After Samsung, where's next?

markyboy81 wrote:

After having a bit more time with the camera I've come to the following conclusions. I did own this camera before the NX1, which I got around 5 years ago, but the GNX still holds its own. I really like the output from the GNX and think that for stills inactialy prefer it to the NX1 and NX500. I like the size and it's easier to hold, certainly easier than the nx500 and lighter than the NX1.

I found out yesterday that the headphone jack should double up as a mic jack so I've ordered an adapter and will test this with my external mic. There's no way to adjust audio levels so I'll have to see how it performs.

In terms of connectivity it's fantastic in theory but unfortunately in practice it's not as good as it could be. Even when it was released initially I feel that Samsung skimped on the hardware - this was at the time when they released the Note 3, which had a beefier processor, more ram and was capable of 4k video. Sadly the GNX only really received one update and I've encountered numerous issues with apps crashing - a case in point is WhatsApp, which keeps closing unexpectedly so I've had to uninstall it. Installing an earlier version of WhatsApp also doesn't work, which is a shame. Sadly it seems that mobile OS's only seem to be supported for a few years, the GNX is 8 years old now so I guess we can't expect too much. The WiFi direct feature does work very well though, and that's the most important feature of a connected camera.

Overall then I think the GNX is still a good buy in 2021, especially if you have several lenses (unless you plan to use the 50-150mm!). I would bear in mind that the connected side of the camera has its limitations - don't expect it to be up to 2021 android standards! But the camera itself is great, the interface is well thought out, the screen is fantastic for composition and the added viewfinder (although inferior to the NX1 viewfinder) is a plus.

Can you test something please? I usually connect the nx500 or nx1 to my TV when in photo display mode and they are displayed perfectly, but with GNX, the picture is small, it's like a low resolution and it doesn't fill the whole tv.

Also..when you went through setup did you see the dropbox offer? I did but used my old account and did not receive any storage space. Was wondering what if I create a new dropbox account.

True about the apps, Instagram, Whatsap, Ebay, all modern apps no longer work. You can get the old apk files but still you will be prompted to update and won't work.

Too bad there aren't many around to make forums like XDA work on custom roms. A lite, stripped down recent version of android would work wonders.

I have 2 of these, one from Switzerland one UK, the one from Switzerland is full of bloatware, much like Samsung phones around that time, but the UK version is quite lite.