Samsung Infuse 4G impression

After being disappointed by T-Mobile’s LG G2x, my search for a new phone continues. The selections outside US are grand, between the highly praised Samsung Galaxy S 2, or Sony Ericsson’s Xperia Arc/Neo, etc. Alas, NONE of those phones are being released in the US by their respective douchebag companies. Instead, what do we have? Samsung released a rehashed Galaxy S 1 phone on AT&T, called the Samsung Infuse 4G. Trying to import the Galaxy S 2 is prohibitively expensive and risky (at least $750, and it will have no warranty whatsoever). However, I’m too annoyed with my Nexus One already that I finally bite and checked out the Samsung Infuse 4G from the lovely AT&T.

First of all, it IS a re-hashed Galaxy S 1 phone. It contains the same single core processor as with the Galaxy S 1 phones, albeit at slightly higher clockspeed (1.2GHz vs 1GHz). While people outside the US are treated with dual-core goodness of the SGS2, US gets some leftovers. Performance wise though, it’s actually not bad. Despite the old architecture and Samsung putting their own skin on top of Android, the phone seems to perform fairly well. AT&T, as bad as they are, did a decent job by not overloading the phone with too much junk ware. Remember my review of the G2x, where T-Mobile put buggy old junkware apps in it that you cannot force-close? AT&T didn’t do that. Sure, the stuff that are pre-installed on the Infuse cannot be uninstalled, but you can easily force-close them if needed. This probably explains why the Infuse, despite having an older hardware, feels better and more stable than the G2x. The only glitches I experienced are mostly related to Froyo as I also experienced them when I had Froyo on my Nexus One. Gingerbread should take care of those, if AT&T is kind enough to update the Infuse.

Did I say Froyo? Yeah, in 2011, while other countries are getting Gingerbread phones, US gets old phones with old OS sold as new. Pathetic and sad. Even worse, it’s not even the latest version of Froyo, which is 2.2.2. It’s 2.2.1. You might think what’s the big deal. OS updates is a HUGE deal in modern smartphones because it doesn’t only give you new features, but also bug fixes and security fixes. Emphasis on security. There are serious security flaws that are fixed in Gingerbread, leaving tons of Android with Froyo vulnerable. It is extremely irresponsible of the OEMs and carriers for not pushing updates in a timely manner. Imagine if Dell or HP blocked service packs of Windows. There will be a huge outrage and security concern.

The main seller of the Infuse is its 4.5″ screen. Yeah, it’s massive! It puts my iPhone 3GS and Nexus One to shame. It’s even bigger than the LG G2x. The 4.5″ Super AMOLED screen is a beauty, bright and vibrant colors. Alas, it still has the same resolution as my Nexus One, 800×480. Definitely not “retina” resolution, and it kinda shows on some fonts and icons, aliased jaggies aplenty. Still, there are times now that I appreciate the larger screen. Maybe signs of my eyes getting old. 😀

Another main seller of the Infuse is 4G, or more like fake 4G. AT&T is marketing HSPA+ as 4G. This may make you think the Infuse is somewhat more “advance” than something like the Galaxy S2, even though the Galaxy S2 also supports HSPA+, minus the hype and marketing. Is it fast? It is. I can get 3 to 5mbps down and 1mbps+ up. This is a lot faster than my iPhone 3GS, which usually gets only up to 2mbps down and a lousy 50-100kbps up. A far cry for sure. Still, it’s not really 4G, and it’s unfortunate that everybody now is misusing the monicker, thanks to T-Mobile. Now, the Infuse apparently is not compatible with GoPhone for data, even if you have purchased data packages. I have a GoPhone pay-as-you-go SIM for backup, and it works fine for data on my Nexus One and 3GS, but it doesn’t work at all on the Infuse, not even reverting back to 3G or EDGE. It just doesn’t work.

The camera is sweet. It’s not as fancy as the G2x though. The G2x can do 1080p video while the Infuse is maxed out at 720p. Still better than my Nexus One and 3GS. The front facing camera on the Infuse is also 1.3MP, beating the VGA resolution on most other phones, including the iPhone 4. Photo is at 8MP on the rear facing camera. Nice.

Samsung is quite generous on the internal storage, 16GB partitioned into the usual ~1+GB for apps and the rest as internal “SD card.” There’s also a microSD card for even more storage. I’ve been downloading apps like crazy, finally being freed from the limited internal memory of the Nexus One. The SIM slot is located above the battery so you can replace it without having to take the battery out. However, the microSD card slot is located UNDER the SIM slot, and access to it is blocked by the battery. It’s not that easy to take it out either since, so if you are those people that like to change SD cards often, well, look elsewhere. The Infuse comes with a measly 2GB microSD card, but considering you already have ~16GB internal storage, it’s not a big issue.

One thing I immediately miss is the trackball on the Nexus One. As silly as it may look, the trackball on the N1 serves as a very useful notification light, so I can see if the phone need my attention without having to turn it on. No such thing on the Infuse, just like the iPhone.

Another surprise is that the Infuse actually supports 5GHz 802.11n, a nice update from most other phones that usually only support the crowded 2.4GHz band.

One drawback of Android is its media capability. Let’s face it, nothing beats the iPod integration on iPhones, and their ecosystem of accessories and support, especially in cars. My car has a USB port that supports my 3GS. As expected, the Infuse doesn’t work with it like the iPhone did, it only works for charging, no difference than the Nexus One. Sad. 😦

The Infuse comes with an HDMI adapter. It basically converts the micro-USB slot into an HDMI slot. However, you have to plug-in a power source on the HDMI adapter instead, making it a dongle-cable mess.

So, let’s recap.
The goods:
+decent performance for an old single core phone
+not too much junkware from AT&T
+other sources for apps is enabled
+beautiful huge screen
+tri-band HSDPA: 850/1900/2100
+HSPA+ is decently fast

The bads:
-4.5″ may be too big for some
-old hardware released as new, while other countries are getting the dual-core SGS2
-old outdated and buggy OS
-all the stuff one may not like on Android (eg. media capability, accessories support, etc)
-locked to AT&T
-fake 4G

If you’re on AT&T and you need a new phone, what are your options on the same price range? The main one will be the dual-core Motorola Atrix 4G, which is sold for the same price. Despite having dual-core, the Atrix has poorer screen, only VGA front-facing-camera, and at this point, I have a felling Samsung is more likely to pull through with updates than Motorola. The Atrix does have fancy feature like finger-print scanner and you could turn it into a linux netbook using an optional expensive dock. I’m not a fan of Motorola though.
Another phone on the same price range is the 16GB iPhone 4. At this point in time, however, I wouldn’t get the iPhone 4 as the iPhone 5 is near the corner.
Then there’s the cheaper Samsung Captivate, which is an AT&T variant of the Galaxy S. Cheaper, smaller screen, but no front facing camera.
There’s also the HTC Inspire, but since HTC only made it with dual-band 3G (850/1900), I’m not interested.

So there you go, a quick impression on the AT&T Samsung Infuse 4G.

 

T-Mobile G2x Brief Impression

Haven’t been updating my blog for a long time. 🙂 Easier to rant on twitter, but I guess I have a new thing to rant.

Let’s start with the background, about wireless carriers in the US. There are only 2 GSM carriers in the US, AT&T and T-Mobile. Sure, you might find some no-name local/prepaid carrier, but in the end if they are using GSM, they are using AT&T or T-Mobile’s towers. The biggest problem with GSM in the US is the incompatibility between AT&T and T-Mobile for 3G. AT&T uses 850/1900 frequency bands, T-Mobile uses AWS (1700/2100) frequency bands. To make things worse, the number of modern smartphones that support 3G on both carriers are few and far in between. Nokia is the first one that put out a penta-band equipped phone, the N8, running Symbian. Android is the worst, as the OEMs are only interested in making their phones specific to each carriers (eg. HTC phones on AT&T would only have 850/1900 3G bands, while HTC phones on T-Mobile would only have AWS). It’s ridiculous and severely limit consumers’ choice.

Enter the G2x. It was advertised by T-Mobile to have quad-band 3G, supporting all of the bands above, 850/1900 and AWS. Every tech blogs and reviewers regurgitated the same information, claiming this to be a future-proof phone in the event AT&T bought T-Mobile. Naturally, I bought one, thinking that I can have it unlocked and use it on AT&T since my Nexus One is showing its age.

Let’s start with the goods. The G2x is a dual-core Tegra 2 Android phone, running 2.2.2 (Froyo). It’s basically the LG Optimus 2x, but with un-skinned Froyo + T-Mobile junk added. It’s fast. Android phones other than the Nexus’ are well known to be laggy. The G2x feel very snappy, even sometimes smoother than my Gingerbread running N1. The phone is sleek and nicely built. The front glass is curved, adding a neat design. The screen is a 4″ IPS screen, looks quite nice and vibrant without oversaturation like the OLED screen on the N1. Same resolution though as the N1.

The camera is great too, capable of 1080p video recording, definitely above and beyond the N1’s camera. Not only that, it has a 1.3MP front-facing camera, dwarfing most other phones that only have a VGA front-facing camera. Really, there’s a lot to like about this phone.

Another plus is the 8GB built-in memory. The internal memory is partitioned into two parts, with about 5.4GB set aside as an “internal SD card” storage. There’s still an ample amount of memory left for the main partition, about 1+GB free. This is a huge advantage over the Nexus One where it only has 100 something MB free on the internal memory, severely limiting how many apps you can put on the phone (not all Android apps can be installed on the SD card).

Now, let’s start with the ugly side. When I first set up the phone, I found out that for whatever reason, it refused to hand off data from the cell network to wifi, even with a solid wifi connection. The G2x insisted on using the 3G connection to do data. Not cool. This issue has been posted in T-Mobile’s own forum and XDA forum. Long story short, this happens since I don’t setup my Google account from the start, and the only way to fix it is to factory reset the phone and setup the Google account on the first setup phase. Annoying bug. I have no issues in setting up my Google account later on my Nexus One. To make things worse, that’s not the only culprit. Once you did this, the phone is more reliable in switching from 3G to wifi, but there are times that the 3G connection is still being used. Apparently it’s due to T-Mobile’s own My Account app that, for whatever reason, requires a cellular data connection instead of wifi. Highly annoying, but at least you could force the phone to use wifi by intentionally disabling cellular data in the settings. Still, it’s cumbersome and shouldn’t be an issue in the first place as handing off data from 3G to wifi and vice versa is the basic feature of the OS. I never have this problem at all on my Nexus One. This is extremely dangerous if you are on metered or limited data plan. Another proof that carrier junk really screw up the user experience of Android.

Another ugly side is stability. Users are reporting that the phone freezes/reboots. This happened to me once, when the phone just rebooted itself. Hard to see if it’s the phone or the software. My Nexus One also experienced random reboots prior to Gingerbread, so my guess it’s the OS.

Now, the bad. Remember how I bought the phone thinking that it has quad-band 3G support? Sounds too good to be true, right? Well, guess what, it doesn’t. Yup, the phone actually only supports T-Mobile’s 3G, AWS. No 850/1900 3G support, contrary to T-Mobile’s own website. I should’ve realized this as the box itself only listed 1700/2100 as the supported HSDPA frequency bands. People on XDA forum that got their G2xes unlocked only got 2G when they used AT&T SIM. Even LG’s own service manual for the phone only listed the phone as dual-band WCDMA capable. So why did all the tech bloggers and reviewers not mention this? Well, this kinda proves to you that these tech bloggers are not doing thorough reviews. Even Engadget, a well known tech blog site, failed to point this out on their review, and even after they updated it, they still think that the phone might be quad-band.

So, that kinda defeats my purpose in purchasing the phone. Extremely disappointed. I want to like the phone, but alas, I guess it’s not meant to be. After using it for a couple days, I returned it. Back to my Nexus One. It’s unfortunate that today, in 2011, US phone selections still sucks, with phones that only work with one carrier.