Samsung Fascinate Review: Verizon's Galaxy S Smartphone
by Brian Klug on October 5, 2010 12:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Samsung
- Galaxy S
- Fascinate
- Mobile
Final Thoughts
The Fascinate ultimately leaves me with two completely conflicting final conclusions.
On one hand, the hardware and platform itself is undeniably the best out there - Hummingbird and the SGX 540 make the whole experience incredibly fluid in places where it counts. There's absolutely no doubt about how snappy and smooth Android feels throughout, even on 2.1. The 1 GHz Hummingbird just does an awesome job. Everyone I've let play with the Fascinate says the same thing, it feels fast and fluid. Fire up that default gallery application and compare with a Nexus One and you'll see exactly what I'm talking about.
The screen is also undeniably among the best on the Android platform, given a run for its proverbial money only by the Droid and Droid 2's IPS panels. There's less glare compared to the non-super AMOLED variety we've seen in the Nexus One outside, and it's measurably brighter as well, all thanks to fewer air-glass interfaces and those pesky fresnel reflection coefficients adding up.
There camera is nicely done, including 720P video recording and a suite of customizations for camera control. Oh, and you've also got an LED flash - something the Captivate and Vibrant lack.
Battery life needs work, but it's on par with the original Motorola Droid in every area except call time.
The rest of the experience is a bit more sordid, however. There's that glaringly blatant GPS issue that the entire Galaxy S line never should have shipped with, but what really sticks out in my mind is what Verizon has done to the software side. It's hard to even tell you're on a Google phone given how much Bing there is on the device, and just about everywhere else it's possible is something Verizon branded.
For power users, this admittedly isn't a big deal. Root the thing and change it, install a custom ROM, and be done with it. To some extent, Android is the new Windows Mobile because of just how much you can change and customize, and how both enjoy strong and active ROM cooking communities. For normal users however, this is just this same kind of platform-confusion which led to Windows Mobile's eventual identity crisis and death. Every device came with different software, different carrier customizations, and different experiences. Getting that out of box install light is what makes high end smartphones feel more like smartphones and less like chintzy featurephones.
The rest of the weird, out of place Bing facsimiles of Google apps can thankfully be remedied by a quick trip to the applications marketplace. The unfortunate part is that you'll never really be rid of them since you can't uninstall them without rooting.
Then there are just completely disingenuous things like making the default search engine Bing, and not allowing users to change it or delete preinstalled carrier bookmarks - again without rooting. Android is open, sure, it's a question of just who it's open to.
Ultimately, the Fascinate is up against the HTC Incredible, Motorola Droid 2 and Droid X on Verizon. It's better than the Incredible for sure so let's just kick that out of the running. The Droid 2 has a physical keyboard which the Fascinate does not, so if you need physical keys you have your answer. Which leaves us with the Droid X. Motorola gives you better battery life, a better GPS experience and the freedom to be given Google Maps and Search from the start. Samsung on the other hand gives you a smaller form factor, a faster SoC and a punchier display. If you're on the road a lot, use GPS, and need the most out of each charge, pick the Droid X. If you don't mind Droid 1 battery life and a flaky GPS which will hopefully be fixed quickly, go for the Fascinate.
Wait another 6 - 8 months, and you'll probably have something even better than both of these to choose from.
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metafor - Tuesday, October 5, 2010 - link
That seems to be a common misconception. Just think about it, the processor is somewhere around ~500mW doing an intensive task. Compare that to an RF radio chip that eats 2W or so while communicating to a 3G cell tower. Or the 2-3W display....The App Processor is a small percentage of overall power draw.
strikeback03 - Tuesday, October 5, 2010 - link
Agreed, checking the power usage utility on Android it isn't uncommon to see the screen drawing the vast majority of the power. Which AMOLED has the potential to help with if there were a way to format websites to be more friendly to it (i.e. no white backgrounds).metafor - Tuesday, October 5, 2010 - link
I'm personally banking on either Pixel Qi or Mirasol improving to the point where they can take over being the displays used. The power savings would warrant any apparent difference in image quality as long as it's "good enough".JimmiG - Wednesday, October 6, 2010 - link
"Just think about it, the processor is somewhere around ~500mW doing an intensive task. Compare that to an RF radio chip that eats 2W or so while communicating to a 3G cell tower. Or the 2-3W display...."I guess you're right. I can play games and watch video on my HTC Desire without using much battery, but 3G browsing absolutely kills battery life. My daily routine involves heavy 3G web browsing on the 1-hour commute to school by train, then the phone spends most of the day in standby, then another hour of heavy usage on the way home in the afternoon. This is enough to run the battery down to ~10% by the time I get home, if I'm lucky enough to have it last the whole day.
But then, how does the iPhone4 manage nearly 7 hours of 3G browsing? Does it use a different radio chip, is it the network, or what?
metafor - Wednesday, October 6, 2010 - link
RF chips don't really vary that much. I would take a guess that it's good software management. What you don't realize is that most of the time you're browsing, you're not actually loading data. You have a burst of data as the website loads, but then it stops.I've noticed on my iPhone that periods of inactivity -- while I'm reading a webpage -- would cause the signal bar to drop a bit. It would go back up once I clicked on a link.
I suspect the software is putting the RF chip in a low-power mode more aggressively than HTC equivalents.
A lot of people discount it but software throttling is the single-most effective way of reducing power consumption.
ssj4Gogeta - Tuesday, October 5, 2010 - link
Is there any chance you'll do an I9000 review? It's the European/Asian version of the Galaxy S. It comes unlocked, doesn't have loads of crap preinstalled, and trades the LED flash for a front VGA cam. It also doesn't have a search button, but you can long-press the menu button to search.Also, please consider trying the voodoo lag fix in your future Galaxy S reviews.
http://project-voodoo.org/
It basically changes the system partition file system from RFS to EXT4, which makes the phone noticeably faster and smoother (no stalling while installing apps, no stuttering..)
8steve8 - Tuesday, October 5, 2010 - link
i personally have an international galaxy s with beta froyo rom (JPK), with lagfix, these are the numbers i get:Rightware BrowserMark:
35345 : my galaxy s 2.2
29018 : fascinate 2.1
sunspider:
07375.8ms : my galaxy s 2.2
15835.0ms : fascinate 2.1
linpack:
14.399 MFLOPS : my galaxy s 2.2
08.157 MFLOPS : fascinate 2.1
NeoCore Benchmark:
55.6FPS : my galaxy s 2.2
55.6FPS : fascinate 2.1
quadrant:
2000ish : my galaxy s 2.2 w/lagfix
0800ish with my galaxy s 2.1 stock
the phone ships with a terrible filesystem setup, causes severe lag over time... as shown in the quadrant score which does some IO stuff... this is fixable with root and a lagfix app...
and gps works about as good as my nexus one
(although in 2.1 builds of the firmware GPS was terrible)
this has been said by everyone, but the 4" SAMOLED displays on these things are sick... makes a nexus one display look really dated, and although props to the iphone for finally getting hi-res, 3.5" just seems comparably too small.
annoying it shipped so broken, but once dealt with, a beautiful device and over-all experience
ssj4Gogeta - Wednesday, October 6, 2010 - link
You don't even require root for voodoo lagfix. It comes in an update.zip and changes the filesystem to ext4.webmastir - Tuesday, October 5, 2010 - link
fantastic review. this is why i love this site! great job & great info.Shadowmaster625 - Tuesday, October 5, 2010 - link
If you can forget that a $500+ piece of hardware is in your pocket, then you need to be... outsourced.