and has made it legal again.

How To: Clone Any Android App on Your Samsung Galaxy Phone Without Using Any Third-Party Tools
Samsung has a cool security feature built into One UI that has an interesting side effect, one that lets you have two separate copies of any Android app on your Galaxy phone. And that's not the only integrated Samsung tool for cloning apps.

How To: Test Your Samsung Phone by Using Secret Code *#0*#
Besides obvious features like a touchscreen and biometric sensors, the modern smartphone comes with an array of state-of-the-art hardware in the form of various sensors that help your device sense the environment around it. And if you have a Samsung handset, chances are, you have a handy feature built in that enables you to check if these sensors are functioning 100 percent.

How To: Turn Your Samsung Galaxy Smartphone or Tablet into a Second Display for Your Computer
An iPad can serve as a second screen for a Mac via Sidecar, available since iPadOS 13, but Apple isn't the only manufacturer to support such a feature. Samsung has had a similar tool since One UI 3.1 that lets you turn certain Samsung Galaxy tablets into second displays for your PC — and there's a hidden feature that expands it to more tablets and even Samsung Galaxy smartphones.

How To: Disable App Icon Badges and Unread Notification Counts on Your Samsung Galaxy Smartphone
If you scan the notification panel on your Samsung Galaxy smartphone daily, all those red circles with numbers that litter the apps on your home screen and app drawer can feel like persistent nagging and unnecessary clutter rather than friendly reminders to check your app alerts — but you can do something about it.

How To: Root Your Samsung Galaxy S3 (And Flash Stock ROMs) Using Odin for Windows
Need root on your Samsung Galaxy S3? Phone not getting the Jelly Bean update? Stuck on the Samsung screen? Phone bricked? Need to restore back to stock? Odin can help!

How To: Hide Apps on Your Samsung Galaxy's Home Screen, App Tray, and Search
You don't have to see every app installed on your phone if you don't want to. Samsung One UI makes it easy to hide apps from your Samsung Galaxy's home screen, app tray, and search tool, whether you want to declutter, simplify things, or keep other people from seeing some of the apps you use.

How To: Unroot & Restore a Samsung Galaxy S6 Back to Stock
There are several reasons that you might want to restore the factory firmware on your device—maybe you need to send your phone back for warranty purposes, or perhaps you're getting ready to accept an over-the-air update and need to unroot first. In some cases, reverting to the stock firmware can even resurrect a soft-bricked phone.

How To: Trick Apps That Won't Run if Your Phone Is Rooted into Thinking Its Not on the Galaxy Note 3
As a preventative measure against exploitation, certain Android applications won't work if your device is rooted. Opening one of these apps that detects root will typically end up with a warning and an inability to access its features, like in the picture below. AS IF!

How To: Adjust Your Samsung Galaxy Note's S-Pen Sensitivity for Better Touch Response
Touchscreens are all the rage these days, and it seems that the stylus has become a relic of the past thanks to newer and better fingertip responsive smartphone displays. But when it comes to phablets like Samsung's Galaxy Note line, the added S-Pen is definitely helpful for more accurate and precise actions (and a less greasy screen). Of course, there are disadvantages of using an S-Pen too, one being hardware issues. Unlike your finger, the S-Pen can malfunction and become a huge problem, n...

How To: See What Your Android Emojis Look Like on iPhones Before Sending Them
When you send an emoji from your Android device to someone that uses an iPhone, they don't see the same smiley that you do. And while there is a cross-platform standard for emojis, these don't work the same way as unicode-based smilies or dongers, so not every operating system displays these little guys the same way.

How To: This Innocent Calculator Is Really a Secret App Safe for Android
Trust can be a touchy subject in general, and is often required when sharing personal information—especially so when handing our phones over to others. You may not have a ton of secret or nefarious information on your device, but that doesn't mean you want your mom or snoopy coworker having easy access to your messages or Facebook app.

How To: Root ANY Samsung Galaxy S5 Variant (Even AT&T & Verizon) in 20 Seconds Flat
With a root bounty of over $18,000 up for the taking, developers were highly motivated to get the AT&T and Verizon Wireless variants of the Samsung Galaxy S5 rooted. Legendary hacker George Hotz, aka Geohot, has won the race and can now step up to claim his prize.

How To: Free Up Space on Android by Moving Large Game Files to an SD Card
Many Android games use large, storage-heavy OBB files to store supplemental data. Generally, games with high-end graphics download these extra files when you install them from the Google Play Store.

How To: Instantly Create Important Reminder Notes After Every Phone Call on Your Galaxy S3
I can be pretty forgetful. If there's something important to remember, I need to jot it down right away or risk losing it forever.

How To: Network Unlock Your Samsung Galaxy S3 to Use with Another GSM Carrier
Why unlock your Samsung Galaxy S3 to use with a different SIM card? One possible reason is that you love your phone, but not your cellular provider because of the poor service or an unreliable connection. If you purchased a Samsung GS3 with AT&T, T-Mobile, etc. on a contract, it might be locked for a specific amount of time called the contract period.

How To: Use Samsung's Hidden Hearing Test to Get Drastically Better Sound Quality from Your Galaxy
A lot of folks complain about the extra features Samsung adds to Android, but while there are some benefits to the slimmer stock Android, the TouchWiz firmware on Galaxy devices definitely has its own advantages.

How To: Turn On Your Android's Flashlight Using the Power Button
Navigating through the darkness—literal darkness, not the existential variety—is always a difficult task on its own, and my Android doesn't necessarily make it any easier. Many manufacturers offer quick access to a flashlight or torch feature, but my Galaxy S4 doesn't have an easily accessible toggle or button available to turn it on.

How To: Eliminate Screen Flicker & Lower Minimum Brightness on Android
If you pay close attention, you might notice that the screen on your Android begins to flicker or pulsate when you lower the brightness past a certain point. This is a result of the AMOLED technology Samsung, among other manufacturers, use in their displays, and the way that these types of screens operate.

How To: Unroot & Restore a Galaxy S5 Back to Stock
There are many different reasons that you might want to revert your Samsung Galaxy S5 back to stock. The main one would probably be that you need to return your device to the manufacturer for warranty purposes. And if you've used root to modify system-level files and components, you'll need to undo those changes before you send the phone back.

How To: Use Smart Switch to Update Your Galaxy S6—Even It's Rooted
In the past, updating a rooted Samsung Galaxy device has always involved the complicated process of downloading the proper firmware for your variant, installing device drivers, then sideloading the update with Odin.

How To: Create & Restore Backups, Flash ZIPs, & More Without Tripping KNOX on Your Galaxy S6
KNOX is a major pain for Samsung owners who like to modify their devices. Its combination of hardware and software security measures make things rather difficult when you're trying to modify system-level files and functions without voiding your warranty.

How To: Secure Your Samsung Galaxy Device by Disabling the Clipboard History
Whether you use a third-party keyboard or the stock offering, your Samsung device keeps a history of the last 20 words you copied on its clipboard. Samsung added this feature to Android to help make multitasking a bit easier, but if you use a password manager like LastPass, this feature quickly becomes a gaping hole in security. While you're copying and pasting your various passwords, the last 20 of them become freely available to anyone that gets their hands on your device.

How To: Update Makes It Easy to Remove S Finder & Quick Connect from Your Galaxy S6's Notification Tray
Sure Samsung toned down TouchWiz on their latest flagship devices, but there was one issue (albeit minor and mostly cosmetic) that really irked me: those damn "S Finder" and "Quick connect" buttons in the notification tray. Only the T-Mobile S6 variants shipped with an option to remove these two buttons, so AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, and other non-T-Mobile users were stuck with them taking up space in the notification panel. If you didn't mind rooting your device, there was a way to remove them b...

How To: Set Up Multiple User Profiles on Your Galaxy S5—Or Any Other Android Phone
When Google released Android 4.2, a new feature was introduced for tablets that allowed for multiple accounts to be used on a single device. In order to create a unique experience for each user, apps and personal data were kept separate, and switching between users became as simple as tapping your profile photo from the lock screen.

How To: Control Your Samsung Galaxy Device from a Mac or Windows Computer
With AirPlay for iOS, Chromecast Screen Mirroring, and even third-party PC-pairing apps to play around with, getting your devices to interconnect could not be any easier than it is today.

How To: Turn Your Android Phone into a Personal Distress Beacon with Motorola's "Exclusive" Alert App
Loving parents can suffer bouts of insomnia when their children leave the house. Not just when they move out, but when hanging out with friends or during out-of-town weekends. Others may worry about their significant other who has to work late all week and their only option for getting home is that sketchy nighttime bus.

How To: Turn Your Galaxy S4 into a TV-Pranking Machine with a Universal Power Button
April Fools may be over, but any day is a good day to prank someone, and the best time to do it is when everyone's eyes are glued to the television.

How To: Fix Lock Screen Issues When TalkBack & Explore by Touch Are Enabled on Your Samsung Galaxy Note 2
One little known feature on Android devices is TalkBack, which provides you with spoken feedback and vibrations in order to help you navigate your device. Obviously, if you're not blind or visually impaired, this isn't a feature you're likely to use.

How To: Change the Boot Up Sound to Anything You Want on Your Galaxy Note 3
Every time my Galaxy Note 3 boots up, I'm greeted by the monotonous and slightly annoying AT&T sound. If you're as tired of the stock boot up sound as I am, then follow along with me below to see how to change it to whatever sound you want, no matter what carrier version you have.

How To: Create "Frame Within a Frame" Photo Effects on Android
Creating interesting photographs used to be more fun, before we all collectively decided that color filters and rotations qualified as "unique" smartphone pics. Scrolling through my Instagram feed only confirms that these supposedly special, filter-laden photos are actually the norm now.

How To: Final Burn Alpha Emulator Revived on Android for Old-School Gaming Fun
Arcades have long faded away from popularity, but their legacy is being kept alive thanks to emulators and the avid fans who grew up loading quarters into all of those coin-op games. Although nothing beats an actual arcade environment, my favorite emulator from the early 2000s has found a new home on Android, and with it a second life.

How To: Get Custom Lock Screen Widgets on Your Samsung Galaxy S5
Stock Android has come with lock screen widget support for a couple of years now, ever since the days of the first Ice Cream Sandwich build. But for some reason, Samsung decided to remove this feature in the Galaxy S5.