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Dislike my Samsung Fascinate..Other options?

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whitneykline

Newbie
I got my Samsung Fascinate in October and still HATE it. I tried to go in 2 times to Verizon within my 30 day exchange policy to get the Incredible and they assured me that the Fascinate was the best phone on the market. I am still wondering if I would have liked the Incredible better because it is an HTC, a little smaller and everybody said such GREAT things about it. Well fast forward to now and I am debating on 3 options...

A) buying an outdated Incredible.. B) buying the Droid Pro (since i am an old blackberry user who loved my keyboard, i may feel more at home with the pro's keyboard) and selling my Fascinate on Ebay??? C) Going to the iPhone since I love my Mac (i know the iPhone 4 is outdated but I am really struggling with my Fascinate and I don't know why.)

Any help would be greatly appreciated because I am downright frustrated with my Fascinate and am enjoying my 2nd phone (a simple "non-internet") phone wayyy more than my Droid..Help!
 
You should start off by telling us what you don't like about the Facinate. Is the user interface, form factor, performance etc.. There may be solutions out there that will help make it more useable.

If you want to get a new phone, tell us what you're looking for in a phone. How would you use it. What are some must have features. With some of those facts, we can help point you in the right direction.
 
This is the most legitimate reason I think I have seen yet of someone considering to move to the iPhone 4. FWIW I think you would love the incredible. Dpeneding on your viewpoints, you might thoroughly enjoy the iPhone 4 as well. It's a great device, just a bit more limited (even when jailbreaking).

The guys at Verizon are great at talking you down from something your gut tells you is right. Wish I could say it wasn't so but a similar thing happened to me. In the end I told them to shove it and took my business elsewhere. I don't care how good their network is!
 
I do not get along with texting on it and HATE swype (i think i am one of the only ones). I dislike the battery life even though I have app killers installed on it. It randomly freezes up. I wish it had some sort of LED light to indicate I had a text message and do not like the "text message pop up" feature for privacy reasons.

I would like a phone that is more texter friendly (do not enjoy the overly large touch screen or swype). I do really like the browsing on the android phones. I just am beginning to think an Android phone isn't for me and am no way looking to go back to a Blackberry (even though I loved it at the time, they are outdated now)
 
You do know you don't have to use use Swype, right? There are SO many keyboard options available to you.
 
Get a Droid 1, root it, flash Cyanogen :) ! You got a physical keyboard, no swype, a great rom with many customizations, and D1s are a bargain right now. You can get one for less than 100 on craigslist contract free.
 
I hate to say it, but as a fellow Mac user I recommend you at least take a look at the iPhone. I'm a former BlackBerry user too, currently using the HTC Evo on Sprint and loving it. I looked at the iPhone and for some reason it's the only Apple product ever that I'm not interested in. Go figure! Their best selling product ever and I don't want one. What I do like about the idea of an iPhone is the tight integration with the Apple ecosystem. For that reason, at least take a peek.
 
whitneykline said:
I got my Samsung Fascinate in October and still HATE it. I tried to go in 2 times to Verizon within my 30 day exchange policy to get the Incredible and they assured me that the Fascinate was the best phone on the market. I am still wondering if I would have liked the Incredible better because it is an HTC, a little smaller and everybody said such GREAT things about it. Well fast forward to now and I am debating on 3 options...

A) buying an outdated Incredible.. B) buying the Droid Pro (since i am an old blackberry user who loved my keyboard, i may feel more at home with the pro's keyboard) and selling my Fascinate on Ebay??? C) Going to the iPhone since I love my Mac (i know the iPhone 4 is outdated but I am really struggling with my Fascinate and I don't know why.)

Any help would be greatly appreciated because I am downright frustrated with my Fascinate and am enjoying my 2nd phone (a simple "non-internet") phone wayyy more than my Droid..Help!
Click to expand...

Tell your sellers the big FU, and tell them you want a Droid Pro or Incredible. The Incredible is a great phone, but it seems you may like the Droid Pro. I have the Incredible and it truly earns its name. No opinion on the Droid Pro as I never owned one but I guess you might like it.
 
I'm not trying to be a jerk here, but did you even test the fascinate before you purchased it. You list a number of dislikes about the phone that you should have been aware of from the start I.E...

1. Screen size
2. Texting options
3. Lack of an LED.

The term "best phone on the market", is relative to the person speaking those words. I think that you have to carry a lot of the burden of having this phone that you so adamantly dislike. No one should be able to talk you into something that you do not wish to do.

Again, I'm not digging on you, just pointing out some facts.
 
:ready to get flamed:

I have yet to like any Samsung Smartphone

they are all laggy and seem like they were rushed into production
 
whitneykline said:
I do not get along with texting on it and HATE swype (i think i am one of the only ones). I dislike the battery life even though I have app killers installed on it. It randomly freezes up. I wish it had some sort of LED light to indicate I had a text message and do not like the "text message pop up" feature for privacy reasons.

I would like a phone that is more texter friendly (do not enjoy the overly large touch screen or swype). I do really like the browsing on the android phones. I just am beginning to think an Android phone isn't for me and am no way looking to go back to a Blackberry (even though I loved it at the time, they are outdated now)
Click to expand...

T.M.M.L said:
I'm not trying to be a jerk here, but did you even test the fascinate before you purchased it. You list a number of dislikes about the phone that you should have been aware of from the start I.E...

1. Screen size
2. Texting options
3. Lack of an LED.

The term "best phone on the market", is relative to the person speaking those words. I think that you have to carry a lot of the burden of having this phone that you so adamantly dislike. No one should be able to talk you into something that you do not wish to do.

Again, I'm not digging on you, just pointing out some facts.
Click to expand...

whitneykline sorry to hear you dont like the SF, TMML has some decent points but thats water under the bridge now. Sounds like you're all in on leaving the SF. Before you go you might consider some final tweaks or not. For instance if you were to try an undervolted kernel you'd likely see a nice gain in battery life [if you're on 2.1]. Or if you move up to the leaked 2.2.1 that might give you a better overall experience.
I mean most people love the SF screen but if you truly dont then thats nothing you can tweak and yes you will probably need to find a replacement. Best advice I can offer you is to go in store and actually play with your desired replacement. At least give yourself some sense of what it will be like before committing to it.
 
saps said:
Best advice I can offer you is to go in store and actually play with your desired replacement. At least give yourself some sense of what it will be like before committing to it.
Click to expand...


Thanks saps, I forgot this important little tidbit while on my mini soapbox. As others have stated, don't let any sales person pressure you into what they believe is best for you. When it all comes down to it, you have to be comfortable with your choice of phones.

P.S.

I avoided the mention of rooting and all that jazz, for the simple fact that some people get heated when told that this is a way to get your phone the way you want it. Its one of the reasons I choose the fascinate, but its not for everyone.
 
ok..

you love texting.. hate screen keyboards...
then that would rule out the iphone... no keyboard.
and the incredible is out too.. again no kb.

you are already in contract with SF..
so try a few things first...
get rid of the app killer.. uninstall it. forget about apps in the background. Really forget about them.. wipe them from your mind!
this should help with some of the lag and freezes.

go to market and find other keyboards to try. :)

no LED for notifications...
well that is all you .. should have known that.
but I agree that sucks.. now you know.. what you want in next phone.
lesson learned.

then if you still cant deal with the SF...
sell on craigslist...
and buy a droid with a real kb on craigslist..
 
I've been nothing but satisfied with my unrooted Fascinate from Verizon. It's not laggy or buggy at all, and in fact is one of the fastest mobile devices I've used. It seems like all I have to do is look at a menu item and it's selected...very responsive, silky-smooth screen. I did have some minor issues with the stock TouchWiz UI (purely aesthetic), but since I started using LauncherPro I absolutely love interacting with it.

All that being said, I send and receive maybe 10 text messages per month and make even fewer calls. So, I could agree with the notion that this isn't the best choice for a hardcore texter. But like dan330 suggested, that fact is something that would be apparent right off the bat in the store.
 
whitneykline said:
I do not get along with texting on it and HATE swype (i think i am one of the only ones). I dislike the battery life even though I have app killers installed on it. It randomly freezes up. I wish it had some sort of LED light to indicate I had a text message and do not like the "text message pop up" feature for privacy reasons.

I would like a phone that is more texter friendly (do not enjoy the overly large touch screen or swype). I do really like the browsing on the android phones. I just am beginning to think an Android phone isn't for me and am no way looking to go back to a Blackberry (even though I loved it at the time, they are outdated now)
Click to expand...

maybe i missed the posts but I can't believe no one here even so much mentioned that app killers will kill your battery faster and they're completely useless garbage unless you're doing beta testing on apps.
 
Buy a phone with a keyboard.

There are loads on alternate keyboards on the market, if you can't find one you can work with then the only other option is a physical keyboard.

As for other complaints, no flash and no LED, this is your own fault for not reading up or taking a look at the phone before buying it.

battery life is pretty bad on any high end phone, you won't see any improvement from an iPhone 4 regardless of what their marketing team say about battery life.
 
Thank you everyone for your help. I have decided to try and sell my Fascinate and buy the Droid Pro..now the trick is finding one reasonably priced! :)
 
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