The Samsung Captivate Glide, released last November, is a powerful 4G smartphone for those who need a physical keyboard. Let’s discuss how the Captivate Glide performs.
Design
First, let’s take a look around the Glide. On the front, we have a front facing 1.3 MP camera and four buttons for Android shortcuts. On the right side, we have a headphone jack and a mini USB port. On the left side, a volume rocker resides. On the back, we have a 8 MP camera (More on that soon) and a flash. Although the back cover is made of textured plastic, it is unfortunately still slippery.
In the hand, the Glide feels well built and solid. It has a pleasant weight.
Hardware
The Glide has a Super AMOLED screen with a resolution of 400 X 800 pixels. All that techie gibberish basically translates to: “It’s a beautiful screen.” It is not the best screen available, but it should serve most users’ purposes quite well. The blacks are deep, and the colors are very bright.
And now for the main attraction of the Glide, the keyboard. Although I personally wish the keys were raised or had a bit more travel, the keyboard is quite comfortable to use. The keys are well spaced and large, keeping my typing errors to a minimum. Another plus is the four android buttons on the keyboard. The menu, home, search, and return buttons are quite handy when you have already have the keyboard extended.
Finally, let’s talk about the camera. It takes beautiful, crisp, eight megapixel shots. For things that stay still such as flowers or landscapes, this camera takes very nice pictures. The caveat? It has a long shutter lag. For instance, taking pictures of my cat was not very successful. I focused the picture, but by the time the picture was actually taken, my cat had already moved out of focus. My energetic cat is difficult to photograph in the first place, but the shutter lag compounded the problem.
Performance and Software
The Captivate Glide is one snappy, little phone. Its dual core 1GHz Tegra 2 processor keeps things humming along smoothly. I did not encountered any lags to speak of.
The Glide currently runs the Android operating system Gingerbread. Gingerbread is a recent operating system, but the latest version, Ice Cream Sandwich, was just released. Although everyone likes to have the latest-and-greatest version of the Android operating system, I would not let the current lack of Ice Cream Sandwich stop you from getting this phone.
The Glide comes with AT&T’s 4G capabilities. However, 4G is not available where I live, so I couldn’t test the data speeds.
Call Quality
Talking on this phone is a pleasant experience. The sound quality is quite clear and distinct for both parties.
Battery Life
During my daily routine of checking e-mail, Twitter, making a call or two, surfing the web, and playing Fruit Ninja, this Captivate’s battery lasted over a day. Captivate Glide battery life seems to be on par with or exceed similar smartphone battery performance.
Conclusion
If you are looking for a AT&T smartphone that has a comfortable keyboard, snappy performance, and 4G data, the Samsung Captivate Glide is an excellent choice. I recommend it!
Product Info
| MSRP: | $150 on contract from Sprint |
| Manufacturer: | Samsung |
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