The next big AT&T phone?

[s44]

My father has an upgrade this month, and I'm inclined to get him off his Captivate ASAP and onto a Skyrocket. Star Wars has eaten up all my following-phone-news time, so I don't know if there are any big releases on the immediate horizon to make this a bad idea. If the Nexus drops on contract/LTE by February, that might be an option, though at his age the learning curve from Touchwiz Gingerbread to stock ICS (rearranged soft buttons!) might be a pain. Also, he uses speakerphone a lot, and I can't hear anyone when I use that feature.

Anything else announced/strongly rumored? All the expo devices later this month won't be out for a quarter, if not more thanks to the carriers.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

Why the Skyrocket? At the rate At&t's LTE deployment is taking place the phone will be ready to be replaced by the time most areas have it. That wouldn't necessarily be a big deal except the Skyrocket is inferior to the standard Galaxy S2 across the board and tends to cost a decent bit more.

 

[gorcorps]

Why the Skyrocket? At the rate At&t's LTE deployment is taking place the phone will be ready to be replaced by the time most areas have it. That wouldn't necessarily be a big deal except the Skyrocket is inferior to the standard Galaxy S2 across the board and tends to cost a decent bit more.

I agree with this. While the differences between the Skyrocket and non-Skyrocket mean little to those who aren't tweakers and not power users, the Skyrocket is still more expensive simply for LTE. If you're not in an LTE area already then getting the cheaper Galaxy SII is regarded as the better buy. The processor/GPU is better on the standard SGSII, and the big thing is developer support is huge. If your dad isn't into custom roms, tweaking and all that stuff then if nothing else he'll save at least $50.

I would also check out Amazon for prices. Many times you can get phones there cheaper than the ATT stores.

But to answer your questions, no there's nothing on the immediate horizon.

 

[Patranus]

iPhone 5.

 

[GT1999]

LTE + ICS = Buy. Especially if it's a Nexus. Of course you can always see if there's a custom ROM running ICS, but I don't think there is one for the Skyrocket yet (running ICS).

 

[pantsaregood]

Lumia 900 is apparently being announced for AT&T soon.

 

[Red Storm]

Lumia 900 is apparently being announced for AT&T soon.

The 800 hasn't even come stateside yet, are you sure?

 

[EightySix Four]

The 800 hasn't even come stateside yet, are you sure?

Yeah, they may be skipping the 800 stateside. Supposedly Nokia is launching the 900 at their press conference at CES. Windows Phone 7.5, LTE, 1.4ghz, 512mb ram, 16gb storage, and a 4.3 inch screen.

 

[Deeko]

Lumia 900 is apparently being announced for AT&T soon.

This is what I was going to say. Nokia has a big announcement scheduled for next Tuesday at CES, the rumors sites are all pretty sure its an AT&T + Nokia + LTE type of thing.

 

[JeffreyLebowski]

LTE + ICS = Buy. Especially if it's a Nexus. Of course you can always see if there's a custom ROM running ICS, but I don't think there is one for the Skyrocket yet (running ICS).

There are some buggy Roms out there, Nothing I would have a non techincal person use.

Even for the non Skyrocket Galaxy S II there aren't really any great ICS ROMS out.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

This is what I was going to say. Nokia has a big announcement scheduled for next Tuesday at CES, the rumors sites are all pretty sure its an AT&T + Nokia + LTE type of thing.

At&t has a number of dual core LTE phones already and we have no idea how good or bad the Lumia's battery life would be. The SGS2 and Skyrocket both get you bigger, better screens and a much more popular OS.

 

[Deeko]

At&t has a number of dual core LTE phones already and we have no idea how good or bad the Lumia's battery life would be. The SGS2 and Skyrocket both get you bigger, better screens and a much more popular OS.

More popular doesn't necessarily mean better. As far as battery goes, pretty much across the board Windows Phone beats Android in that category, so while the Lumia will undoubtedly have worse battery than an HSPDA equivalent, chances are pretty high it will be better than the Skyrocket.

Anyway, not much point in further debating the merits of a phone that hasn't been announced yet. I'm just saying its probably best to wait and see what CES has to offer.

 

[ilkhan]

Are there even any SGSII exynos ICS ROMs out there? Cyanogen isn't out yet...

 

[Puddle Jumper]

More popular doesn't necessarily mean better. As far as battery goes, pretty much across the board Windows Phone beats Android in that category, so while the Lumia will undoubtedly have worse battery than an HSPDA equivalent, chances are pretty high it will be better than the Skyrocket.

Anyway, not much point in further debating the merits of a phone that hasn't been announced yet. I'm just saying its probably best to wait and see what CES has to offer.

No but more popular means that a given person is far more likely to want Android vs WP7

Actually the Droid Razr beats the Lumia 800 across the board in Anandtech's battery life tests and web browsing on wifi is the only test the Galaxy S2 doesn't beat it in also.

 

[Deeko]

No but more popular means that a given person is far more likely to want Android vs WP7

Actually the Droid Razr beats the Lumia 800 across the board in Anandtech's battery life tests and web browsing on wifi is the only test the Galaxy S2 doesn't beat it in also.

As I recall, the Lumia 800 had some sort of software bug that lowered its battery life, didn't it? I was under the impression Nokia already fixed that.

edit: Also, most battery life tests are "straight-through" tests...how long it can perform a single task for an extended period of time. These aren't terribly indicative of real-life battery performance, where your phone spends a lot of the day in your pocket, and the OS' standby performance comes into play. In the "can I make it through the whole day without charging" test, almost every Android phone I've ever had has failed, whereas all three Windows Phones that I've owned pass.

 

[pantsaregood]

At&t has a number of dual core LTE phones already and we have no idea how good or bad the Lumia's battery life would be. The SGS2 and Skyrocket both get you bigger, better screens and a much more popular OS.

The SGS2's screen and Lumia 900's should be comparable. The Lumia 900 will use a 4.3" (rumored, at least) AMOLED with ClearBlack.

The Lumia 800 has a known battery life issue that prevents it from charging fully. My Titan, despite being huge and marginally more powerful than the Lumia 800, gets great battery life.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

Whenever Wp7 fails at some benchmark it's fans alsyws have some excuse to explain how it is really amazing in reality. Until someone posts tests from a respected site that shows WP7 gets better battery life than the best Android phones I see no reason to take that statement as anything more than wishful thinking.

The SGS2's screen and Lumia 900's should be comparable. The Lumia 900 will use a 4.3" (rumored, at least) AMOLED with ClearBlack.

The Lumia 800 has a known battery life issue that prevents it from charging fully. My Titan, despite being huge and marginally more powerful than the Lumia 800, gets great battery life.

The 800 has a pentile super amoled screen like the original Galaxy S and there is no reason to assume that the 900 will get one of the superior Super AMOLED Plus screens like the GS2 has. Since Samsung manufactures all of these screens they have complete control over what type Nokia gets.

 

[Deeko]

Whenever Wp7 fails at some benchmark it's fans alsyws have some excuse to explain how it is really amazing in reality. Until someone posts tests from a respected site that shows WP7 gets better battery life than the best Android phones I see no reason to take that statement as anything more than wishful thinking.

I've been speaking out against arbitrary synthetic benchmarks vs real world performance for the entire 11 years I've been posting here. It has nothing to do with being a "fan" of a particular platform. For example, SunSpider - like it or not, its just not indicative of real world performance of ANY browser, not just WP7.

Just read the reviews. The text of the reviews, don't just skip to the charts. Pretty much every single one lauds the battery performance of WP7, and thrashes Android. Its just how it is, it has nothing to do with being a "fan".

 

[pantsaregood]

Whenever Wp7 fails at some benchmark it's fans alsyws have some excuse to explain how it is really amazing in reality. Until someone posts tests from a respected site that shows WP7 gets better battery life than the best Android phones I see no reason to take that statement as anything more than wishful thinking.



The 800 has a pentile super amoled screen like the original Galaxy S and there is no reason to assume that the 900 will get one of the superior Super AMOLED Plus screens like the GS2 has. Since Samsung manufactures all of these screens they have complete control over what type Nokia gets.

I have yet to see anyone refer to WP7 as "slow" in any way. Yes, it performs poorly in SunSpider, yet is generally referred to as "snappy" in reviews. That indicates that, to some extent, SunSpider has some bias against Trident.

As for battery life, the Lumia 800 has known battery issues. Other than that, I don't know of anyone who experienced poor battery life on a WP7 device. My HD7, with its crappy TFT LCD and 65nm SoC, managed to make it through the day, and my Titan manages to withstand heavy use.

Reviews from tech sites generally note that WP7 is snappy and offers good battery life.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

I have yet to see anyone refer to WP7 as "slow" in any way. Yes, it performs poorly in SunSpider, yet is generally referred to as "snappy" in reviews. That indicates that, to some extent, SunSpider has some bias against Trident.

As for battery life, the Lumia 800 has known battery issues. Other than that, I don't know of anyone who experienced poor battery life on a WP7 device. My HD7, with its crappy TFT LCD and 65nm SoC, managed to make it through the day, and my Titan manages to withstand heavy use.

Reviews from tech sites generally note that WP7 is snappy and offers good battery life.

Smooth does not mean it's fast.

Also Anandtech just posted their review of the Lumia 710 and the battery life on it is very mediocre.

 

[smartpatrol]

I switched from an HD7 to a Galaxy Nexus. I can honestly say that in SOME ways, WP7 indeed feels faster.

WP7 does an amazing job of tracking your finger. It responds instantly and feels amazingly smooth. Zooming and scrolling pictures/web pages is smoother than on the Nexus. And, although ICS' keyboard is a huge improvement, I'd take WP7's super-responsive keyboard any day.

 

[Deeko]

Smooth does not mean it's fast.

Also Anandtech just posted their review of the Lumia 710 and the battery life on it is very mediocre.

From Engadget's review of the 710, which backs up what I said above:

1,300mAh isn't the amount of juice we'd necessarily recommend for a daily driver, but somehow the Lumia 710 makes it last just long enough. Riding along T-Mobile's HSPA+ 14.4Mbps network, the phone doesn't fall prey to the excessive drain we've seen on the carrier's faster HSPA+ 21 and 42 devices, like the Amaze 4G. Even under moderate to heavy usage, we managed to eke out nearly a full day's worth of productivity on a single charge -- about 17 hours. That's with Twitter set to sync at 15 minute intervals, one push email account, brightness at 50 percent, GPS and WiFi enabled, some light browsing and streaming video consumption -- not bad for a $50 handset. The 710, however, didn't fare so well in our formal battery rundown test, giving up its Li-ion ghost after two hours and 35 minutes.

Are there times where you're going to just sit and play a game for 3 hours on your phone, and a straight-through battery test comes into play? Sure - but the vast majority of the time, how long your phone's battery last is gauged by day to day usage, where the OS' standby performance comes into play, and this is an area where WP7 performs very well.

edit: From TheVerge, with consistent findings:

The battery is slightly smaller than the Lumia 800’s (1300mAh vs. 1450mAh), and likewise I was getting results that were just a hair less than what Vlad reported in his review of the flagship phone. I was consistently getting a full day of moderate use (push email, web browsing, photo and video capture, and the occasional game of Burn the Rope).

Also, in the context of this thread (Lumia 900), the latest rumor I saw said it will sport over 1800 mAh in battery power, for what its worth.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

From Engadget's review of the 710, which backs up what I said above:



Are there times where you're going to just sit and play a game for 3 hours on your phone, and a straight-through battery test comes into play? Sure - but the vast majority of the time, how long your phone's battery last is gauged by day to day usage, where the OS' standby performance comes into play, and this is an area where WP7 performs very well.

edit: From TheVerge, with consistent findings:


Also, in the context of this thread (Lumia 900), the latest rumor I saw said it will sport over 1800 mAh in battery power, for what its worth.

None of their tests are truly objective like Anandtech's. Trying to compare battery life without consistent test conditions is completely pointless.

Using similar conditions to what they described I can easily get more than a day from my Galaxy S2 so I'm still not seeing WP7's amazing battery life.

 

[Deeko]

None of their tests are truly objective like Anandtech's. Trying to compare battery life without consistent test conditions is completely pointless.

Using similar conditions to what they described I can easily get more than a day from my Galaxy S2 so I'm still not seeing WP7's amazing battery life.

You're right, its not the best way to test. Do you have a better way to test realistic battery life? If you have such a method, do send it to the review sites so we can get better numbers. The fact is that its true a straight through, controlled situation battery test is the most objective...but that doesn't make it realistic or indicative of real world performance.

As for your anecdote, well, I've never had a Galaxy SII, but I've had a littany of other Android devices (including the Galaxy S) and the only one that could consistently make it through a whole day of use was the original Droid. In fact, I've owned a few direct comparisons (Samsung Focus / Samsung Vibrant, HTC HD7 / HTC HD2 + Android), and in both situations, the WP7 equivalent gets better battery life.

The vast majority of reviews for WP7 devices praise their battery life. This isn't something I'm making up, I don't know why you find it so difficult to accept.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

You're right, its not the best way to test. Do you have a better way to test realistic battery life? If you have such a method, do send it to the review sites so we can get better numbers. The fact is that its true a straight through, controlled situation battery test is the most objective...but that doesn't make it realistic or indicative of real world performance.

As for your anecdote, well, I've never had a Galaxy SII, but I've had a littany of other Android devices (including the Galaxy S) and the only one that could consistently make it through a whole day of use was the original Droid. In fact, I've owned a few direct comparisons (Samsung Focus / Samsung Vibrant, HTC HD7 / HTC HD2 + Android), and in both situations, the WP7 equivalent gets better battery life.

The vast majority of reviews for WP7 devices praise their battery life. This isn't something I'm making up, I don't know why you find it so difficult to accept.

I'm very satisfied with how Anandtech tests battery life.

Comparing Android devices known for poor battery life to WP7 doesn't really accomplish anything. Besides the HD2 was never an official Android device and the only hardware the Vibrant and Focus have in common is the screen.

The vast majority of WP7 fans always say that it is the fastest, has the best battery life, or the best browser despite the fact that they have no hard evidence to back up their claims and in many cases there are even benchmarks that directly contradict them. Until you can actually prove WP7 has the battery life you claim it does I see no reason to accept it.

It's also worth pointing out that in BrowserMark the 1.4ghz Lumia 710 lost to the 1ghz Nexus S running an old version of Android, on ICS the gap would be even larger. That kind of pokes a hole in the belief that WP7 is better optimized than Android.