HTC Fuze & Samsung Eternity

[tdawg]

I know this is unsolicited, but I just spent a few minutes playing with the new HTC Fuze (AT&T's version of the HTC Touch Pro) and Samsung Eternity in the AT&T store and thought I'd share my humble opinion. So far, I'm not at all impressed with the HTC Fuze, or at least this display model was bad. From my brief time with the device, the touch interface was slow and unresponsive and the display was almost monochromatic--pictures of the device show a vivid display; perhaps this is the dumbed-down AT&T version? Navigating in general seemed unintuitive, but that's a subjective opinion. The screen was sharp though, so that's a plus. I couldn't try the physical keyboard as AT&T's security zip ties wouldn't allow it to slide.

On the flip side, I am initially impressed by the Samsung Eternity. Touch response was fast and intuitive (again, subjective), and the pseudo-haptic behavior of the device was a nice touch--no pun intended. Screen was vivid and sharp and the various apps looked pretty decent for a non-smartphone device. One weird thing was that while the phone has an accelerometer to tell if it's in portrait or landscape mode, it doesn't seem to know which way it's been turned as the QWERTY keyboard shows up in landscape on the same side, regardless of the direction of rotation. The only real disappointing thing I found was the camera seemed crippled--test photos didn't appear sharp--not to mention that this is Samsung's dumbed-down sensor for AT&T (T-Mobile's Behold gets a 5 MP camera). This bugs the hell out of me--not because I value a camera in my phone, I don't--but the fact that this separation of cell providers causes these pointless, minute differentiations in the same devices.

Other than that, I was impressed by Samsung's device. My biggest worry is the fact that the OS is a proprietary Samsung OS as far as I've been told, so the availability of after-market apps may be sorely lacking, with no bright future for 3rd party development. The HTC Fuze offers WM 6.1, so there are a lot of apps there, but the performance seemed severely lacking to me.

I don't know if the aftermarket ROMs that have been discussed for the Touch Diamond exist for the Touch Pro nor if they provide a performance boost for the Touch Pro.

 

[WelshBloke]

After market ROM's certainly exist for the touch pro, whether they are any good you'll have to find out for yourself (don't own one ). But there are plenty over at XDA developers.

Comparing the touch pro and the eternity is a bit weird, ones a smart phone and one isn't, its like comparing a PC and and Xbox, you can do it but you wont get a useful comparison.

If the Eternity does what you want straight out of the box then thats probably for you, if you think you'll need to take advantage of a lot off 3rd party apps then go for a smartphone.

 

[tdawg]

Originally posted by: WelshBloke
After market ROM's certainly exist for the touch pro, whether they are any good you'll have to find out for yourself (don't own one ). But there are plenty over at XDA developers.

Comparing the touch pro and the eternity is a bit weird, ones a smart phone and one isn't, its like comparing a PC and and Xbox, you can do it but you wont get a useful comparison.

If the Eternity does what you want straight out of the box then thats probably for you, if you think you'll need to take advantage of a lot off 3rd party apps then go for a smartphone.

Yeah, I know they aren't in the same class, but for me, they provide similar services, so I was curious about both and just thought I'd throw my opinions for both in the same post. I don't mean this to be a direct comparison between the two, but rather a comparison of the devices against my respective expectations for them.

I've gone back to my Blackberry Pearl after going thru the Blackjack I, Curve, and Blackjack II. I get bored with phones pretty quickly, and the Pearl kinda lacks some stuff I would like. I do like the form factor of the Pearl more than the Blackjack or Curve, and both the HTC and Samsung devices fit the mold for me. It really sucks that AT&T no longer lets me buy refurbished phones via my premier account like it used to, so my ability to buy and use new and different phones has dropped to none.

 

[WelshBloke]

Originally posted by: tdawg

Originally posted by: WelshBloke
After market ROM's certainly exist for the touch pro, whether they are any good you'll have to find out for yourself (don't own one ). But there are plenty over at XDA developers.

Comparing the touch pro and the eternity is a bit weird, ones a smart phone and one isn't, its like comparing a PC and and Xbox, you can do it but you wont get a useful comparison.

If the Eternity does what you want straight out of the box then thats probably for you, if you think you'll need to take advantage of a lot off 3rd party apps then go for a smartphone.

Yeah, I know they aren't in the same class, but for me, they provide similar services, so I was curious about both and just thought I'd throw my opinions for both in the same post. I don't mean this to be a direct comparison between the two, but rather a comparison of the devices against my respective expectations for them.

I've gone back to my Blackberry Pearl after going thru the Blackjack I, Curve, and Blackjack II. I get bored with phones pretty quickly, and the Pearl kinda lacks some stuff I would like. I do like the form factor of the Pearl more than the Blackjack or Curve, and both the HTC and Samsung devices fit the mold for me. It really sucks that AT&T no longer lets me buy refurbished phones via my premier account like it used to, so my ability to buy and use new and different phones has dropped to none.

If you can find a non smart phone that does all you need then take that over a smartphone.

I, personally, like smartphones as i like messing around with them (trying different roms or shells) and get that bored feeling you talk about.

I also never buy contract phones, I always buy unlocked phones so I can chose any phone I like then ( and change as often as I like).

 

[zylander]

I had pretty much the exact same first impressions as you did with those two phones. I was not at all impressed with the Fuze, the interface was extremely sluggish. The Eternity on the other hand I thought was great. Very responsive display and easy to navigate.

 

[Tom]

I initially had a similar experience at a Sprint store with the Touch Pro and the Diamond, both seemed to be slow and hard to use. But I went home read a bit about how the interface works and went back to look at them again and they both worked very well.

I think it was a combination of me knowing how to use them coupled with probably them having been rebooted or something. Anyway, I decided to buy a Diamond and the interface is very quick and responsive.

 

[tdawg]

Originally posted by: Tom
I initially had a similar experience at a Sprint store with the Touch Pro and the Diamond, both seemed to be slow and hard to use. But I went home read a bit about how the interface works and went back to look at them again and they both worked very well.

I think it was a combination of me knowing how to use them coupled with probably them having been rebooted or something. Anyway, I decided to buy a Diamond and the interface is very quick and responsive.

Do you have a link to the tips you found for using the Touch Pro interface effectively?