This is the Droid Charge . . . nothing you haven't seen before

[Bateluer]

http://www.droid-life.com/2011/04/2...able-april-28-for-299-on-contract/#more-31233

The DROID Charge is designed with Samsung’s 4.3-inch Super AMOLED™ Plus display, setting a new touchscreen standard for brightness, clarity and outdoor visibility. The DROID Charge is equipped with both a rear-facing 8-megapixel camera with LED flash and front-facing 1.3-megapixel camera for both stills and video chatting. The smartphone’s 1 GHz application processor and HTML 5 Web browser maximizes high-speed 4G LTE connectivity for faster downloads and graphics processing

So, basically a Galaxy S with an LTE radio.
And at 299 with 2yr contract, its not cheap.

 

[Fire&Blood]

Droid Charge, better name would have Droid Overcharge? Or Droid $300, this is madness!

They probably wanna get rid of the hummingbird pile to make room for new ones. Fail price/phone though there must be suckers willing to pay that much for LTE.

 

[anxi80]

Yeah *maybe* $300 for stock Android. But $300 for TouchWiz with old tech + LTE? Yeah good luck with that VZW/Samsung.

 

[Kabob]

With that processor that's a ridiculously overpriced device.

 

[alent1234]

is it me or has verizon completely screwed up the Droid brand name? it was nice when the first and second came out but now with constant droid phones being released it's like the android phone of the month deal.

 

[s44]

Heh, a hate thread. Figures.

Overpriced, but by far the best smartphone screen ever. SAMOLED+ = no more pentile.

 

[Fire&Blood]

What's there to love about it? Who's actually willing to lock into a 2yr contract over a SAMOLED+ display? If this was the only SAMOLED+, LTE dual core phone (but it's not), I could kinda rationalize the pricing.

But not with the SGS2 around the corner and not with these 2010 specs, not worth $300. I'm curious what the unsubsidized price is, maybe buying it outright would make more sense.

The poor value to begin with will only get worse 6 months from now. Current dual cores phones will retain their value over time much better than this and the other LTE bait.

 

[boomhower]

Heh, a hate thread. Figures.

Overpriced, but by far the best smartphone screen ever. SAMOLED+ = no more pentile.

The screen isn't worth the price even as nice as it is. With all the dual cores coming out and higher speed single cores a 1ghz chip just doesn't cut it anymore, especially at $300. That's just nuts.

 

[Anubis]

Heh, a hate thread. Figures.

Overpriced, but by far the best smartphone screen ever. SAMOLED+ = no more pentile.

im missing it, the screen on my OG droid looks fine for the amount of time i spend looking at it

other then large res and larger size what am i missing that is so great about this

 

[stag3]

yea it looks more and more like i'm going with a thunderbolt as the bionic has been delayed til q3 and the charge being ~300 w/ 2 yr contract LOL

just need amazon to give the 150 price again and i'm set

 

[s44]

But not with the SGS2 around the corner

SGS2 is right around the corner... on GSM carriers. But the delay hijinks we've seen on the Thunderbolt, Charge, and Bionic are just a taste of what anyone wanting LTE can expect.

No LTE SGS2 has even been rumored, much less announced, much less shown in public. In fact, not a single LTE dual-core has been announced besides the indefinitely delayed Bionic. Remember, LTE requires a *second* radio *and* a SIM, which means a total redesign, not just a simple adaptation of the HSPA designs we've seen from HTC (Pyramid/Sensation), LG (2x/G2x), and Samsung (SGS2). I predict it'll be six months before we see a non-Bionic dualcore LTE. Heck, it might be six months before we see the Bionic.

other then large res and larger size what am i missing

LTE (unlimited)

 

[UNCjigga]

I think the reason for the high upfront price is that mobile hotspot is included for free...I'm not 100% sure about that though...

Also, don't hold your breath for dual-core, 1.2ghz+ LTE phones--you probably won't see many of them until next-gen 28nm and 32nm Cortex A9 CPUs are widely available...

 

[MrX8503]

is it me or has verizon completely screwed up the Droid brand name? it was nice when the first and second came out but now with constant droid phones being released it's like the android phone of the month deal.

It's not you, Moto did screw up the Droid brand royally. It was such a successful campaign and now it sucks. Moto should have kept two versions of Droid, Droid and DroidX. The successors to both arent new phones at all.

Moto had a chance to create a Droid brand that could rival the iPhone, but they messed up and now we got all these random Moto Droid phones that has no identity.

 

[Fire&Blood]

SGS2 is right around the corner... on GSM carriers. But the delay hijinks we've seen on the Thunderbolt, Charge, and Bionic are just a taste of what anyone wanting LTE can expect.

I am guessing we agree that the phone lacks the appeal of a HTC Sensation or the SGS2 to justify skipping these GSM phones and instead signing a brand new contract for it. It may be an option for those who are headed to Verizon for other reasons or renewing with them but it still doesn't improve the value of the phone. The cost of being an early LTE adopter is too high IMO.

I think the reason for the high upfront price is that mobile hotspot is included for free...I'm not 100% sure about that though...

Sounds to good to be true. Verizon charges $20 monthly for tethering, $480 over a 2yr contract. I doubt the cost would be reduced to a mere $100 "add on" at signing that pushes the price to $300.

Also, don't hold your breath for dual-core, 1.2ghz+ LTE phones--you probably won't see many of them until next-gen 28nm and 32nm Cortex A9 CPUs are widely available...

I agree, it will be a while before they arrive. LTE, just like Wimax is a factor in battery drain and the die shrink could help offset the power drain and who knows, by the time these new phones roll out they may feature more efficient displays.

Network speeds are by far the most advanced aspect of today's smart phones ability. I'm not a fan of the marketing hype that pushes for DSL like speeds but with a fraction of the monthly bandwidth allowance. T-Mobile recently upped their HSPA+ to 42 Mbps in Las Vegas and announced a roll out in 10 other cities.

My SD card's writing speed maxes out ~4.5MBps, it would be the bottleneck if I were to actually download file to the SD card at those speeds though these advertised speeds are hard/impossible to reach.

I tested 4 different phones both on the T-Mobile network ~4Mbps and my ~10Mbps wifi.
Page loading times are about the same despite double speed on the wifi network, phone's hardware bottlenecks prevent the phone from taking advantage of higher speeds. I guess my point is that these network speeds are overrated and shouldn't be a reason to buy a service until the hardware catches up is and able to take advantage of them...

 

[Bateluer]

Heh, a hate thread. Figures.

Overpriced, but by far the best smartphone screen ever. SAMOLED+ = no more pentile.

How is this a hate thread? I pointed out that its expensive and that its essentially the same hardware from last year that deputed with the Galaxy S derivatives. For all the flak HTC gets for rehashing the same Qualcomm hardware over and over, there doesn't seem to be anything against Samsung for doing the same thing with their Hummingbird design.

And I don't see the hubbub about SAMOLED+ screens. Even when side by side with my old Droid 1, it was only noticeably better in bright day light. Against the SLCD in my Thunderbolt, I couldn't tell the difference at all, from a visual perspective anyway.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

How is this a hate thread? I pointed out that its expensive and that its essentially the same hardware from last year that deputed with the Galaxy S derivatives. For all the flak HTC gets for rehashing the same Qualcomm hardware over and over, there doesn't seem to be anything against Samsung for doing the same thing with their Hummingbird design.

And I don't see the hubbub about SAMOLED+ screens. Even when side by side with my old Droid 1, it was only noticeably better in bright day light. Against the SLCD in my Thunderbolt, I couldn't tell the difference at all, from a visual perspective anyway.

First off you haven't seen a SAMOLED+ phone before, this is the first one.

IMO the difference between SAMOLED and the crappy screens everyone else but Apple uses is like night and day. After owning the Captivate my first reaction when seeing the Inspire was how awful it's screen was in comparison.

 

[Bateluer]

First off you haven't seen a SAMOLED+ phone before, this is the first one.

IMO the difference between SAMOLED and the crappy screens everyone else but Apple uses is like night and day. After owning the Captivate my first reaction when seeing the Inspire was how awful it's screen was in comparison.

Ok, haven't seen a Plus version yet. But I've seen the SAMOLED screens on Captivates and Fascinates. Nice screens, but you two claim them to be the only feature worth making a purchasing decision on. Side by Side, I couldn't discern the difference between my TB and a Fascinate at the VZW Store, or a friends Vibrant.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

Ok, haven't seen a Plus version yet. But I've seen the SAMOLED screens on Captivates and Fascinates. Nice screens, but you two claim them to be the only feature worth making a purchasing decision on. Side by Side, I couldn't discern the difference between my TB and a Fascinate at the VZW Store, or a friends Vibrant.

I'm surprised you couldn't tell them apart side by side, I could easily point out a Galaxy S phones from a distance solely by the screen.

For me screen quality is absolutely worth basing a purchasing decision on, when I was looking for a new laptop I basically ruled out 95% of laptops because their screens were unacceptably poor. Likewise I'm only interested in phones with extremely good screens.

 

[Bateluer]

I'm surprised you couldn't tell them apart side by side, I could easily point out a Galaxy S phones from a distance solely by the screen.

For me screen quality is absolutely worth basing a purchasing decision on, when I was looking for a new laptop I basically ruled out 95% of laptops because their screens were unacceptably poor. Likewise I'm only interested in phones with extremely good screens.

Your choice. This thread was basically about how the 300 dollar Droid Charge is basically a Galaxy S with an extra .3in on the screen and an LTE radio.

Underwhelming, IMO.

 

[stag3]

oh wow just ordered my thunderbolt finally, it's 129.99 right now on amazon wireless
couldn't pass that up

 

[quakefiend420]

oh wow just ordered my thunderbolt finally, it's 129.99 right now on amazon wireless
couldn't pass that up

how did you get it for 129? shows up as 200 for me

 

[stag3]

no idea, it was already in my cart from before , yesterday it was 199.99
today when i logged in it showed 129.99

here's a screenshot, i just opened up IE which hasn't been on amazon yet and it still shows up 129.99

http://img251.imageshack.us/i/thunderboltv.jpg/

 

[stag3]

here you go

http://www.gottabemobile.com/2011/04/21/htc-thunderbolt-to-drop-to-130-at-amazon/

 

[UNCjigga]

Looks like I was right about Mobile Hotspot being included...for a limited time only...

 

[Anubis]

LTE (unlimited)

id like to thank you for 100% not answering my question