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Galaxy S pros and cons


Guest pp56825

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Guest pp56825

Now i have i900 omnia, and i'm want to change it, i'm thinking about i9000.

can you share your opinion and tell me pros and cons.

Thanks and Regards

Peter

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Guest unfnknblvbl
Now i have i900 omnia, and i'm want to change it, i'm thinking about i9000.

can you share your opinion and tell me pros and cons.

Thanks and Regards

Peter

Pros:

  • It's really really fast
  • It's new
  • The screen is amazing
  • It has an unlocked bootloader
  • It's ridiculously easy to 'root'

    Cons:

    • It's new, so the ROM availability is not great
    • Apparently Samsung uses encrypted drivers so it's more difficult to roll custom ROMs (I may be wrong here)
    • The built-in flash memory makes it more annoying to migrate from an older Android handset to it, as the 'external' SD Card is mounted in /sdcard/sd/ so most (if not all) backup/restore apps can't see it.
    • The stock homescreen/launcher is vile.
    • Samsung's software (Kies) can't see the phone on Win7 64bit. At least, not for me. Not that I really care.

    ...did I mention that it's fast?

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Guest DistortedLoop

It's a pretty awesome phone. I have an iPhone 4 and a Nexus One also. I had a Sprint EVO 4G as well, but it's going back to Sprint.

I'm not sure I can say the SGS i9000 is a perfect phone - it's got some flaws and missing features my other phones have/had, but I don't think you'd be disappointed with it.

I agree with everything unfnknblvbl stated above, and I'll add the following:

Pros:

It's lightweight, very lightweight. iPhone 4, EVO and even Nexus One feel like bricks compared to this thing.

The size is just about perfect. The iPhone 4 is too small and too thin and too hard to pick up. The EVO wasn't too big, but it was close to being too big to hold comfortably - if you're smaller handed person, could be a problem with that one. This Galaxy S is the perfect combo of screen size and body size...big enough to be a pleasure to look at without feeling like you're using a tablet and not a phone.

The music player is awesome. One of the GSM phone review sites did frequency testing on the SGS and report it to be the most accurate/best sounding of any phone out there right now, even the beat the new iPhone if I recall correctly.

16gb internal memory. You could get away without even having an external SDcard on this one.

Cons

It feels cheaply made because of the thin plastic backing. They'd have done much better using the material that HTC uses on the Nexus One or EVO.

It's an iPhone clone. Both in physical appearance and software/launcher/GUI. There's nothing fresh about it's industrial design. Lots of people think it's an older iPhone on first glance except for the big Samsung printed on the front at the top. Install ADW launcher and you get rid of the iPhone feel in the software easily.

The headset jack is PROPRIETARY! Regular mic-enabled headsets that work in the iPhone, EVO, and Nexus One do not work properly at all in the SGS. My Etymotics, Apple in-ears, and Bose headsets all don't sound quite right with the headset, and the headset won't work at all for mic or earbuds in phone calls. Depressing the mic button while listening improves the sound. Turns out that Samsung is using a different plug arrangement on the tips.

It's lightweight, very lightweight. LOL. (this is both a pro and a con) It's so light it feels like it's going to go flying out of your hand. I actually prefer the heft of the Nexus One.

No LED camera flash. I didn't know I wanted or needed one for three years when I was an iPhone guy, but having one on the Nexus One the last six months really made me a fan of having them. The EVO had TWO of them. They make for great flashlights, and for some pictures that otherwise will come out too dark indoors.

It's only got three buttons (home, menu, back), not the four that other Androids have (missing the search button). You can get search off the menu button, but I miss it as its own button.

The USB/charger port is on the top of the phone. It's counterintuitive and will make docking the thing an interesting affair.

The power on off button is on the side - I'm used to it on the top on all other phone designs.

You must have Windows to flash some of the ROMs or to restore your phone, and the drivers don't work in Mac VMware machines. Not an issue if you're a Windows user, but for Mac folks, it's a bit of a pain in the butt.

Some folks complain that the GPS is weak, slow to get locks - I had this issue, but it's actually just a setting you can change (turn off hot starting, and I also turned on Network Provider mode). I get GPS sat lock in seconds now, even indoors.

It's funny, I listed more cons than pros, but that's misleading. This is an awesome phone. I think I focused on the negatives because the phone is such a winner overall that it's a bit disappointing to see some of these nitpicks with the phone that if Samsung had addressed would have made it perfect. The SGS is the phone I am currently recommending to friends along with the iPhone 4 (but only if they're currently heavy iPhone users).

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Guest casper326
Pros:
  • It's really really fast
  • It's new
  • The screen is amazing
  • It has an unlocked bootloader
  • It's ridiculously easy to 'root'

    • It's new, so the ROM availability is not great
    • Apparently Samsung uses encrypted drivers so it's more difficult to roll custom ROMs (I may be wrong here)
    • The built-in flash memory makes it more annoying to migrate from an older Android handset to it, as the 'external' SD Card is mounted in /sdcard/sd/ so most (if not all) backup/restore apps can't see it.
    • The stock homescreen/launcher is vile.
    • Samsung's software (Kies) can't see the phone on Win7 64bit. At least, not for me. Not that I really care.

    ...did I mention that it's fast?

    KIES is working fine with me on Windows 7 64Bit....

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Guest sionyboy

Thinking of getting myself a Galaxy S as well, at the moment I'm on a Nokia 5800 and I'm a few days away from the final month of my contract. So at the moment its real squeaky bum time as to what phone I commit myself to!

Very interested in the Galaxy S, to be honest the only thing that is putting me off at the moment is the reports of lagging/stalling during phone operation, the UI and whether or not Samsung will continue to support the phone with future updates. The plastic back is also a bit on the cheap side, although I'm hoping that a trendy art skin on the back of the phone will put a stop to that.

Up until last week I was dead set on the Desire, but having seen the difference in graphics performance with the SGX540 I think the Galaxy might be a bit more future-proof. I was also worried that the Galaxy would be substantially bigger than the Desire, though having played with the handset in the carphone warehouse last week I was surprised to see that there was minimal difference between the two, so congrats to Samsung on squeezing the 4" screen into that shell.

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Guest acjames

Kies works for me too on Windows 7 64bit.

Also i use the headset that came with my Blackberry Bold 9700 on this phone and it works flawlessly. I can answer and disconnect calls by pressing the little button.

My only complaint about this phone is the location of the USB port.....

Its by far the best display i have EVER seen on a phone and quicker than any Android phone i have used.. (G1, MyTouch, Evo, Cliq and Cliq XT)

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Guest appelflap
KIES is working fine with me on Windows 7 64Bit....

Well that's nice! What did you do to make it work? Because on my x64 7 box in doesn't work ... at all :angry:

On topic:

Big pro for the Galaxy: typing! (because of the big screen and because of a perfectly balanced touchscreen) I'm comming from a HTC HD2 and really this is such a big step forward for me.

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Guest casper326
Well that's nice! What did you do to make it work? Because on my x64 7 box in doesn't work ... at all :angry:

On topic:

Big pro for the Galaxy: typing! (because of the big screen and because of a perfectly balanced touchscreen) I'm comming from a HTC HD2 and really this is such a big step forward for me.

Just install the KIES normally. Nothing special.

The problem is how can you make the KIES startup at Galaxy S.

First, you must need to use the TWLauncher (from samsung).

then need to set KIES in usb setting.

The last thing is.... kill all the task.

And go to Home and connet the usb cable.

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Guest appelflap
Just install the KIES normally. Nothing special.

The problem is how can you make the KIES startup at Galaxy S.

First, you must need to use the TWLauncher (from samsung).

then need to set KIES in usb setting.

The last thing is.... kill all the task.

And go to Home and connet the usb cable.

The problem was that the drivers didn't work with x64... The standard setup didn't work because KIES didn't "see" the Galaxy.

I reinstalled everything according to this workaround and now it is working.. (more or less :angry: )

Thanks

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Guest pp56825

thanks for all your opinions, but the question now is:" is it the best choice for smartphone in europe as of now?" will it be anything better released in near future?

Edited by pp56825
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Guest casper326
The problem was that the drivers didn't work with x64... The standard setup didn't work because KIES didn't "see" the Galaxy.

I reinstalled everything according to this workaround and now it is working.. (more or less :angry: )

Thanks

Really?!

I just download the KIES from samsung.com.hk

All driver is working fine for me... I don't need to do any other step to make my KIES work.

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Guest cdmackay

one downside that surprised me: the Galaxy S doesn't have a notification LED. On my Hero, I was used to being to tell if I had new msgs etc by glancing across the room and seeing the little LED flashing.

I don't mind the power/USB port on top; makes it slightly easier to use handheld whilst charging, too.

Battery life seems very poor, compared to my Hero.

overall, I'm very pleased I upgraded.

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Guest mickeko
The headset jack is PROPRIETARY!

Actually it's the iPhone that has a nonstandard headphone jack (in typical Apple fashion), not the other way around.

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Guest DistortedLoop
Actually it's the iPhone that has a nonstandard headphone jack (in typical Apple fashion), not the other way around.

Well, yes and no. I understand that Nokia and Blackberry headphones are working, and they've been around longer than Apple in the phone business - BUT, the headphone jack on my EVO 4G and my Nexus One matches the Apple iPhone jack. No problem at all interchanging my Apple and 3rd party headphones between iPhone, EVO, N1. I've never owned a BB, but I might have a five year old Nokia I can test the jack on.

Maybe this is one of those US is different than the rest of the world things...

I could certainly make a strong and valid argument that with the Nexus One being Google's chosen device, the anointed "reference phone" for Android devices, and it having an Apple-compliant headphone jack that the Apple-jack is the standard for Android.

I could also argue that since HTC, arguably the largest Android device maker appears to be using Apple-jacks in their phones that it is also the Android standard.

At any rate, it's something you need to be aware of in considering the SGS. Apple/HTC/Etymotics/Bose and many other brands of 3rd party headphones do not work properly with the SGS. It's good to know that you can buy products that work with BB and Nokia that do though, since the SGS included headset isn't bad, but it's not particularly good, either.

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Guest colonel_butt

I have has nexus one, htc legend, iphone 3gs and 4 .

The samsung galaxy s is the best smartphone i have ever used.

The screen is amazing. I am also using the default o2 f1 rom and feel no need to upgrade (until froyo).

The main thing i would have changed is to have a grippy back, like the desire. Perhaps some 3rd party co (or samsung) will produce one. Although the back is fine.

I also wish therr were more cases, but they will come in time.

At the moment i am using a golla slip case which fits just right and was only £7.99 from a tmobile store.

Rgds

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Guest Kilack

Well I love parts of the galaxy s but am starting to get annoyed by it really, even with the lag fixes the lag comes back in, I think people are just getting used to it.

When I put it side by side with an iphone 3gs, the iphone is far snappier, even with the lag fixes there are small delays here and there.

Also I think the camera is pretty horrid on this phone. My wife used to take photos on her 3gs all the time even of moving things, they came out clear, now on the galaxy she is discarding most of her photos because they are all blurry. She is probably going to go back to her 3gs because she hates the camera and the blurry photos and is sick of the delays.

I guess I'm a bit disappointed in this phone, sure that screen is lovely but apart from that...it's not that remarkable.

thin plastic case, slow memory, camera is pretty shocking for anything that isn't perfectly still and the gps is a bit flakey...

For me it is yet another android phone that came close but cut corners in some important areas....

of course the positives are the cpu/gpu and screen... unbeatable in that area...

Edited by Kilack
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Guest iLiquid
Thinking of getting myself a Galaxy S as well, at the moment I'm on a Nokia 5800 and I'm a few days away from the final month of my contract. So at the moment its real squeaky bum time as to what phone I commit myself to!

Very interested in the Galaxy S, to be honest the only thing that is putting me off at the moment is the reports of lagging/stalling during phone operation, the UI and whether or not Samsung will continue to support the phone with future updates. The plastic back is also a bit on the cheap side, although I'm hoping that a trendy art skin on the back of the phone will put a stop to that.

Up until last week I was dead set on the Desire, but having seen the difference in graphics performance with the SGX540 I think the Galaxy might be a bit more future-proof. I was also worried that the Galaxy would be substantially bigger than the Desire, though having played with the handset in the carphone warehouse last week I was surprised to see that there was minimal difference between the two, so congrats to Samsung on squeezing the 4" screen into that shell.

For me you should only concern about lagging issues. Truth the back of the phone is in plastic (and as we all know almost all devices have a plastic back cover!) but I think it has a nice design, a nice pattern and is very very light.

Maybe you should wait a little more and decide when Android 2.2 comes out.

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Guest colonel_butt

I don't get the lagging issues in the way many are describing them, or at least don't find it an issue.

I have an O2 build with rom F1 (most people are on G5) and there are occasional hesitations but nothing that gets in the way of enjoyment of the phone.

I find it faster then my iphone 4.

I wouldn't be detered by this. The main downsides with the phone are the super-lightweight and thinness, some folk like a chunkier phone which weighs more.

Additionally, Samsung would have done well to have a non-slip back cover, rather then a smooth backcover.

There is no flash for the camera, and its not as good as the iphone, but its better then most HTC camera phones.

Otherwise there is nothing like this screen display and speed on the market.

Its difficult to describe the speed increase over previous phones I have had (inc. the HTC legend). Its like the Samsung is scoffing at your commands, like it thinks they are below it :angry:

I bought this so I would not have to get a smaller phone and a dell streak for browsing.

This does a great job, also the phone is good as well. Thats one thing about Samsung and Nokia, they always get the phone system right.

Edited by colonel_butt
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Guest bandwidthcrunch

Pros :

Awesome phone in most aspects

Cons :

Lags & Black Screens

Google voice missing in some areas

Heat !! I find it getting considerably hot if wifi , gps are ON for more than few minutes. Anyone else feels the same ?

Froyo missing

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Guest DistortedLoop
Pros :

Awesome phone in most aspects

Cons :

Lags & Black Screens

Google voice missing in some areas

Heat !! I find it getting considerably hot if wifi , gps are ON for more than few minutes. Anyone else feels the same ?

Froyo missing

What phone officially has FroYo yet, except the Nexus One?

I've not noticed head on mine as an issue any more than on my Nexus One.

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