List of Epic Pros and Cons

**tnolte** · 09-01-2010, 10:25 AM

As a current Samsung Moment user, and having constant airplane and responsiveness issues. I'm looking to keep my eye on the Epic 4G to know what issues users are finding with the device. There are many days that I'm about tempted to toss my Moment across the room. Since a hardware keyboard is big ticket item for me the Epic is what I'd be looking at over an EVO.

Anyways, to the question at hand I'd like to know what are the annoyances and/or major issues that users have discovered with the Epic 4G. Currently the biggest item I'm seeing so far is:

1. Capacitive Touch Responsiveness/Failure
2. Battery Life with 4G/Hotspot (pretty much a given with any smart phone)

Please post with what items you've found. Thanks!

Moderator Note: This thread is now about posting cons AND pros. Please post things you like and things that you wish that need to be fixed.

**Andrew Ruffolo** · 09-01-2010, 10:45 AM

Actually, no issues with the capacitive buttons here, nothing wrong with them. Battery life is decent for me, but haven't seen it on a full charge yet. My only issue is with the dock. Volume shuts down and screen doesn't stay on if you navigate away from the desk home app, and come back to it.

**hybrid85** · 09-01-2010, 10:48 AM

I can also confirm that the capacitive buttons work great. I would not list them as an issue. I know a lot of people were worried about it, but ask any other user who has an epic and they'll also tell you they work just fine.

**rundown87** · 09-01-2010, 10:54 AM

PINK AND PURPLE FEEDS AND UPDATES WIDGET. This shouldn't make me as mad as it does, but why in the world would they choose to make it pink and purple if they won't let you change it?

**downsouth11** · 09-01-2010, 10:55 AM

(knocking on wood) capacitive buttons are perfect for me.

**HAAS599** · 09-01-2010, 10:57 AM

4G/Hotspot battery life is the only problem across all phones.

The capacitive button, USB device, and loose slider issues have all been affecting only some users and phones.

edit: You could add that you can't recieve MMS messages while on wifi but it works just fine on 3g/4g

**navoid** · 09-01-2010, 11:02 AM

My experience

Capacitive buttons- perfectly responsive.
Slider mechanism- very solid, no wobble like on pre.
Battery life- very similar to evo, better than pre

Power button placement- getting annoying, when I go to push power and I push on slider mechanism. Minor complaint

Overall way less issues then I have had with any other phone prior to this. Such as evo and pre (both fantastic phones with odd little issues).

**LonghornTreo** · 09-01-2010, 11:12 AM

Personally, I think you can add slow charging time to the list. My Pre could go from drained to fully charged in an hour and half, Epic is taking longer than 3 hours

**scottresnik** · 09-01-2010, 11:14 AM

Maybe it's because I'm new to android, but the Home Screen won't go into landscape mode with the keyboard closed.

**sndplace** · 09-01-2010, 11:14 AM

capacitive buttons are fine here.... my co-worker went back to sprint to get a new sd card.. hers wasn't being read. we switched out cards my worked fine on hers, it read and loaded the card quick. her sd card on my phone didnt work........ I love this phone.....

**lorcha** · 09-01-2010, 11:29 AM

Some folks are noticing GPS issues.

**stomperxj** · 09-01-2010, 11:37 AM

Capacitive buttons = good
GPS = Marginal at this point. I'm in the boise id area

Had to re-seat my SD card before it would recognize it.

My biggest issue is with all the Sprint bloatware starting automatically on this thing. I go in and send a text, and Spring Navigation starts up in the background. I wish there was a way to uninstall the Sprint garbage. Thank you Advanced Task Killer...

**sushi** · 09-01-2010, 11:50 AM

Odd - just noticed that as well. Why does Sprint Navigation need to be running unless I say so?

I too had an issue with my SD card not being recognized about mid-day yesterday. After a few reseats, it came back.

**coolqf** · 09-01-2010, 11:53 AM

Originally Posted by rundown87

PINK AND PURPLE FEEDS AND UPDATES WIDGET. This shouldn't make me as mad as it does, but why in the world would they choose to make it pink and purple if they won't let you change it?

Haha! I SOO agree. I went ahead and removed this widge and put in the Facebook and Twitter widgets in its place. You just can't look past those colors for the Samsung widget!

**barbarianthemadserb** · 09-01-2010, 11:53 AM

!.Could not get wifi at home to work. Kept getting "unable to scan for networks" error. Sprint tech support finally had to wipe the phone, and reactivate it.

2.Suddenly today, my Epic said I had no SD card installed. Pulled the battery to reset it and now it says I do have an SD card.

**ywenz** · 09-01-2010, 12:06 PM

Sorry to say but this thing sound buggy as hell.. we'll see how I like it when it arrives via fedex tomorrow.

**sstea** · 09-01-2010, 12:27 PM

There is definitely a Wifi bug. I experienced it as well as another poster. We both were setting up access with WPA and hidden SSID. The Wifi can get hosed to the point where you have to wipe your phone with a hard reset. I had to do this but since then I have not had a problem and Wifi is working fine now.

Some minor items...

The capacitive buttons are a little too unresponsive on my unit. For some reason it is more pronounced on the home button.

System sound volume setting is not persistent. I turn this down almost all the way but every time a reboot the phone it resets to max volume.

**seistoes#AC** · 09-01-2010, 06:43 PM

Originally Posted by scottresnik

Maybe it's because I'm new to android, but the Home Screen won't go into landscape mode with the keyboard closed.

I just downloaded Launcher Pro. It allows the home screen to rotate and overall it's a much better launcher than the native one.

**bigmacwrap** · 09-01-2010, 10:08 PM

I have a little screen wobble is that normal?

**murso74** · 09-01-2010, 10:11 PM

my GPS really sucks... other then a few lag issues everything else seems ok

**huytrang90** · 09-01-2010, 11:00 PM

GPS bad
Bluetooth bad: can't pair with Motorola S9-HD

**Andrew Ruffolo** · 09-02-2010, 01:15 AM

Originally Posted by huytrang90

GPS bad
Bluetooth bad: can't pair with Motorola S9-HD

That headset sucks. My LG dare had great blueooth, but I couldn't go running with the phone in my pocket cause it would disconnect with every stride.

**sstea** · 09-02-2010, 08:25 AM

Let me say something positive first....I had the EVO for almost 30 days and the responsiveness and graphics capability are significantly better on the EPIC. This should improve even more with 2.2.

That being said there are definitely some quality issues. I am on my third EPIC.

The first EPIC had very loose slider. It also had very unresponsive capacitive buttons. There is definitely some variation between units on the capacitive buttons this isn't just varying preferences between users.

I picked up a second unit yesterday. Mechanically it was great. Rock solid. When I got home, I remembered that this device is actually supposed to be a phone. ;-) I placed a call and discovered I had defective speaker. It rattled and distorted at very low volumes.

I have my third unit. It has a solid slider at the extended position but there is some see-sawing when it is closed (rocking when pressing the screen at opposite ends). This is somewhat minor so it should be OK as long as it doesn't get worse. The downside of a real keyboard is that you can't guarantee that it will be rock solid over time.

GPS:
Across all three units the GPS is a little bit sluggish especially compared to the EVO. I also noticed that on all units the system would never report accuracy better than 30m. This appears to be a bug because using google maps it appeared to be able to eventually resolve my position on the map within 10 feet or so.

S/W:
There are some Wifi bugs and 4G can be flakey when it is going in and out. These items should easily get worked out along with GPS in an update...I hope.