u/DevilOnYourBack

I was excited when I saw that the launcher was being updated again, figured that the development had resumed. Unfortunately, upon closer inspection, insted of fixing bugs or adding new features I now have two permanent offers to buy additional services within the settings. If there's one thing I truly hate it's the ads! Epseiclaly those advertising irrelevant garbage and services, baked into an app I came to trust. I don't get the targeted audience, I mean, who in their right mind will spend $15/month on an AI agent made by some ad company??? Moreover, who (again, in their right mind) will entrust their number to said company if tomorrow it may go under and take the number with it??? What's the strategy here? Using users' loyalty to try and push this garbage upon them in hopes of creating a new revenue stream? No one will ever use it, definitely not me. Gemini, made by one of the world's biggest companies, charges $5/mo or so and it's garbage... Spending $15 on an AI offered by a launcher company? It's simply idiotic!

I loved Nova and have been using this launcher for over a decade now, however, now that its primary function seems to've been changed to offering unsolicited ads for services nobody wants, I think it's time for a change. Samsung's built-in launcher offers most of the features anyway, is more stable and better integrated, most importantly, somehow, even Samsung's own launcher does not have the same annoying ads as Nova does, now.

Just my $0.02 on this strange, unwelcome development. Don't mean to ruffle any feathers or offend anyone!

*I am emphatically NOT asking about other launchers or ads, just to make sure I'm compliant with the rules.

I pre-ordeded the Ultra 2 because my 2024 Ultra's battery has already began showing signs of aging and no longer lasts me three days without recharging. Unfortunately, while pre-ordering, I didn't realize that the watch band I selected sucked so I tried to get a different from from samsung.com... Why do they cost $90?! Not a single one of them is made out of genuine leather, what are they made out of that warrants such a cost and why doesn't Samsung throw in another one with purchase, like they used to?

I'm not trying to mindlessly bitch, moan and slander Samsung, it just seems that $90+ isn't just excessive or egregious but just insane! $90+. For a polyurethane/rubber band. I wonder if a single Samsung executive has ever been to Amazon or any other large retailer, having searched for "galaxy watch ultra band"? These (exact) same bands, even those made out of better materials than Samsung's and fully compatible with this new version of the watch cost $13-30, moreover, even the brushed stainless steel and even pure TITANIUM bands cost less than $90! Samsung once offered a $300 genuine titanium band for Watch 5 Pro, it was an excellent band and I paid $80 for it when they were liquidating stock since nobody bought one... And that was a 22mm dlc-coated, precision made, genuine TITANIUM band which I now use with my Movado and can use with any watch that takes a 22mm band. This new $90+ piece of rubber can only ever be used with Samsung's recent SW models because of the proprietary attachment mechanism and, if they change it again, then my $90 purchase will end up in the trash, same as all the expensive bands I purchased prior to Watch Ultra...

So... What gives? Does the Samsung-branded band have some exotic technology or hidden features of which I'm ignorantly unaware or is this $90+ price a result of a moneygrab attempt and Samsung is simply trying to capitalize on a (finally) newly-released Ultra model without realizing how desperate and greedy it makes them look?

If greed is all there is then... Why not also charge a, say, $150 "Innovation fee" or something? For releasing a new smart watch model instead of doing what they did last year and re-paibting an existing one with an even uglier color then re-re-releasing it under a "2026 Edition" moniker?

Seriously. Can somebody explain to me why the $90 price tag for a piece of perforated Polyurethane and a few milligrams of metal?..

Hello and allow me to apologize if this question has been answered, also, if the answer, to you, is obvious, again, I'm asking because, to me personally, it isn't.

There's nothing wrong with my old WH-1000xm4 pair but I keep hearing about how much better the XM6 model is from one source, then immediately told that it's not worth it because the upgrades are difficult to perceive. I haven't heard nor tried on a pair of the new ones because I don't know anybody who has one.

Are there major differences between them? Would I be better off waiting until the next pair (or until mine breaks) or bite the bullet now and just buy a new pair? It's a big chunk of change ($450 + tax) so I'm hesitant to spend money on something that may not even be any better. Would love to trade in my old pair, if anybody knows where then please do tell!

My biggest complains are that, 1) sometimes, my XM4 does this loud feedback right into my ear, forcing me to turn them off and on, more than once on occasion. 2) the ear pads are non-removable. 3) no USB-C audio 4) can't charge and listen to them at the same time.

Would be nice to know if things have changed, asking AI is pointless because it just says "yes" to everything, then flatters me for asking the question. The Reddit community is much more helpful and I hope to get the help I need to make up my mind.

Would appreciate any sound advice! Thank you!!

My fairly new 'smart' brewer lost its cloud connection/wifi and now, despite all types of troubleshooting, factory resets and app data deletions, it just doesn't work, moreover, it developed an annoying pattern of wasting pods, brewing an ounce or two of my Starbucks Veranda then suddenly throwing an error, forcing me to throw away a perfectly good pod it can't use for whatever reason, pour out the brew, wash the cup then use another pod. It doesn't happen every time but, out of 10 cups, 2 will fail.

Now, something I didn't expect was Keurig's customer service being bad, which it is, I'd actually go as far as to say that their customer is pure, unadulterated CRAP! Can't even call it "garbage" because it would be seriously unfair to garbage, since it can still serve a purpose, unlike Keurig's customer service department...

Who knew that after TWO DECADES of buying their overpriced coffee and brewers, the one time I actually needed them to step in and help me they would just ignore me and/or try to convince me to purchase another one of their shitty brewers instead of fixing or exchanging the barely used, broken piece of shit one that they already sold me?!

I blame myself in this situation because something possessed me to replace my old but functioning Elite brewer with this connected newer one, it was the biggest mistake I ever made, coffee-wise, either that or getting involved with Keurig in the first place.

Do NOT buy their smart brewers friends, I didn't do any research and had no idea that they fail so often, make this a learning experience and stay away!!!

I was wondering why my Ultraglass 9h+ Terminator Super Plus-whatever and all other 'prenium' screen protectors were cracking and getting scratched-up so easily, after all, on MOHS scale only a diamond has hardness higher than 9H and, since I safely assuming that the "9H" moniker was not a marketing technique for trusting idiots, like me, but an indicator of hardness, I figured my phone's screen was well-protected, until I dropped it from a two-foot height, onto a piece of metal, cracking both the protector and the screen last week. I then did some research and learned that the most hardcore, most premium, highest-priced screen protectors, even those without any magnetron-sputtering surface treatment for reduced reflection or other surface depositions that make them less hard and safe, can only reach a hardness of 6-6.5, in very rare cases 7, which is still a high hardness indication but not nearly as hard or resistant to scratches as a true synthetic sapphire is.

I also learned that all "Sapphire-infused" brands of glass are just regular alumina oxide glass (a3o2)! Turns out, mixing sapphire with aliminooxide glass destroys the rigid lattice required to achieve sapphire's true scratch resistance, which means that it's not possible to infuse anything with sapphire or ever mix the two. So, unless it explicitly and without any asterisks says that it's a 100% lab-grown sapphire then it's not a "Sapphire-infused" (or "Sapphire-adjacent") glass.

From what I can tell, there is not a single screen protector that can come close to the hardness exhibited by Sapphire (and also not a single "true" synthetic sapphire screen protector available for the Samsung S26 Ultra anywhere in the world), simply because it's way too expensive to produce and even those manufacturers that are based out of the US and thus do not abide by the consumer-friendly laws against false-advertisement and claim to sell synthetic sapphire screen protectors, don't actually sell anything made out of synthetic sapphire but rather a higher-hardness Lithium Aluminaoxide (Or Sodalime glass with higher ion exchange) with additional laminating and surface treatment, manufacturing techniques that do make it safer but nowhere near as safe as sapphire, they also reduce screen responsiveness and have many other negative side effects as a result of their multi-layer construction.

Needless to say im very disappointed, just wanted to share it if, like me, you are puzzled in terms of why the screen protector you spent $40+ purchasing doesn't last and doesn't protect your phone nearly as well as you hoped it would.