went to T mobile and played with their S model

[drizek]

I'd have to say this is the first time I've ever heard anyone be annoyed by text reflow. You actually prefer to scroll back and forth when reading an article?

The only time I need to scroll back and forth is when I load a page written in 1997. Like I said, it is nice to have the option to do it when necessary, but on every other site, I don't want it messing up the layout of the page.

Does anyone else get annoyed when people have software complaints about an Android phone? Its so frustratingly n00bish. Like they don't understand what the biggest selling point of an Android device is, THE CUSTOMIZATION OPTIONS.

That's great, and I'm gonna let you finish your rant, but where did I say that I wasn't going to buy the Epic? I just mentioned that I was annoyed with the out of the box experience. It just feels like they were trying to cram as much crap into the phone as possible, and the home screens on the device I was using were just loaded to the gills with widgets that clash with each other.

@phenderson, I'm glad you hate your Pre. I want to replace mine with the EPIC as well. The Pre was announced a year and a half ago and it is obsolete right now.

My real complaint is that the display looks very pixelated. In theory, it has a higher pixel density than the Pre, but I can't see individual pixels on the Pre. It gets blurry with small text, but you don't see the "grid" like you can with the pentile AMOLED display.

Pixels are easily discernible and it does make small text hard to read. Comparing it to my Nokia N800, which has the exact same size and res display, but LCD instead of AMOLED, it just isn't as sharp. There is no question that the it is beautiful to look at when it comes to pictures, far nicer than the dim 16k display on the N800, but it just plain isn't as sharp as it should be. The problem was compounded by the way it messes with the back light when you are in the browser. In a brightly lit AT&T store, reading text on a website just wasn't very pleasant.

@rufflez, don't be so sensitive. I'm glad there is an option to disable mobile sites in the browser. I've been using iCab mobile on my iPad and it is pretty robust. It's got ad block, tons of privacy settings, multi finger gesture controls, visual tabs, extensions(like readability and instapaper), custom search engines and a long list of browser identification strings. I haven't looked too hard at the various android browsers, but hopefully I can find some with a similar set of features. Anyway, hopefully Samsung will hurry up with FroYo and we can get some of that V8 goodness.

 

[drizek]

The Sprint Nav "works"... BUT and this is a big but, it cannot be used for a long distance trip on the Pre. When I had it, and plugged into the cigarette lighter, the phone still lost power, while it was supposedly charging. Thats how much of a battery whore the phone is. When not in use, its fine, when you need to do anything, you can just watch that battery drop. Its sad that the charger only barely covers charging with medium tasks, but throw in 1 task of navigation, and you're SOL.

Ya, I've even had it discharge while sitting on the touchstone. It's the problem with having such a small phone with a small battery, when you start powering all the radios it gets overwhelmed, whereas someing like the Epic with a 1500mah battery won't see a huge drop just to get 3G and GPS. Of course, then you have something like the iPad which will not charge from most USB ports if you even have just the screen turned on.

 

[caliskimmer]

The only time I need to scroll back and forth is when I load a page written in 1997. Like I said, it is nice to have the option to do it when necessary, but on every other site, I don't want it messing up the layout of the page.



That's great, and I'm gonna let you finish your rant, but where did I say that I wasn't going to buy the Epic? I just mentioned that I was annoyed with the out of the box experience. It just feels like they were trying to cram as much crap into the phone as possible, and the home screens on the device I was using were just loaded to the gills with widgets that clash with each other.

@phenderson, I'm glad you hate your Pre. I want to replace mine with the EPIC as well. The Pre was announced a year and a half ago and it is obsolete right now.

My real complaint is that the display looks very pixelated. In theory, it has a higher pixel density than the Pre, but I can't see individual pixels on the Pre. It gets blurry with small text, but you don't see the "grid" like you can with the pentile AMOLED display.

Pixels are easily discernible and it does make small text hard to read. Comparing it to my Nokia N800, which has the exact same size and res display, but LCD instead of AMOLED, it just isn't as sharp. There is no question that the it is beautiful to look at when it comes to pictures, far nicer than the dim 16k display on the N800, but it just plain isn't as sharp as it should be. The problem was compounded by the way it messes with the back light when you are in the browser. In a brightly lit AT&T store, reading text on a website just wasn't very pleasant.

@rufflez, don't be so sensitive. I'm glad there is an option to disable mobile sites in the browser. I've been using iCab mobile on my iPad and it is pretty robust. It's got ad block, tons of privacy settings, multi finger gesture controls, visual tabs, extensions(like readability and instapaper), custom search engines and a long list of browser identification strings. I haven't looked too hard at the various android browsers, but hopefully I can find some with a similar set of features. Anyway, hopefully Samsung will hurry up with FroYo and we can get some of that V8 goodness.

Coming from an iPhone 3g s, nothing is pixelated lol.

 

[wphend00]

This is all getting complicated. I do not believe that the EVO runs smoother than the epic. I also have seen numerous videos on how the galaxy s videos were supperior to the EVO.

EVO larger screen, "better" UI

Epic, better screen, better camera, better video.

Who knows--


I guess we'll just see when it comes out. I don't think we should compare other carriers phones to the EPIC. The 1.3 Evo camera may not even be as good as the vga on the samsung... and The flash on the evo is not good so the samsung flash for the EPIC only should not be much worse if any.

I cannot speak for the EPIC.... but I can speak for the Vibrant...
I played with it for an hour. Pictures were ok in the low light... I would say about on par with the EVO's except out of 5 pictures that I took with the EVO.. one of them was absolute crap, where as all 3 of the ones that I took with the Vibrant were ok... remember this was in a restaurant with low light. The camera film was very much on par with a Canon IS 3's 640x480 resolution video that I normally took, before mine was stolen...

 

[Cory Streater]

Moreover, the brightness in the browser is noticeably dimmed, to the point where I didn't feel there was enough contrast for me. I didn't see a way to adjust this.

The browser has it's own brightness settings that can be adjusted separately from the rest.

 

[hampstenj]

I cannot speak for the EPIC.... but I can speak for the Vibrant...
I played with it for an hour. Pictures were ok in the low light... I would say about on par with the EVO's except out of 5 pictures that I took with the EVO.. one of them was absolute crap, where as all 3 of the ones that I took with the Vibrant were ok... remember this was in a restaurant with low light. The camera film was very much on par with a Canon IS 3's 640x480 resolution video that I normally took, before mine was stolen...

i'm glad you pointed out low light, keeping in mind there is no flash on the Vibrant, Capivate, and the facinate. whereas the Epic will have an LED flash on it, so that will help on the low-light situations. Question, on the pics you took with the EVO, was you using the flash or was you going no-flash (keep in mind I don't know if you even HAVE that option on the EVO)

 

[wphend00]

i'm glad you pointed out low light, keeping in mind there is no flash on the Vibrant, Capivate, and the facinate. whereas the Epic will have an LED flash on it, so that will help on the low-light situations. Question, on the pics you took with the EVO, was you using the flash or was you going no-flash (keep in mind I don't know if you even HAVE that option on the EVO)

I used the flash on the EVO... which says A LOT about the camera on the vibrant....

And when it comes to video... you can see the FPS slowing down to like 15 fps onthe EVO in the low light... which is, just plain sad..... The Vibrant never missed a beat..

 

[hampstenj]

I used the flash on the EVO... which says A LOT about the camera on the vibrant....

And when it comes to video... you can see the FPS slowing down to like 15 fps onthe EVO in the low light... which is, just plain sad..... The Vibrant never missed a beat..

that says all you need to say right there... that camera in the Vibrant is great then! mind posting some of the pics sometime?

yeah I've seen plenty of video, there's no contest at all, the Epic has by far one of the best video and still cameras in a smartphone out there today. only one better may very well be the iphone 4, and videowise it may be on par with the iphone 4.

 

[coolqf]

The Sprint Nav "works"... BUT and this is a big but, it cannot be used for a long distance trip on the Pre. When I had it, and plugged into the cigarette lighter, the phone still lost power, while it was supposedly charging. Thats how much of a battery whore the phone is. When not in use, its fine, when you need to do anything, you can just watch that battery drop. Its sad that the charger only barely covers charging with medium tasks, but throw in 1 task of navigation, and you're SOL.

Haha. So true on the pre and Sprint Nav. Although I did learn that the discharge only happens when you're going consistently fast. If you're driving in the city with the GPS it actually, ever so slowly, charges the battery.
My fast experiences are when driving from DC to NYC, and slow are in Wash., DC.

 

[jsimon9633]

I went and tried out the vibrant over the weekend and it was pretty good. I didnt feel it was slow or sluggish. I thought the screen looked really good and the size was perfect to me.

I am a pre owner and have had the Evo and iphone before.

I was not a big fan of the touchwiz but I think I can deal with it.

What I am afraid of is that lag issue that others are having when many apps are running that I believe i read was due to the the internal memory being used as sd storage type.

hopefully it can have custom roms soon on epic 4g

now if they would only release it now..

 

[wphend00]

One thing that I can say that I like about the Vibrant more so than the EVO... is that I like the idea of being able to access your power widget settings (sort of) from the notifcation area. I had an EVO 4G with Baked Snack's v9.6 rom... which, to me, was the best ROM out there (until Cyanogen releases their EVO rom)... and running Touchwiz.. and with Fance Widget, and a the FPS hack, I was sitting pretty, with a very stable device... I might be in the majority, but because of my 6 month infactuation with all things Iphone, I really loved the TouchWIZ interface, at least the one loaded in Backed Snack's ROM. Gives me the best of both worlds... I get that nice Sense clock and weather, but the scrolling apps and App-DOCK at the bottom... plus the folders of Android...

I will try to upload some pictures here, in a few...

 

[jsimon9633]

yeah im a big iphone fan too and i like that aspect of it. screenshots would be nice

 

[karnovaran]

One thing that I can say that I like about the Vibrant more so than the EVO... is that I like the idea of being able to access your power widget settings (sort of) from the notifcation area.

Power Strip might be a solution for you. It's an app that lets you pop up widgets and shortcuts from within any app, so you can put the Power Control widget on there to access it from anywhere. Mine is set to be activated by long-pressing the search button. It's especially useful if you want to toggle WiFi or brightness settings without exiting the app you're using.

 

[coolqf]

yeah im a big iphone fan too and i like that aspect of it. screenshots would be nice

I second this! I would love some pix too.

 

[wphend00]

Power Strip might be a solution for you. It's an app that lets you pop up widgets and shortcuts from within any app, so you can put the Power Control widget on there to access it from anywhere. Mine is set to be activated by long-pressing the search button. It's especially useful if you want to toggle WiFi or brightness settings without exiting the app you're using.

Yahh, I know about power strip... did not know that you could pop it up in any application... but I liked that you could slide down the notification menu and boom, activate wifi-bt, satellite, etc...
Very nice... very slick...

Now, like others, I am reading about several different issues with the vibrant

a) The phone slows down horribly when more than 5 or 6 apps are opened...
(I remember the EVO would just keep chugging along until it locked up, or rebooted randomly

b) The Antennae on the phone, in regards to wireless and in regards to the GPS is not the best...

I just wish Sprint would stop pulling our chains, and get with us in regards to this whole EPIC.... I am ready...

I am more than ready... so ready, and sick of this pre, that I offered to trade it to a free, for TP2, just so that I can load Android on that thing....

 

[liquidxit2]

.3" is a big deal- my question is do you want a "big" phone or a "GIANT" one?

I never got used to how big the evo was. I liked the screen size- but really wanted a .25" SHORTER phone. I can't imagine owning the even TALLER Droid X. For me- the Epic and other Galaxy S phones would make for a "good size" everyday phone. I'll miss the larger screen size- but with a hardware keyboard- and more vibrant screen color indoors I'll easily forget about that. I kinda figured the SAMOLED wouldn't be as good as the TFT outdoors- but still sad to hear it confirmed. Doubtful anything will beat the PRE for outdoor use for a bit I guess.

FYI: Avatar preloaded is a Tmobile EXCLUSIVE.

I want a giant phone. I would love for the epic to have a 4.3in and higher resolution, but in the real world it is perfect on paper. I need to hold it in my hands for it to be final, but at this point my brain is already making the transition from webOS to android (sadly).

 

[drizek]

So I went back to the ATT store:

I found the setting to adjust the browser brightness. I couldn't find one to turn off mobile sites, but if people here say it is there, I believe you.

TW didn't look so ugly, but then I turned the brightness up and I was blasted with way too much color again. I think samsung needs to learn how to design a UI for a S-AMOLED display that doesn't burn your retinas.

I could still see the pixel grid, but I noticed that I was holding the phone pretty close to my face, considering how large the display and the various UI elements were. THe phone was still perfectly usable held further away and the pixels became less noticeable.

I watched a Youtube HQ video and while it was pretty nice, I think the screen is too small to actually watch movies on. I have watched movies on my Nokia N800 before, but it really is something that you would only do as a last resort.

Then I went to look at the iPhone 4.

Compared to the Captivate, it was noticeably heavier, although, TBH, it feels amazing in the hand. The screen seemed small and so while text was amazingly sharp(again, lets be clear, it is quite a bit better than AMOLED), it was often so small and cramped that I don't think there is a clear winner between the two displays.

I am particularly excited about being able to read books on the galaxy on a black background. Apparently the battery will last forever that way, and even longer than that if you have red or green text instead.

The Clock app was great. I don't know if it is from google or samsung, but it is really really nice, and what every phone should have by default. Nobody should have to download some third party crapware to get a stop watch and a timer. Dumbphones from ten years ago used to have these standard.

So, basically, I was always planning on getting the Epic, but now I feel a little better about the phone, especially in comparison to the iPhone 4.

 

[Andrew Ruffolo]

The captivate may not have turning mobile view off since they only have tiered data pricing now. I would be very shocked if the Vibrant didn't have it as a setting.

 

[aparigraba]

I have both of them. The vibrant has a better camera...both pictures and videos, better screen, thinner and lighter. Better for gaming. It does lag a lot, so I will be returning it. The Evo is snappier, bigger screenand has HTC Sense. Once Samsung fixes all the lag issues the Galaxy Line will destroy all phones, but the fact that they haven't even mentioned it worries me.

 

[Eazail70x7]

^^
I'm pretty sure I heard not too long ago that Samsung was gonna do an ota fix for it or something. Check the Galaxy S threads for it...

I actually think that with AMOLED displays, white text on black background is a little bit sharper than vice versa. Not 100% sure. Its possible judging from my Samsung Moment. I already like my regular AMOLED screen so I can't wait to see a bigger Super AMOLED screen.