Help Questions before i buy Galaxy S

[boger]

Hi,

I currently have the old & super slow Galaxy i7500.
I told myself i will never buy another samsung product in my life, but this seems to be the best android phone right now.

MY questions are:
1. Is the GPS working good on this device?
2. How is the battery life?
3. Do you think we will get an OTA of Froyo & Gingerbread?
4. Would you recommend this device?

Thanks

 

[SlowRain]

1. I don't use the GPS.
2. I get about 2 days. That's about 5 hours of internet, 2-3 hours reading, no 3G, and very little phone use. I set my screen to the dimmest setting I can.
3. I doubt anyone knows. Kies can be problematic.
4. In a heartbeat, just not to those who are impatient or who are perfectionists.

There are a couple of new HTCs in the pipeline that should be released soon.

 

[caesey]

1. used it a couple of times, its slow to get a lock on you, but once its done, its pretty good.

2. 1 day on average, you can tweak your usage to get more a little more (maybe half a day), but that defeats the purpose of buying a highly featured phone.

3. froyo should be out this month (no guarantees though), no idea about gingerbread, I highly doubt it.

4. yes

 

[karnka]

I keep saying I won't post here any more but I came back to ask some advice about selling my Galaxy S and I can't resist this one

1) No, it's very poor for at least some people
2) Battery life is on a par with other smart phones. Charge it pretty much every day.
3) No. You will have to use Kies for Froyo, who knows when that will come out though. Gingerbread - even more uncertain.
4) No

I'm surprised that someone who has been as thoroughly shafted by Samsung as an i7500 owner is considering another Samsung device. I personally think something from HTC is the way to go.

 

[boger]

I wanted to purchase the HTC Desire HD, but i've looked at the reviews and it doesn't looks very good.
The Galaxy S has an amazing screen also.

Can you tell me which is the best android device today?

 

[karnka]

The screen on the Galaxy S is beautiful, nothing will touch it, but I decided that the problems with it and lack of support aren't worth the pretty screen.

I have played with a Desire HD and it is a very nice, very attractive phone. I think the extra screen size goes some way towards making up for the quality of the panel. Not all the way but it does help.

I have a Desire HD on order to replace my Galaxy S.

 

[boger]

The screen on the Galaxy S is beautiful, nothing will touch it, but I decided that the problems with it and lack of support aren't worth the pretty screen.

I have played with a Desire HD and it is a very nice, very attractive phone. I think the extra screen size goes some way towards making up for the quality of the panel. Not all the way but it does help.

I have a Desire HD on order to replace my Galaxy S.

Doesn't it bother you the poor battery life? And the fact people complains this phone is not faster as expected?

 

[karnka]

I think the battery life won't be much worse than the Galaxy S, we will see. Even if it is worse, I'm near a charger 90% of the time.

The comments in the Desire HD forum about lag amuse me. No one has any idea about lag until they've tried a stock Galaxy S. It regularly stalls for seconds at a time (quite a few seconds sometimes) unless you install a lag fix.

 

[kumar3234]

Hi,

I currently have the old & super slow Galaxy i7500.
I told myself i will never buy another samsung product in my life, but this seems to be the best android phone right now.

MY questions are:
1. Is the GPS working good on this device?
2. How is the battery life?
3. Do you think we will get an OTA of Froyo & Gingerbread?
4. Would you recommend this device?

Thanks

Hello Boger,

Buy a HTC Desire, not Desire HD.
The unbranded / unlocked HTC desire has a froyo update from HTC.
Functional GPS,
Froyo
If nexus one gets Gingerbread, Desire can also handle it.
Battery life......depends.....4 hrs on heavy usage.......

Regards,
Kumar.

 

[boger]

But in HTC Desire I can't play 3D games in a smooth way. On Galaxy S I can...

Can I play it smoothly on Desire HD?

 

[karnka]

The new generation snapdragon in the HD has far better performance than the original snapdragon (original Desire). Although the fill rates aren't quite up to the Galaxy S levels it's supposed to be pretty good.

 

[kohc22]

Another factor to consider (although not in your list of questions) is whether or not you are looking for a phone that supports video calls. HTC Desire doesn't come with a front camera, so it doesn't support video call. I got the Galaxy S because of this.

 

[wellibob]

Price point PAYG, Galaxy S wins. Its pretty crap with stock software, but impressive on a custom Rom. Ive stopped using my beloved Desire, since i put on custom rom on the SGS. Desire HD, nice, but v.expensive, and the slcd screen, is very poor compared to the amoled of the Desire, and samoled of the Galaxy.

 

[EarlZ]

Hi,

I currently have the old & super slow Galaxy i7500.
I told myself i will never buy another samsung product in my life, but this seems to be the best android phone right now.

MY questions are:
1. Is the GPS working good on this device?
2. How is the battery life?
3. Do you think we will get an OTA of Froyo & Gingerbread?
4. Would you recommend this device?

Thanks

1.) Hit or miss, depends on the place you are in, some are reporting a perfectly functioning GPS but most ppl have issues, changes are its a driver issue or a hardware design problem, personally I believe its a hardware issue.
2.) Great! but for a 4" screen and 1Ghz processor dont expect to much!
3.) Probably never unless its carrier specific
4.) Depending on which device you are coming from, but to answer it in 1 word, YES!

 

[cleanermonkey]

MY answers are:

1. Is the GPS working good on this device? No it is not working good. It sometimes loose fix on satelites, but if you're not looking for a phone with turn by turn Navigation device to use for this all the time it is okay... for use to get your location, use programs like places og others that show you what is near you it works just fine.

2. How is the battery life? Battery life is quite deasent I think... took it off charger around 10.30 this "morning" running on 13 hours and 3 minutes, have played some games for about 20 mins, surfed for about 30 all in all and watched 2-3 youtube clips and I have around 60% left. Lige many others I have brightness on super low (around 12%) and screen still looks bright and crisp.

3. Do you think we will get an OTA of Froyo & Gingerbread? No not OTA, but I updated to froyo over Kies smooth and easy with no problems at all. And Gingerbread... well we might not get it "right away" if Samsung makes a new phone and want to sell that on it having Gingerbread... But the SGS can handle it so at one time it will be available as a custom ROM I guess. But anybodys guess is as good as mine I think. ;-)

4. Would you recommend this device? Yes I will and I have. Unless you depend on GPS navigation in your phone In which case I would not recommend it.

Thanks

 

[Gagiksargsyan]

All is very good except battaries, almost about 20 hours of battery live it has per charge if you are reading, using wifi, calling.

Almost 92% of energy is spent for screen.

 

[Subluka]

All is very good except battaries, almost about 20 hours of battery live it has per charge if you are reading, using wifi, calling.

Almost 92% of energy is spent for screen.

I had my screen time up around a few minutes. Then I saw that my screen took up about 70% or more energy. Setting the screen turn off time down helps - a lot.

As for original questions:
GPS - so so, fine for occasional use, I would predict frustration if used all the time. Be interested to see if Froyo improves.
battery - I use my phone a lot and I usually need to charge up 12 hours or so into the day. Not sure if I have something sucking my battery. For me that's not a big problem, but my experience has been 'fair' only.
Over the Air - no idea.
Recommend: I have that on hold, pending official Froyo. It is lagging quite badly for me. I wll see if official Froyo fixes that and otherwise lagfix, so recommendation depends on if froyo fixes or you are prepared to root and lagfix. But out of the box, I think it's really good in most ways except the lag problem. I appreciate the screen all the time (especially the dark blacks which can make you forget you are looking at a screen. Great in apps with black backgrounds, and especially for watching vids).