thinking of converting to android, should i wait?

[seriousbuisness]

hey all, first post here,
I am currently the owner of an iphone 3g, and i thought that i would be getting the iphone 4, untill the antenna fiasco AND the stupid design. who makes a freaking phone with 2 sides of glass?????????

so ayway, ive decided to convert to android. i have to stay on at+t,so i was wondering if i should go with a captivate, or wait until something better comes out. (my 3g, while incredibly sluggish with the new os, still works)

so my questions are:
is it worth waiting at most 6 months for a newer android phone to come out,
or should i just go with the samsung captivate?
and im not really worried about the samsung captivates performance (1ghz proc will be a nice upgrade from 412 mhz) but the battery life, so can anyone tell me how many hours i will get out of the captivate using 3g/wifi connection? i read a few reviews that said they had wished the brought a second charge because the phone only lasted half the day.

 

[Starfleet Captain]

hey all, first post here,
who makes a freaking phone with 2 sides of glass?????????

Apple. And millions of the Apple faithful are eating it all up as if its some type of revolutionary device. Damn fools. Look at how much AT&T's new insurance plans cost them already and compare that to the cost of the deductible for replacing them. OUCH!

Now, to answer your question:

As a general rule in the technology world, If you continue to wait until the latest and greates type of gadget is released, you won't ever own one. This is ever true for Android devices. Every time there is a new "KING of Android" phone out, its one upped the very next month. The Incredible was one upped in a period of 3 months by the Evo, The Droid X and the Galaxy S phones. So, yes there will be better phones out 3 months from now with Android 2.2 Installed. (Rumor is Android 3.0 will be out in October, but my money is on December or January) But if you wait until then to make your purchase, there will be even better phones on the horizon.

I think you should just get a Galaxy S now. The captivate on AT&T is a decent device. The hardware on it should make it good enough for at least 2 more Android OS updates. In two years (when its time for another upgrade) imagine what kind of phone options will be available by then... A coworker of mine, has one. I laughed when he got frustrated with the battery. Apparently, he let it go 24 hours without charging it and was mad that his battery was so low. I told him that if I let my Evo go 24 hours without charging, I wouldn't have any battery life left at all!!! So, the battery in the Captivate is decent (Even better) for an Android phone. Just set your screen brightness to automatic.

Another thing about battery life: Whenever a person gets a brand new toy like the Evo or Captivate, they will spend a significant amount of time playing with it and testing all its features. This will drain the battery faster than what is considered typical use. My Evo gets around 10 - 13 hours (depending on my use for that day) before I have to juice it up again. I get 15 hours if its a very busy day at work and I have no time to use my phone at all.

 

[Niir]

on my desire with 2.2 im getting 24 hours min (currently sitting on 29% with 25 hours unplugged)

so im guessing the SGS must be similar if u root and go 2.2

all the top android handsets are excellent (evo, droid x, SGS versions, N1, desire) and all equal the ip4.

 

[lunatic59]

so my questions are:
is it worth waiting at most 6 months for a newer android phone to come out,
or should i just go with the samsung captivate?

From everything I've read, the Captivate is one of the most advanced Android phones available right now and the only top model at AT&T. I have recommended it to a business associate and will be getting one for my son as well when his contract is up next month. The biggest common complaints with iPhone converts to Android devices seem to be not finding that app that you lived so much on the iPhone, not sync'ing the same way iTunes does, and the way Android handles email. My advice to you is to check out the Market to see if the apps you use now have an equivalent on Android, and if they don't how much of a deal breaker is it?

There are iTunes sync tools available and replacements. People also say that oddly enough Windows media player sync's much more gracefully with Android.

As far as email is concerned, if it is critical, there are apps that make it usable on Android, but i'd recommend a Blackberry for now. It's a one trick pony, but it does that trick so much better than everyone else.

and im not really worried about the samsung captivates performance (1ghz proc will be a nice upgrade from 412 mhz) but the battery life, so can anyone tell me how many hours i will get out of the captivate using 3g/wifi connection? i read a few reviews that said they had wished the brought a second charge because the phone only lasted half the day.

That really depends on a lot of factors, but initially you will see your battery drop like a stone. Let it completely discharge a couple of times and then charge to completely full before taking it off the charger. This isn't to condition the battery as modern Lithium Ion batteries do not require conditioning, but more to train Android on what the true capacity is of your battery. When a phone is new, it is just guessing based on industry averages and I think it underestimates making it look like the battery drains faster than it really does. Be advised though that REGULARLY deep cycling the battery can harm it, so you shouldn't let it drain to zero very often.

I found that if I leave WiFi on, especially at work, I get better battery life on my Nexus One. when your 3G signal is marginal, constantly dropping between 2G (Edge) and 3G drains the battery faster than staying connected to WiFi. Of course everyone's situation is different and you'll have to discover what works best for you.

Set the screen brightness to auto since the screen is going to be the single biggest draw on the battery. You pay a price for a big SUPERAMOLED display. And don't bother with "task killers". They don't seem to make a difference in performance or battery life.

 

[seriousbuisness]

Wow, thanks you guys! so many replies with so much information.
Honestly, being one of the new generation, i really don't use my phone as a phone much, except for texting. I use my phone mainly for social networking/internet browsing, which is why i was wondering about battery life on 3g/wifi. i have good, solid 3g coverage over my whole city (portland, OR). 9 months out of the year its overcast and rainy, so i wont be using my phone outside very much, and i have my brightness set fairly low on my iphone. even with my iphone at a low brightness, i really only get about 2 hours of use from the phone using data, which is annoying.

i have no problem not using itunes (incredibly slow on windows), i used a samsung yp-p2 for years, and i would actually prefer just dragging and dropping my tunes in using explorer.

however, I know the whole thing about "if you wait for newer tech etcetc" but i heard that att is getting 5 android phones of the next month or two or something, so would it be worth it to wait for one of those...

what are the 5 phones anyway? htc aria, captivate, dell something... uhhh

 

[StuartTheFish]

If it helps to reassure you a little, on android 2.1 my HTC desire would just about last a day, and I'd end up charging it at roughly the same time each night. Now I've upgraded to android 2.2, I'm now seeing better battery life, and at one point it went for a full 48 hours before dropping below 10%. Today for example, I charged my phone last night and I still have 70% left...

 

[seriousbuisness]

excellent. it looks like 2.2 has a lot of improvements.
do you mean 48 hours of use, or standby. are you actually using your phone? how much?

 

[lunatic59]

... what are the 5 phones anyway? htc aria, captivate, dell something... uhhh

I guess the question is how long are you willing to wait? The Dell Streak is supposed to come to AT&T "soon", but that could be next month or December ... or never. Right now there are 3 android phones on AT&T ... the Aria, the Captivate and the Backflip. Ignore the last one, the Motorola Backflip is old slow and not going to be updated. The Aria is small and the Captivate is Large. The Aria has HTC Sense UI and the Captivate has Samsung's TouchWiz UI. Go play with then at the store and see which one feels best in your hand and the UI you like better.

 

[Starfleet Captain]

I, too have heard some rumors about more Android phones coming to AT&T. But I also heard that AT&T's precious exclusivity period with Apple's iPhone is coming to an end, which kind of makes sense considering how AT&T has been treating Android kinder and getting better phones, and they will initially become the premiere carrier of Microsoft's new Windows Phone 7 devices, which are do out later this year. So, ye, bigger and better things are on the horizon.

WP7 phones are untested and I will not investing in a brand new platform out of the gate ever again until it has had at least a year to mature. Last time, I made this mistake was with the Palm Pre (WebOS). Android 3.0, with the changes and coming to it, will be hard out the gate at first. If you absolutely must have the latest and greatest... Wait. At least you will be able to show off around Christmas time, when everyone else's phones will be "like... Soooo last Summer...." Myself, I like having my new shiny toys in the summer so I can show off to others who's phones are "like... So last year..."

 

[IOWA]

If you do the wait thing, you'll never make the jump. With Android, there's always something new around the corner, so your best bet is to grab something thats the best right now, and cycle them accordingly when you get your upgrades.

 

[Intervenient]

If you do the wait thing, you'll never make the jump. With Android, there's always something new around the corner, so your best bet is to grab something thats the best right now, and cycle them accordingly when you get your upgrades.

Do what he says. This poster is a true genius.

 

[seriousbuisness]

ok, well i think im convinced. samsung captivate here i come!
how soon will android 2.2 be released? and can i get rid of the touchwiz ui? just make it a stock android OS phone?

what major noticable improvements are there in 2,2?

 

[cyaiphone]

hey all, first post here,
I am currently the owner of an iphone 3g, and i thought that i would be getting the iphone 4, untill the antenna fiasco AND the stupid design. who makes a freaking phone with 2 sides of glass?????????

so ayway, ive decided to convert to android. i have to stay on at+t,so i was wondering if i should go with a captivate, or wait until something better comes out. (my 3g, while incredibly sluggish with the new os, still works)

so my questions are:
is it worth waiting at most 6 months for a newer android phone to come out,
or should i just go with the samsung captivate?
and im not really worried about the samsung captivates performance (1ghz proc will be a nice upgrade from 412 mhz) but the battery life, so can anyone tell me how many hours i will get out of the captivate using 3g/wifi connection? i read a few reviews that said they had wished the brought a second charge because the phone only lasted half the day.

ok there's the captivate on att and in a couple weeks there's a new android phone coming as well. Go to att's facebook page they have it on there.

 

[Unclm311]

I upgraded to the iPhone 4 at launch, realized my mistake, returned the phone and canceled the contract. See if there's some way for you to get out of AT&T, you won't regret it.

Oh yea, the Sony Xperia x10 is going to AT&T soon... but it ships with 1.6 on it :-\

 

[marefin]

I was in the same boat as you (seriousbuisness) but as soon as the Captivate came out I got it. Actually I got it from Letstalk.com for FREE and the price went up to $100 right after I got it. So yah needless to say I was VERY happy with my choice. There some bugs on the Captivate but it's nothing major in my opinion. And the positives outweighs the negatives by a lot. I've gone a bit over a day without having to recharge. I'm on wifi a lot and the battery life is great when on wifi. Check the link out below if you're interested.

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