Thinking about getting the captivate

[EssTuKay]

Any one have suggestions or warning about the phone, ive read a lot of things on here but i am still unsure but i want to get something soon as my contract is almost up. And my iphone 3g is freaking ridiculous after the 4.0 upgrade and im also tired of apple. I want a phone I can do more with a play with.

 

[Deleted User]

Well if you rely heavily on GPS, it's really buggy right now for a lot of people. For me it works alright in certain areas (Can't get a lock indoors and takes a while outdoors in Stockton, CA but locks well in San Jose, CA). Other than that, it's the perfect phone for me and I can't find any other issues with it right now. I'll update my post if I can think of anything.

 

[Infinite-t]

Any one have suggestions or warning about the phone, ive read a lot of things on here but i am still unsure but i want to get something soon as my contract is almost up. And my iphone 3g is freaking ridiculous after the 4.0 upgrade and im also tired of apple. I want a phone I can do more with a play with.

Well, I came from the same boat as you. I was planning on getting the iPhone4. I got my wife one and she really likes it. But they are very unavailable and as I started thinking about it, I really wanted to try something out of the Apple box.

We have a family plan so I would have to find a good phone on ATT. Then the Captivate came out and I snatched one up the second day they where out.

Let me tell you that coming from the iPhone 3g myself:

The Captivate is much faster, and the screen is super nice compared to the 3g. The UI is simular, but is very open to customize in nearly every way.

Syncing the phone is very different, and confusing at first. You dont use a progam like iTunes to upload stuff to your phone. Just plug it in to your PC and dump stuff on it like you would a flash drive. If you are like me, you probably have a zillion songs you purchased on iTunes that you want to transfer over. I found an app for the phone called iSyncr, worked like a charm. Plug in your phone, start iTunes and it transfers your music and stuff just like it would with the iphone.

Expect to have a learning curve in getting used to how things work and how to mess with settings and stuff. it took me 4 days, and some help from the fine folks on this forum to help me get things working how I wanted them to.

Beware though of a few 'Issues" with the Captivate. Most notibly, the GPS problem, many people, including myself are having serious trouble getting the GPS to lock in a signal, even outside on a clear day. Conflicting reports say Samsung is aware and is working on a fix. other reports, including my conversation with a CS rep this morning says there are "No known issues with GPS on this phone".. I hope that pans out.
2: The death grip. It seems that not even Samsung is able to escape the deathgrip that plagued the new iPhone and a few others. Many people have reported, including myself, that holding the phone in certain ways can sugnificantly affect the signal. I havent experienced any drop calls from this nor have heared on any real instances of the "death grip" killing calls on this phone. It has been reported though that it does affect the wifi and 3g data speed. There are conflicting report weather or not a case helps this issue. I dont have a case yet, but I have tried putting a sock on my hand, and strangled the phone in many which ways and was unable to affect the signal more that one bar. I had the same result with a washcloth.

So, all that being said, it is a cool phone, and after some getting used to, i think you will like it. It does have its issues, and we all pray they get fixed. But you do have a 30 day trial to take the phone back if you dont like it. So, for me, I figured, what the hell, its worth a try! The issues aside. I am liking the freedom outside that closed in apple box. I

 

[Infinite-t]

Oh, and about iOS4 on the 3g. I think Apple knew it would seriously choke the 3g and make it run slow as hell in hopes it would encourage people to upgrade..

 

[EssTuKay]

I thank you for all of your informational words. I am really leaning towards the capitivate because i would a phone that i can do more with and i mean every phone has issues but from what i have seen is that the pro's out weight the cons...i believe that i will be going into get the capivate shortly hopefully. Well see how i like it i assumed that i will like it alot. thx again for the info.

Lance

Well, I came from the same boat as you. I was planning on getting the iPhone4. I got my wife one and she really likes it. But they are very unavailable and as I started thinking about it, I really wanted to try something out of the Apple box.

We have a family plan so I would have to find a good phone on ATT. Then the Captivate came out and I snatched one up the second day they where out.

Let me tell you that coming from the iPhone 3g myself:

The Captivate is much faster, and the screen is super nice compared to the 3g. The UI is simular, but is very open to customize in nearly every way.

Syncing the phone is very different, and confusing at first. You dont use a progam like iTunes to upload stuff to your phone. Just plug it in to your PC and dump stuff on it like you would a flash drive. If you are like me, you probably have a zillion songs you purchased on iTunes that you want to transfer over. I found an app for the phone called iSyncr, worked like a charm. Plug in your phone, start iTunes and it transfers your music and stuff just like it would with the iphone.

Expect to have a learning curve in getting used to how things work and how to mess with settings and stuff. it took me 4 days, and some help from the fine folks on this forum to help me get things working how I wanted them to.

Beware though of a few 'Issues" with the Captivate. Most notibly, the GPS problem, many people, including myself are having serious trouble getting the GPS to lock in a signal, even outside on a clear day. Conflicting reports say Samsung is aware and is working on a fix. other reports, including my conversation with a CS rep this morning says there are "No known issues with GPS on this phone".. I hope that pans out.
2: The death grip. It seems that not even Samsung is able to escape the deathgrip that plagued the new iPhone and a few others. Many people have reported, including myself, that holding the phone in certain ways can sugnificantly affect the signal. I havent experienced any drop calls from this nor have heared on any real instances of the "death grip" killing calls on this phone. It has been reported though that it does affect the wifi and 3g data speed. There are conflicting report weather or not a case helps this issue. I dont have a case yet, but I have tried putting a sock on my hand, and strangled the phone in many which ways and was unable to affect the signal more that one bar. I had the same result with a washcloth.

So, all that being said, it is a cool phone, and after some getting used to, i think you will like it. It does have its issues, and we all pray they get fixed. But you do have a 30 day trial to take the phone back if you dont like it. So, for me, I figured, what the hell, its worth a try! The issues aside. I am liking the freedom outside that closed in apple box. I

 

[micmin]

I bought my wife a iPhone4 believe that it's a great phone for anyone who wants a nice phone w/o much customization. And being a programmer myself, i'm just not satisfied enough to go with an iPhone myself.

There are so much more you can do with this phone, and so many tweaks out here, and most importantly, it has a great support community (and growing).

My wife is so jealous that I can play different formats of video (w/o any conversion), i.e. rmvb and mkv files that I download from the web.