My thoughts on the Fascinate after owning the Incredible for 5 months

[durangojim]

I bought the Incredible back when it was first released and have been pretty happy overall. I like Sense, not so much for the widgets, but for the efficiency it brings the device. I like the dialer and the home screen launcher. I have the official froyo update and find it to be fast and with good battery life. Wireless hotspot (free) works well without root. GPS location is almost instantaneous. Call quality and reception are OK. Not awful but not great. The biggest thing is that I wish the screen was larger, which brought me to the Fascinate.

Originally I was upset with this whole Bing issue. After reading some initial user reviews though, it seemed like it was overblown, and I went out and bought the device on the day it was released. I've been happy and frustrated with it and will probably return it.

Pros: As everyone else has said, the screen is beautiful
Some of the touchwiz implementation is pretty good. Being able to turn on off wifi/gps/airplane mode from the pull down shade is nice (remember I like efficiency).
The music player is good and again it's nice to be able to control from the shade.
Gaming is excellent on this device. Angry birds looks and plays great!
The movie player is awesome! Nice controls and sound.
The browser reformats text very well when resizing
Video camera is very good

Cons: Unfortunately there's quite a few
There's no way to change what screen pops up when you hit the phone button. I would prefer to have the call log come up rather than the dialer. HTC does this nicely with sense.
The phone can be a little laggy. I see no lag with my Incredible, but there is definately some here at very odd times.
USB mode doesn't work on all computers -- it works on my laptop, not on my desktop
I can't get free wifi hotspot without rooting like I can on the Incredible
GPS takes a long time to locate me. When it does it works well but it can take up to 2 minutes (might not seem like a lot, but if I'm travelling on the freeway someplace I'm not familiar with it can be).
I get a little "feedback" from my own voice when speaking on the phone, I've exchanged phones and still get it, not bad, but enough to be annoying.
WIFI signal is pretty weak
BING integration - I used to use the hard search button all the time on my Incredible. I rarely use it on the fascinate, I don't like bing, and it doesn't work as well for me as Google. I know this can be changed with root but I wish it worked out of the box.
No FFC
Have to make a contact on the phone, not just Google contacts to have a personalized ringtone assigned.
I prefer the abilty to fast scroll through numbers when setting alarms or dates, rather than typing in the numbers or pushing the +/- buttons.

So I'll probably return the fascinate the first week of October and wait to see what comes out in November/December. I'll be going out of town the last week of September so I'll be interested to see how it performs while travelling. It could be that Froyo will add some enhancements and I'll come back to it, but this phone seems like a minor evolutionary step rather than a great new phone as it didn't seem to build on anything the Incredible or X is already doing.

 

[ghdtpdna]

I wouldn't switch if I had gotten Inc on launch.
What did you do with the Inc? How did you get the Fascinate (upgrade on another line or full retail)?

 

[xliderider]

There is an HTC phone supposedly coming out in December, Verizon's version of the Evo. Perhaps you have seen pics of it?

I too am conflicted over whether to keep or return the Fascinate, having had a D1 since release day in November '09. Rooted, overclocked, and running a custom Froyo ROM, it was nearly a perfect phone.

My top priority on a smartphone is always reception and audio quality while in-call. The Droid was better, with it's noise cancelling mic and very good receiver/transmitter.

I'll probably end up returning the Fascinate for the DX if an update/maintenance release that addresses a lot of the issues with the Fascinate isn't released before the 30 days are up, or just returning the Fascinate outright and waiting, though the HTC phone probably isn't the answer due to HTC not having the best phones in regard to reception.

 

[durangojim]

I wouldn't switch if I had gotten Inc on launch.
What did you do with the Inc? How did you get the Fascinate (upgrade on another line or full retail)?

I've got three lines that rotate about every 4 months so I can upgrate about every 4 months since with my corporate discount a 1 year contract is only $30 more than a 2 year. I've still got the Inc. I didn't want to get rid of it until I knew I was keeping the Fascinate.

 

[durangojim]

There is an HTC phone supposedly coming out in December, Verizon's version of the Evo. Perhaps you have seen pics of it?

I too am conflicted over whether to keep or return the Fascinate, having had a D1 since release day in November '09. Rooted, overclocked, and running a custom Froyo ROM, it was nearly a perfect phone.

My top priority on a smartphone is always reception and audio quality while in-call. The Droid was better, with it's noise cancelling mic and very good receiver/transmitter.

I'll probably end up returning the Fascinate for the DX if an update/maintenance release that addresses a lot of the issues with the Fascinate isn't released before the 30 days are up, or just returning the Fascinate outright and waiting, though the HTC phone probably isn't the answer due to HTC not having the best phones in regard to reception.

Yep, I've seen the HTC device. To me it looks pretty sweet, and I have to admit having a FFC would be great so I could see my kids while I'm away. Like I said, I'll probably return it too and see what happens in Nov/Dec. Samsung seemed so close, but kind of messed up what could have been a really great phone IMO.

 

[TheXFactor]

DX > DINC > fAsCiNaTe. Nuff said.

 

[Kelmar]

DX > DINC > fAsCiNaTe. Nuff said.

To each their own

 

[burningembers]

To each their own

Agreed.

For me, having personally owned an Incredible and now a Fascinate, and having numerous friends with a DX...

I'd put Fascinate on top, DX second, and Incredible dead last. I never really liked the Incredible.

I will be curious to see what this new HTC phone is, but I'm pretty close to giving up on HTC because their functionality so far is lacking for what I want.

 

[hanano17]

I bought the Incredible back when it was first released and have been pretty happy overall. I like Sense, not so much for the widgets, but for the efficiency it brings the device. I like the dialer and the home screen launcher. I have the official froyo update and find it to be fast and with good battery life. Wireless hotspot (free) works well without root. GPS location is almost instantaneous. Call quality and reception are OK. Not awful but not great. The biggest thing is that I wish the screen was larger, which brought me to the Fascinate.

Originally I was upset with this whole Bing issue. After reading some initial user reviews though, it seemed like it was overblown, and I went out and bought the device on the day it was released. I've been happy and frustrated with it and will probably return it.

Pros: As everyone else has said, the screen is beautiful
Some of the touchwiz implementation is pretty good. Being able to turn on off wifi/gps/airplane mode from the pull down shade is nice (remember I like efficiency).
The music player is good and again it's nice to be able to control from the shade.
Gaming is excellent on this device. Angry birds looks and plays great!
The movie player is awesome! Nice controls and sound.
The browser reformats text very well when resizing
Video camera is very good

Cons: Unfortunately there's quite a few
There's no way to change what screen pops up when you hit the phone button. I would prefer to have the call log come up rather than the dialer. HTC does this nicely with sense.
The phone can be a little laggy. I see no lag with my Incredible, but there is definately some here at very odd times.
USB mode doesn't work on all computers -- it works on my laptop, not on my desktop
I can't get free wifi hotspot without rooting like I can on the Incredible
GPS takes a long time to locate me. When it does it works well but it can take up to 2 minutes (might not seem like a lot, but if I'm travelling on the freeway someplace I'm not familiar with it can be).
I get a little "feedback" from my own voice when speaking on the phone, I've exchanged phones and still get it, not bad, but enough to be annoying.
WIFI signal is pretty weak
BING integration - I used to use the hard search button all the time on my Incredible. I rarely use it on the fascinate, I don't like bing, and it doesn't work as well for me as Google. I know this can be changed with root but I wish it worked out of the box.
No FFC
Have to make a contact on the phone, not just Google contacts to have a personalized ringtone assigned.
I prefer the abilty to fast scroll through numbers when setting alarms or dates, rather than typing in the numbers or pushing the +/- buttons.

So I'll probably return the fascinate the first week of October and wait to see what comes out in November/December. I'll be going out of town the last week of September so I'll be interested to see how it performs while travelling. It could be that Froyo will add some enhancements and I'll come back to it, but this phone seems like a minor evolutionary step rather than a great new phone as it didn't seem to build on anything the Incredible or X is already doing.

I'm rooted and Wireless Tether works fine for me, not sure what you used that didn't work.
There are usb drivers from Samsung, both my PCs work fine with the phone.
I had just as much lag on my Dinc as I do with my SF, just in different areas.
Not sure what you are doing with your Dinc to give you "good" battery life, but mine was terrible even with the slim extended battery.
You like Sense, I don't...to each their own.
If you rooted to try to get free hotspot, why is it a big deal to root to get rid of Bing?
FFC is overrated, its a feature people think they should have now.
The other issues you mentioned are supposedly being addressed with an update, when ever it comes...though i've had no issue with voice feedback or GPS locks taking long (I do have accuracy issues indoors though).
Try LauncherPro or a different home launcher, that might solve your issues with TW (such as the phone dialer), i've never personally used one (I'm one of the few who like TW :/ )

 

[hanano17]

Agreed.

For me, having personally owned an Incredible and now a Fascinate, and having numerous friends with a DX...

I'd put Fascinate on top, DX second, and Incredible dead last. I never really liked the Incredible.

I will be curious to see what this new HTC phone is, but I'm pretty close to giving up on HTC because their functionality so far is lacking for what I want.

Couldn't agree more.

 

[durangojim]

Agreed.

For me, having personally owned an Incredible and now a Fascinate, and having numerous friends with a DX...

I'd put Fascinate on top, DX second, and Incredible dead last. I never really liked the Incredible.

I will be curious to see what this new HTC phone is, but I'm pretty close to giving up on HTC because their functionality so far is lacking for what I want.

Very interesting, because I foudn the Incredible very efficient at doing what I wanted it to do, but like others have said, to each his own.

 

[durangojim]

I'm rooted and Wireless Tether works fine for me, not sure what you used that didn't work.
There are usb drivers from Samsung, both my PCs work fine with the phone.
I had just as much lag on my Dinc as I do with my SF, just in different areas.
Not sure what you are doing with your Dinc to give you "good" battery life, but mine was terrible even with the slim extended battery.
You like Sense, I don't...to each their own.
If you rooted to try to get free hotspot, why is it a big deal to root to get rid of Bing?
FFC is overrated, its a feature people think they should have now.
The other issues you mentioned are supposedly being addressed with an update, when ever it comes...though i've had no issue with voice feedback or GPS locks taking long (I do have accuracy issues indoors though).
Try LauncherPro or a different home launcher, that might solve your issues with TW (such as the phone dialer), i've never personally used one (I'm one of the few who like TW :/ )

I didn't root my fascinate. Also with froyo and the Incredible, you don't need to root to have wireless tether. Also, these are just my observations. I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything, just trying to offer some insight into one Incredible owner's opinions. Like many have said, people will like and dislike different things.

 

[durangojim]

Another con that decreases the efficiency of this device -- when adding an entry to the calendar, you have to go in and manually change the entry to the google calendar from the device calendar for each entry, there's no way to set it as a default. Lame. Almost like they wanted to de-Googlefy it as much as possible.

 

[irish]

My wife and I both got the Inc the very first day available. I had major issues with my first one and had it replaced. The second was great and I really liked the device. It seemed to lag (with and without the update) but not so bad that I could not deal with it. I had every intention of getting the X and keeping the Inc until I decided which one I wanted to keep. After my visit to Verizon and speaking with a buddy of mine that worked there, I left with the Fascinate. I could NEVER go back to the Inc. IMHO, the Inc can not be even considered on the same playing field. As I have mentioned before, my wife still has the Inc. She really does like the phone. Every head to head test we did put the Fascinate well over the Inc. Net speed, pictures, screen quality, video and acuracy typing all goes to the Fascinate. My wife hates jumping from phone to phone as she does not like to learn new devices. She LOVES my Fascinate!! Bing is no issue for me. Just my opinion, but a search engine is a search engine. When the update does end up showing up for the Fascinate, it will be even better. Even if an update never did come out, I still love the phone.

 

[rushmore]

Well, all three are good devices (X, Fas and Inc). That said, if I go by BB and three VZW corporate stores in my area, the Inc still sells more devices. Size is just right for a lot of folks and (believe it or not) 2.2 is also a factor. In the Fascinates defense, stores are pushing the Inc more than the Samsung, so that is helping the Inc.

Still, I think the Fascinate will be the tops of the three when it gets 2.2.

added:

Wish we had a keyboard version with 16gb bulit-in and a flash.

 

[TheXFactor]

Very interesting, because I foudn the Incredible very efficient at doing what I wanted it to do, but like others have said, to each his own.

Ditto. If it weren't for the X, I would still be using the Incredible. The only downside, in my mind, was the very poor battery management. Even with the 2150 battery, the Incredible can't touch the X with it's standard battery. Everything else about the Incredible I thought was really good.

In regards to the X vs the Fascinate, I'm sure it's a very nice phone. But, it's been proven in the past, Samsung has very poor radio's in their phones. You can't compare the reception and voice quality on a Samsung to that of the X, because there is no comparison. Build quality, Samsung vs Moto? Again, no.

The LCD screen on the Moto is better, for me. Whites appear white, not blue-ish. Text is crisp and sharp. Colors are more true on the LCD.

Bigger screen, more pixels. Better build quality. Better reception. Better voice quality. All in all, better. . Oh, more memory too. Again, better.

 

[howdy]

My last phone was an incredible as well and it is a great phone, but not in the same league as the fascinate in my opinion. My biggest gripe is that they are so cheaply made. Also the reception on my incredible was not good.

As for reception, the fascinate is better than any Motorola phone I have had (and I have had 2 in the past 2 yrs.). I have not had an X though, so I can't compare. I'd take the incredible over the x probably just because of the form factor. The fascinate isn't quite as easy to 1-hand, but it's a good compromise on size/portability.

Not sure where people are getting the idea that the fascinate has poor reception, but I have found it to be very good and call quality better than anything I've had to this point. To each his own, as soon as you buy one there will be a better phone in a few months anyway!

 

[irish]

lol.....I went to VZW today to get new case for my daughters phone. While we were waiting, we started to look at all the devices. The DX and Fascinate were side by side. A sales guy was helping a couple in there 30's or so choose between the two. The sales guys says "I have the X, its an pretty good phone. Last night my 8 year old son ask me why I was talking into my lap top. This phone is just WAY to big!" LOL. I and my daughter began to laugh out loud!! We stuck around just long enough to see them walk out with the Fascinates..

 

[xliderider]

What Motorola phones have you had within the past 2 years that weren't as good or better than the Fascinate? I have a Droid 1 and the reception and call quality is much better than the Fascinate's.

 

[droid_head]

Just got my Fascinate and keeping it.

All phones have their shortcomings and quirks, and no one is ever going to make the perfect phone.

I had a Dinc that died after 4 days and been stuck w/ a BB Storm I forever. I'm tired of configuring phones and keeping the Fascinate at least a year, or unless they come out with a phone that fixes breakfast before then.

 

[luvit]

i see many people refuse to root their phone. i take the risk (provided, nandroid). i really like everything i've done to the DInc and D1 in adding features that no android phone provides out of the box.

i suppose I could like any rooted phone that has a strong community to supply perfect ROMs and kernels.

i don't study every android phone model, but it seems Verizon's android phones may have the strongest android communities.

every Win/BB smartphone i've owned has had some short comings. I had to own the DInc for a few months before unrevoked forever was released.. and it paid off.

i don't know why i'm writing this... but if i stayed at stock with any android phone.. i'd say they have fallen short in one way or another.

yet.. root does take some guts to "try" things.. nandroid is insurance prior to any experiment.

 

[tats_06]

AOSP ROMs for Fascinate will be a winner

 

[rushmore]

What Motorola phones have you had within the past 2 years that weren't as good or better than the Fascinate? I have a Droid 1 and the reception and call quality is much better than the Fascinate's.

Inc's reception is just as good as my Droid 1's was. Prior to that the dBm level was always 4 to 5 points higher on the Droid 1. My guess is they upped the mW level of the Inc radio, but battery seems better. Probably due to less signal fluctuation (that eats battery too).

Interesting to see how good the Fascinate is, compared to the Droid and Inc, in fringe 3G areas. THAT would be a good test for reception comparisons.

 

[bigbadwulff]

Bing sucks

 

[PaulRivers]

I owned the Incredible for nearly a month before returning it (pre-order). Reception just wasn't good enough, a little worse than my Samsung Gleam (a flip phone).

The Incredible's gps was better. The data really seemed faster and more reliable. And the interface seemed snappier.

However, in addition to the reception, I never liked the voice quality. After the the "oh it's so great"'s, it was a big let down. I actually felt the screen was a little *to* sensitive - I was always hitting something by accident. The Fascinate is the perfect balance, in my opinion in that regard. So far the sound quality on my end on the Fascinate is far better. The other big improvement for me is that the keyboard is waaaaaay less frustrating to use. Maybe it's the size of my hands and the 4" screen is better, or maybe it's the pre-installed keyboard and I could have done the same thing with the incredible. But I was very "not fond" using the use on-screen keyboard on the Incredible. Whereas I almost never hit the wrong key by accident on the Fascinate. Also, there was always this weird issue with Incredible where I thought I was pressing the screen clearly in one area, and it decided I was pushing it in a slightly different place - both were under my finger, but it seemed like it chose something different than I expected a lot. That hasn't been a problem at all with the fascinate. So far the GPS on the Fascinate has trouble locking on a signal indoors, but works fast and fine outdoors. I suppose I'll see what happens when it storms or something.

All the Moto droids are just to big and heavy for me - I don't need a heavy-ass phone so I can pretend my phone "is built better". The Fascinate seems like it will hold up well - it even feels like a solid phone, despite being much thinner and lighter than any of the motos.