(This is part of the My Quick Start Guide for Samsung Galaxy S3 Series.)
Ready to take your Samsung Galaxy S3 smartphone experience to the next level ? Here are the few customization tips that will help you to get started with personalizing your S3.
a. Change the display language
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Language and input > Language.
2. Select a language.
b. Add additional input languages
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Language and input, and then tap the Setting icon next to Samsung Keyboard.
2. Select the input languages you want by checking the boxes.
If you have more than one input languages, the virtual keypad will have this key for you to switch between languages.
Also you can tap and hold the to switch to different input modes: handwriting, voice, keyboard (default) and access the clipboard.
c. Turn on or off the touch tones
Some may find the touch tones (on by default) a bit disturbing. If you’re one of them, here are the simple steps to turn it off
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Sound > Touch sounds. You can uncheck if you want to off it.
d. Adjust the device’s volume
1. Press the volume key, located on the left side of your phone, up or down
2. You will see the volume slider appears on screen. Tap settings icon on the right and drag the sliders to adjust the volume level for each sound.
e. Change your ringtone
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Sound > Device ringtone.
2. Select a ringtone and click OK. The default is Over the Horizon. (I quite like this one actually)
f. Change wallpaper for the Home screen
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Wallpaper > Home screen.
2. Select either image Gallery, Live wallpapers or Wallpapers folders.
- Gallery – all pictures you’ve taken using the built-in camera.
- Live wallpapers – animated background pictures.
- Wallpapers – still background image.
3. Then select an image.
g. Change the display font
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Display > Font style.
2. Select a font, and then click Yes on the pop-up window.
h. Lock your device
Instead of just swipe to unlock your screen, you can actually choose other methods such as PIN or Password. Yes, there are also face and voice recognition to unlock.
Let’s not get too excited with those advance stuff and start with something more common, the PIN security.
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Security> Screen lock > PIN.
2. Enter the 4 digits PIN and tap continue.
3. Enter the same 4 digits and click OK to confirm.
i. Change the screen timeout
You can set the length of inactivity time that turns off the device screen.
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Display > Screen timeout.
j. To prevent the backlight from turning off while you are looking at the screen
The device can detect your face when you’re looking at the screen with its front camera. With Smart Stay enabled, the screen will not timeout and turn off.
1. On the Apps screen, select Settings > Display.
2. Check the Smart stay checkbox.
k. To automatically lock the touch screen when the device is near your face for call
To prevent accidental inputs, turn on the proximity sensor to lock the touch screen when it detects the phone is near your face. No more worries of your face might touches the call end button.
1. Tap the phone icon to get to the virtual dial pad.
2. Tap the Option key (besides home button) to get a pull-up menu.
3. Tap the call settings option.
4. Check the Auto screen off during calls checkbox to enable the feature.
l. Add or remove a panel from the Home screen
By default, the device comes with 7 panels. You can add, delete or customize the contents of each one.
I personally find them too many for a start.
1. To edit, you can place two fingers on any panel and pinch them together to switch to Edit mode.
2. Tap and hold the panel’s thumbnail, and then drag it to the dustbin.
Besides removing (or adding) a panel, you can customize the panels with widgets and apps (or stuff such as shortcuts and folders), by simply tapping and holding an app or a widget, and then drag to the panel you wish.
All the apps and widgets are accessible via the Apps/Widgets screen.
Below are the examples of my 2nd and 3rd panel which populated with widgets and apps.
Well, there’re definitely more you can do on this highly customizable phone. Again here are just few to start you off the ground.
(This is part of the My Quick Start Guide for Samsung Galaxy S3 Series.)
* Last updated by Ethan at .