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"so far the best phone i've owned" on by JacksSmirkingRevenge
Pros: sensitive,accurate screen,thin but durable,very light,bright screen,enough options for the average user,creative contacts list.plenty of ring tones.
Cons: low ear speaker sound.soft vibrate,MicroSD location(under battery)OS full keyboard a bit small.like any touchscreen,needs cleaning often.eyeglass cloth,$2 at wal-mart,etc..works great.
Summary: I tried 2 other touch screens prio to the solstice.The Xenon(had to replace 3 in 2 months)The Impression.I'm sure its a great phone new,but it was sent as a refurb in place of the Xenon.but again i had problems with 2 of those before having them allow me to buy a new phone at new customer pricing without a new contract.
I'll be honest and say i did replace it once because it stopped reading my sim.but they replaced it new and its been smooth sailing ever since.hasnt froze,locked up,shut down or any other major touchscreen issues.So i'm very happy with what i have now.the screen is a good size,accurate,sensitive and fun to work with.as mentioned in cons,the OS full keyboard is a little too small and i have very thin fingers.I usually use the T9 on the dial pad and its great.T9 is very smart and easy to switch back to numbers or symbols.dialing is smooth and fast and have lost only 1 or 2 calls so far.I also mentioned the phones ear speaker.it is a bit quiet and can be hard to hear in semi-noisy areas.but overall not THAT bad.i have heard worse.calls are clear and static free.the person on the other end can hear you just fine.never got complaints.speaker phone isnt great and i never use now.echoing on both sides.not that you have to,but a good bluetooth headset clears most of these problems.i use one for the most part anyway.
there is a lot of memory,a good selection of ringtones on at&t available or use one of the list of the tones that it comes with.there are more than most phones and arent as hokey.of course there are a few but its expected.
MicroSD is located under the battery which makes it difficult to remove.USB recommended(not included).Internet package would be usefull as well to transfer or upload anything to or from..
But for the price and the pro's,it is worth every penny.i'm not a phone inernet guy nor do i listen to music off it.so it has more than i need but is there if i want it.I'm glad i went through the problems and stress of the other phones.makes me love this one even more.i would recommend it to anyone looking for a great touchscreen that isnt a overpriced over hyped iPhone. -
"Wanted to like it but too many compromises.Sent back :(" on by kwebmail
Pros: Biggest Pro? Call quality. Hands down this is the best cell phone I've ever had. People often thought I was on a land-line it sounded so good.
Thin and lightweight, much better size to carry than an iphone.
Nice virtual keyboard.Cons: Scrolling is poorly implemented. Far too many scrolls to move down a long list or browing.
Voice dialing (should be a strong selling point on a touch screen phone) is utter GARBAGE.
Speakerphone echoes.
AT&T junk pre-installed.
Other minor stuff.Summary: Man I REALLY tried to like this phone. My Sony W580i camera broke so I gave this a shot after reading the positive reviews. I like the size, not too big and bulky (iphone) not too expensive, nice size screen, good reviews, etc.
The ONE thing that made me keep trying to like it was the call quality. Honestly this thing sounds great, literally I had people asking if I was on a landline. Must be the network and phone combo in my area. This FAR exceeded my expectations and I've always thought "wow, if cell phones could just be great phones first I'd be in heaven.."....well, I was wrong.....there are other things that matter.
Unfortunately the great quality is somewhat mitigated by the fact that you have to hold it up to your ear at all times because you cannot use the speakerphone. It's just worthless. Trying to use the spearkerphone results in major feedback echoes that make it un-usaeble on the other end of the line (did anyone even TEST this function at Samsung?)
Surprisingly it had adequate battery life if you don't use the browser a lot.
Browser use depletes it pretty quick though.
Messaging is pretty easy, landscape mode and the virtual keyboard work well.
Bluetooth works well for file transfers.
The biggest 'across the board' problem is that scrolling is terrible. If you have a lot of contacts or are browsing the web, you'll soon get really sick of scroll, scroll, scroll to try to get through the data.
It really should have more 'inertial coasting' like the iphone or 'hold to continous scroll' buttom.
This was probably the deal breaker for me, since the phone has a nice large screen (which auto changes to landscape) and relatively fast on ATT 3G network. All the scrolling makes it simply not worthwhile to use for browsing and anything else you need to use like going through contacts.
A related issue I had (that you may not) was importing my contacts from the SIM. They came across in all kinds of screwed up ways (last name first, truncated names, missing numbers, etc). I have over 100 so this was not something I was looking forward to fixing but I started against my most frequently used contacts. Got about 30 of the common ones done to practice with in the month I had it.
And because the scrolling isn't great I tried to use the voice dialing (on a touch screen phone you can't dial without looking), Samsung uses some program called Nuance that is supposed to look at your contacts spelling and figure out the corresponding sound signature. good luck with that. You can't 'train' it and you can't improve it's accuracy rate.
I tried a couple of different ways of spelling my contacts, placing names in different fields and never got its accuracy above 1 out of 20 times on names. Numbers and yes/no work okay but so what? Overall it's just crap so there goes another potentially useful feature down the drain.
Honestly I prefer the 'training' approach of other phones as opposed to the 'one size fits none' of the Solstice. If it picks wrong once, it's ALWAYS going to pick wrong (these were not complicated names either). useless.
Minor stuff:
In landscape mode the camera lens is directly under where the fingers of your left hand rest. You can see and adjust though.
All the AT&T stuff is pay-to-play (navigator, demo games, etc etc) and better/free 3rd party apps (like GPS apps) won't work.
Scheduler, calendar doesn't default to having an alarm set to notify you when you enter a notice....what's the point of putting it in there if the thing won't remind you unless you scroll down and select 'alarm'.
Comes with nothing else useful in the box (no data cables, no headphones, no memory). I know this isn't new but c'mon couldn't Samsung toss a $1.25 data cable in there for your customers?
Bottom line I really wanted to like this phone but in the end I knew I'd just get more fed-up with its defects. I ended up taking the $35 hit on 're-stocking' and returned it.
Haven't found a replacement yet but I'm starting the search.
Hope this helps. -
"I chose this over the Eternity" on by regaug
Pros: Touch screen is fast and responsive, better than the Eternity
Build quality seems excellent; leather-like non-scratchable back
Music player sits in memory making it easy to stop/start with bluetooth
Small and light for a touchscreenCons: Wish the widgets were customizable (like adding new ones)
Wish they hadn't downgraded the camera res (only thing that is better on Eternity)
Learning to scroll on the touchscreen takes some real practice
Memory card sits behind battery (nit pick)Summary: I disagree with a lot of CNET's review; this is a solid, nice phone. I chose this over the Eternity and LG's VU because it seemed to have a better quality build, and seemed less "clunky". The Touch Wiz interface seems more responsive on the Solstice; that and the vibe feedback make it much easier to text with, IMO.
I chose this over the Impression because it was cheaper, lighter and smaller, and after trying them both out in the store, I decided I didn't want the slide-out keyboard. I learned to txt with predictive T9, and I can do that faster than use qwerty with my thumbs
I did not compare call quality between the Impression and Solstice; but I have read several reviews complaining of call quality and especially speakerphone echo problems on the Solstice. My phone does NOT have these issues, call quality seems normal, I am told it sounds just fine on speakerphone. On my end, the quality of the speakerphone is not quite as good as my trusty old LG CU500 music phone, but acceptable considering I usually listen to music via bluetooth. -
"Solid phone easy to use" on by grantman54
Pros: Widgets work well.
Two different ways you can text.
Touch works really well.
Good size.
Widgets are mostly useful.
Easy NavigationCons: No gmail.
2 mega pixel camera.Summary: Im really frustrated that Cnet rated this phone lower than the eternity. I have three friends that have the eternity and all have said the touch response works way better on the new Solstice. They also like the size and the camera difference is not really noticeable. Cnet seems to be as thorough in their compare and contrasts as they used to be
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"Worst phone I have owned since 1993" on by osubob
Pros: Price ($99), size and full keyboard.
Cons: Touch screen either too sensitive or not sensitive enough. Screen too small for web use. Horrible web browser (may not be Samsung problem).
Summary: I bought this phone when I switched from a Blackberry Curve with Verizon to AT&T. It looked impressive in the store and the features appeared sufficient for my needs. I would have kept the Blackberry, but it is incompatible with AT&T service.
I initially blamed the performance difficulties on my unfamiliarity with this type of phone; however, after 2 months of using it, I realize the problem is the phone and/or AT&T.
The touch screen is the worst that I have ever used. It is far too sensitive, especially when trying to scroll through contacts or surf the web. You are constantly switching to contacts or screens that you do not want and then having to go back and try again. Perhaps Samsung should have included a stylus. I have an HP Pocket PC and have started using the stylus with the Solstice whenever I use the internet.
If I had used the internet browser more during the 30 day trial period, I would have returned the phone to AT&T. I only use the internet feature whenever I am unsure about the quality or value of a product when I am shopping, so it is not a daily occurrence. After a couple of really frustrating experiences, I have taken the time to really test it out and find it extremely unfriendly.
I have had Motorola Q, Blackberry Curve, LG, and Motorola StarTac cell phones in the past and I have never been motivated to write a review about a cell phone until I used this one. It may work out for you, but find out during the 30 guarantee period. I will probably buy a blackberry soon and chalk up the $99 cost for this phone to a learning experience.
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