Samsung Captivate vs. Iphone 4

[Dr. Tad Hussein Winslow]

Funny you should ask. Week or two back, I had the Captivate for 3 days, before returning it in favor of iphone 4. Great concept, and will eventually be a great phone, but I never did so much cussing in all my life. It's not ready for prime time - lots of little bugs/problems/issues with it. Also, the biggest thing is this: the GPS receiver is a known problem in these phones (google gps captivate) - doesn't pick up the signal as strongly or quickly as Iphone and other Android phones. This was a deal-breaker for me after testing the GPS out since I hunt a lot - it worked - slowly/mostly/sortof, but did not inspire confidence. The other deal-breaker was the undeletable, fee-only bloatware apps on it (namely, AT&T Navigator). As a matter of principle, I won't tolerate monthly-fee-only, undeletable proprietary bloatware - bad bad combination. No reason on earth why you ought not to be able to delete.

But if you can get past the bloatware, it is in theory far far superior to iphone, and will be in practice, in time, when it's debugged and the GPS receiver fixed, and 2.2 OS available. I'd imagine within 6 months I'll be ready to try it again, except that I'll probably go Sprint/Epic 4. The swype keyboard just rocks out. The new world record for speed texting was set with a swype keyboard. Many other neat features too, most of which are better/more intuitive than iphone. YMMV.

Also, another thing: I happen to very much like the front-facing camera of the iphone, because I can take pics of myself making goofy faces easily and send them to my friends & family. Consequently, they hate the front-facing camera, of course. The flash for the camera is another good feature that the Captivate does not have for some very strange reason. Both these phone have identical or nearly-identical video and still-photo capabilities, except that the still pic quality of the Samsung seems slightly superior in terms of delivering true colors.

 

[Danny Tanner]

Funny you should ask. Week or two back, I had the Captivate for 3 days, before returning it in favor of iphone 4. Great concept, and will eventually be a great phone, but I never did so much cussing in all my life. It's not ready for prime time - lots of little bugs/problems/issues with it. Also, the biggest thing is this: the GPS receiver is a known problem in these phones (google gps captivate) - doesn't pick up the signal as strongly or quickly as Iphone and other Android phones. This was a deal-breaker for me after testing the GPS out since I hunt a lot - it worked - slowly/mostly/sortof, but did not inspire confidence. The other deal-breaker was the undeletable, fee-only bloatware apps on it (namely, AT&T Navigator). As a matter of principle, I won't tolerate monthly-fee-only, undeletable proprietary bloatware - bad bad combination. No reason on earth why you ought not to be able to delete.

But if you can get past the bloatware, it is in theory far far superior to iphone, and will be in practice, in time, when it's debugged and the GPS receiver fixed, and 2.2 OS available. I'd imagine within 6 months I'll be ready to try it again, except that I'll probably go Sprint/Epic 4. The swype keyboard just rocks out. The new world record for speed texting was set with a swype keyboard. Many other neat features too, most of which are better/more intuitive than iphone. YMMV.

Also, another thing: I happen to very much like the front-facing camera of the iphone, because I can take pics of myself making goofy faces easily and send them to my friends & family. Consequently, they hate the front-facing camera. The flash for the camera is another good feature that the Captivate does not have. Both these phone have identical or nearly-identical video and still-photo capabilities, except that the still pic quality of the Samsung seems slightly superior in terms of delivering true colors.

The issue with the Galaxy S phones taking forever to be tracked and then once they are, you're a mile and a half away from where the phone is showing you are should be fixed this month. Samsung has been working on an Over-The-Air push to correct this that was planned to come out this month. I haven't received anything on my T-Mobile Vibrant, but that was the plan. If you need GPS now, the Samsung is not for you because of this. I use GPS a couple to a few times a week and it's hit or miss, and there are a few tricks to get this to work, but who doesn't want their phone to work correctly right out of the box?

I'm an Android fanboy, I loved my G1 and I love my Vibrant. But I realize the iPhone has a lot going for it. You can't go wrong either way, but if you want my opinion? Go Android.

Oh, and 2.2 should be pushed this month as well... I'm still waiting.

 

[Larry Morgan]

I'm actually in this situation exactly. I'm going to get either the Captivate or Iphone 4 tonight. I got to fiddle with a Vibrant, not the captivate, and thought it was pretty nice.
I'm still on the fence..

 

[BagdHoe]

Not trying to high jack the TS post, but does anyone use the Captivate for corporate email on a Exchange server? If so, how do you like it?

I have 40 Blackberry users running on a BES and some are pushing hard for the iPhone. I won't use the iPhone, but looking into the Captivate.

 

[Dr. Tad Hussein Winslow]

I agree with DT there... one of the biggest things it has going for it is the number of FREE songs/videosringtones, etc., all of which cost on Apple. And, within a year or so, the number of apps, both free and pay, will blow away Apple. Apple is going to have to innovate at an incredibly faster rate than they have in the past if they don't want their iphone to be crushed into cult-only oblivion.

But the problem with "this upgrade is supposedly coming on this date" and "that upgrade is supposedly coming on that date" is that the devil is in the details - see the key words I bolded there.

 

[Ryan78]

Not trying to high jack the TS post, but does anyone use the Captivate for corporate email on a Exchange server? If so, how do you like it?

I have 40 Blackberry users running on a BES and some are pushing hard for the iPhone. I won't use the iPhone, but looking into the Captivate.

One of the guys in my department has a Samsung with the android OS, and our work email works fine on it. I don't see why it wouldn't on the captivate too.

 

[Danny Tanner]

But the problem with "this upgrade is supposedly coming on this date" and "that upgrade is supposedly coming on that date" is that the devil is in the details - see the key words I bolded there.

Exactly.. which is why I mentioned "I'm still waiting"...

It'll be a welcome patch.

Regarding the phone and features itself, the specs are on par with the iPhone 4.

The screen looks fantastic, mine came with Avatar which I played a few seconds of just to see how well the screen performed. Looked crystal clear, though I'm not going to watch a 2 or 3 hour (or whatever) high def movie on a 3.x" screen, and I'd attempt to remove it, but it sure does keep the little one occupied while grocery shopping.

Once 2.2 hits, browsing and processing speed is supposed to get a tasty boost. I saw a speed comparison on Gizmodo.com using a Droid (I believe) on 2.1, one on 2.2, and an iPad. The iPad loaded up 4 out of 5 pages quicker than either phone (which it's a dedicated device, so no surprise there), but one the 2.2 wasn't much slower and actually loaded a page quicker than the iPad did. Both were significantly quicker than the 2.1 phone.

I will throw in a random tidbit, if you have high quality mp3s, the 5.1 surround sound option works great, and the earbuds that came in the box are really decent for freebies.

 

[Traxxis]

at this point, if I knew how to put movies on this phone, I would. I've spent lots of time lately in waiting rooms.

Options?

 

[doctorjj]

at this point, if I knew how to put movies on this phone, I would. I've spent lots of time lately in waiting rooms.

Options?

Get an iPhone?

J/K!!!

 

[Traxxis]

Get an iPhone?

J/K!!!

screw that! If for nothing else, my sheer hatred for apple would keep me from that.