Battery life, horrible. Mulitple Issues with Phone, cases suck on this one March 6, 2012

Reviewer:  Erik Okerholm "some normal guy....."  (Austin, TX) -

I couldn't be more disappointed with this phone. I can't make it thru the day at a baseball tournamment or at work without a recharge. Had to order the double size battery from SEIDIO here on Amazon. Cases are horrible on this phone too. Otterbox is to slippery and the grips to the slider are weak plastic. Seidios cases are even worse, the thinner clips break so fast. Seidio's belt clip also broke, so I'm stuck carrying this bad boy around. I actually got this phone for the keyboard, but once I got it and learned to use swype, I never ever use it. The slide out keyboard is pretty good, one of the best around, and gives the phone some decent weight but honestly you won't use it, swype is amazing.

Yes, I've cleaned out all my apps and management my downloads, but battery life on this phone is horrible. The phone has major issues. Screen gets stuck, dropped calls or can't send texts, in covered areas. I have to constantly reboot the phone and/or take out the battery to reset it or unlock the screen. Have had to have Spring reset it twice. Very very disappointed. I loved my blackberry curve in my otterbox. That thing was awesome, but no apps, and sloooooow internet killed the usefulnes of that one. I still use it for my daily alarm.

Not a huge fan of Android OS either. On this phone, difficult to make a call, lots of steps required. Favorites aren't as easy at the blackberry numbers. All I had to do was punch 22 + Call and I could call my wife, 14 was a buddy, etc. That system is so much easier and quicker than all the menu selections. I don't like the integration with Facebook either. I don't need to call those people but they get in the way when you try to type in names, etc. Nice to have pictures from FB but annoying to scroll when trying to make a call.

When this contract is up, I'll be switching to the iPhone. I'm going to wait on the 5.

I've heard great things and promises about the Samsung Galaxy S3 coming out this summer, but now that Sprint has done away with their Premier Program I'm stuck with a phone for 2 years, instead of 12 months. So I'm not going to gamble on that phone. My wife and step son both have iPhones with minimal to zero issues (one is on AT&T and the other on Sprint) so seems the iPhone is the phone to get.

Sorry Samsung, I tried. But this phone was a huge let down.

Any phone is useless with out a good battery and its missing on Epic January 1, 2012

Reviewer:  S. Maganti "NYC"  (New York) -

A 1500mAmp battery for a phone like this is ridiculous. If I was Samsung's boss, I would strangle the designer who came up with that spec....

Battery barely lasts abt 90 mins of browsing and you can clearly see the batter level falling continuously even though you are not using the phone... Will probably never buy a samsung phone again.

at first I thought it was better than sliced bread..... July 10, 2011

Reviewer:  M. C. Stith "frozintime"  (Madbury, NH) -

At first I was superbly impressed. I immediately took it to NYC and everything worked great....4G was awesome, surfed easily, and it did pretty much everything I thought it would. Now, after having it for 9 months it has become very buggy, and I think it started with the update to android froyo about 3 months ago. I used to get great life out of the battery, but now it runs down in 12 hours without even using it unless I turn off all background data. The battery runs down faster without having anything on...so I have wifi or bluetooth on and it actually saves the battery....I am telling the whole truth. I used to get 2 days use out of it...no kidding. So I get a full day still with background data off.

There are so many things these phones can do now that I basically compare it to a netbook or computer...it does it all really, and more. I have an ipad2 that sucks compared to my phone....really now.

Since the update to 2.2 this constantly shuts down, and just locks up like my old computers used to....really really annoying. After the update I was supposed to be able to use hands free bluetooth except the voice recognition truly sucks....its unusable really, at least on my phone. I have a few hundred contacts in my phone, so not sure if that is causing the confusion.

For the most part it does its job, but every now and then it locks up at the wrong time and that is ultimately annoying. Paying 100 bucks a month for a phone, this thing should sizzle in all aspects. Its good, but could be much better.

Emails are great, and surfing is great if close to tower...even in 3G. Also the 4G is not at my home....but I have to travel to use it. I have found 4G soso...not as great as I expect as you have to apparently be in direct line with a tower.

It is very versatile all in all, but there is plenty of room for improvement. I think it was the cream of the crop for a while, now not so much and I think someone dropped the ball on the updates....maybe a new strategy to sell phones? I would give it a 65 or 70 out of 100....when I first got it I would have given it a 90 and given it 4 1/2 stars.

UPDATE 11/26/11...Gingerbread Fixes

The 2.3 update saved this phone. I now have double battery time at least....maybe 3x. No more random shutdowns, everything works. I now can re-recommend this!

Samsung EPIC June 27, 2011

Reviewer:  epic lover 

I have had this phone for 2 months and LOVE IT!!! Having switched from Verizon....I don't look back.
The screen on this phone is to die for, absolutely breathtaking!! Everyone is so jealous!
I do have to charge it everyday, but most smartphone users do.
I bought this phone over the EVO Shift for the qwerty keyboard. I actually rarely use the keyboard and use the virtual one. Big surprise to myself, too!

Issues to be aware of June 21, 2011

Reviewer:  S. L. Clifford  (Idaho USA) -

I recently bought the Epic as both my husband & I switched to Sprint from Verizon because of Sprint's data plan. I wanted a keyboard so it was between the Epic & HTC EVO Shift. The Epic has a bigger screen so that was the deciding factor. I ended up returning the phone ( I got it at Best Buy since they did all the number porting, transfer of contacts, etc) & getting the Shift.
1. The phone cut out on phone calls and screen would blank out. Even though timeout was set to 10 mins. Sometimes you couldn't even get through the unlock screen without it blanking out.
2. Outside the screen was difficult to see even if you were sitting in a car with filtered light.
3. Battery life is an issue. I would make sure I killed running apps after I used them. Unlike a computer where you close the window & the program stops on the phone it doesn't so I would you use the task manager to make sure it was closed. You cannot get an extended life battery for this phone without using a third party and it involves removing the back & replacing it with a new back which is bigger & bulky. The Shift battery can be replaced with an extended life one by just swapping and will charge a battery using the wall charger so you can have multiple batteries.

I don't know if my phone was defective causing the screen issue but the call issue did go away when I switched to the Evo Shift.

Software update makes this phone not worth the wait March 28, 2011

Reviewer:  kcfan "Rio"  (san francisco, CA) -

Ok first off this phone is really great but its a little bulky. My only complaint is the software updates for this phone and how it feels like a toy phone. Its running on 2.1 android and they finally released it to 2.2 after around 6-7 months of the phones release. I returned the phone after testing it for 28 days and heard they will be releasing the evo 3d and samsung nexus S this spring and summer so if you can wait I suggest waiting, both these phones will be 4g and will have a lot more power than this phone and also run on the new android OS 2.3 and might be running the 3.0. I wanted to love this phone but with the lack of software updates and the feel of the cheap plastic I stuck with the evo and will probably upgrade to the new evo 3d this summer. The camera is great and so is the key board but its not enough to keep me.

Best Smartphone Available March 22, 2011

Reviewer:  N. Kramer  (Lincoln, NE) -

I'm the owner of an iphone for work and my previous smart phone was a blackberry curve. Wanted to new smartphone with a pyhsical keyboard, and all the cool bells and whistles of a touch phone. This phone ROCKS! It's everything I could have hoped for. I read a lot of reviews saying that the android phones were hard to get used to; the transition was smooth as a baby's butt. I don't even use my iphone anymore except for calls (which drop cause it's at&t).

Despite what all the bad reviews say I think the battery life is fine. Not as good as the blackberry, but blows the iphone away. Now if your gonna watch movies and play games all day, yes you want to be connected to hard power, but that's the same with any smartphone. The "Swipe" thing is pretty cool, I use it about 50% of the time, and the physical keybord the rest of the time. Sometiems I feel like I need the touch, sometimes the swipe thing is the way to go.

I've had the phone a little over a month now and I still have a "Wow, that's way cool" moment every other day when I discover something new on the phone.

I love the weight of it. A tad heavier than the iphone, but the iphone seems toy-like now when I go back to it. Web browser is awesome, the way you can customize where your apps are on the phone is great.

CONS- The numbers on the phuysical keyboard are too close to the screen when using the keyboard and unless you have small fingers, your going to have trouble getting your fingers on the numbers.

I'm also not crazy about the on/off button being directly across from the volume button. I hit them both at the same time when using 1 hand and it can be annoying.

Last negative, I HATE the mini-usb connector. It's too small and everytime I connect the phone to charge I feel like I'm going to break either the phone or the jack.

Overall though the negatives are minor and I would recomend this phone to anyone. It's worth the money.

Good phone bad battery March 4, 2011

Reviewer:  GreyDX  (Medford, Or United States) -

5 stars for the phone 1 for the battery.
I have nothing bad to say about the phone except the battery. All the functions and apps work well and can be fun, interesting, educational and useful. Well, they can be in the morning at least. If you use these functions you will have a dead phone by afternoon. I now run mine as a really nice "phone" without all of the extras. I have all the apps turned off, the GPS turned off, all the syncs turned off, the display on dim, a static wallpaper set and now I can talk to my wife on the way home from work. The included Samsung Widget "Program Monitor" has become my new best friend. It allows you to monitor and shut down everything extra on the phone and will allow you to continue to make calls into the evening. I did a lot of reading about how to keep the phone going and I think this group of hints helped me most […]
All of which brings us to the question; is the cool Droid system with all of it's cool functions worth having if you have to save them for special occasions to keep your phone functions from dying. I especially liked an app called Latitude, but it's definitely not something you can just use whenever you want to.
If Samsung wants to market all the cool stuff you can do with a phone like this, they should provide the battery capacity to handle it.

If you want a fast phone with a keyboard, this is IT. November 9, 2010

Reviewer:  garrmack 

I bought the Epic with some hesitation. I had read that the battery life was bad and some other stuff. Honestly, I don't even remember what I was hesitant about because this phone is great. Still waiting on the 2.2 update, but its not that big a deal. I had a G1 Dream with CM6 before and I don't feel like I'm missing any critical features. Actually, there are some things on this phone that I like that weren't on CM6 like swype and the lock screen that lets you go straight to texts or missed calls.

As for battery life, I had to charge it constantly when I first got it because I was using it constantly. If you play Angry Birds for 4 hours straight, your battery will last about 4 hours, shocker! However, now that the newness has worn off (and I've beaten Angry Birds) I have no problem getting through the day on one charge.

In short, I like this phone. Its nice size, nice keyboard, nice speed, nice carrier.

Epic & Google- great team! October 31, 2010

Reviewer:  Pete F 

looks great, the slide out keyboard is a great option, beats the heck out of using the touch screen. My first smart phone & right now it's a lot smarter than me. I have a lot to learn. I'm glad we did not choose the Verizon Samsung Galaxy S option. Going Google, across the board on the Epic, has been impressive; default search, maps, gmail, calendar; all good. The set up and activation was no big deal. Don't let it diswade you from buying on-line. Much better deals to be had... and we did a lot of shopping.

Who could ask for more. October 29, 2010

Reviewer:  joeyt1974 "Joey Thompson"  (USA) -

I am very critical when it comes to my phone. I have been using smartphones since the days of the HTC Tytn. I couldn't go back to a regular phone knowing that the world is available for the same monthly fee on a smartphone.

THE EPIC: From taking it out of the box, powering it up for the first time, and marveling at the beautiful screen. You can tell right away that this phone wasn't just thrown together as a shot to get in the 4g market.

PROS: The 4in screen is truly amazing,the colors,clairity,and size all contribute to an enjoyable visual experience.
The 1gig Hummingbird processor is fast as you could want in a phone, even faster than the snapdraggon in the evo, desire, and motorolla phones.
The slide-out keyboard is big and easy to use with your menu,home,back,and search keys on the sides.
The fit and finish has to be mentioned as well. Not a cheaply thrown together phone. the weight, rounded edges, and sturdy slide make this phone feel strong in your hands.
Android flies on this little machine even with 2.1 for the time being.
The 5meg camera seems to take very nice pics and has plenty of options for the enthusiast. It does have a forward facing camera for video chat, but haven't used it yet.

CONS: Still looking for something to complain about. Some say the battery is very bad, but mine has gone 18 hours off the charger with normal use. I did notice on the first day I was playing with it constantly and it ran down in about 6 hours. But with normal use you shouldn't have a problem making it thru the day.

This phone is truly on the same playing field as the evo, iphone 4, but with a sliding keyboard for those who want everything. I would have to say that there are just a handfull of awesome phones out there and the EPIC should be placed in the top 3. In my opinion it has earned it's name!

An Awesome Android Phone September 5, 2010

Reviewer:  Jones  (USA) -

Upgraded from an HTC Hero. The Hero wasn't a bad phone but this a huge step up. Any Android fan that wants a keyboard, this is probably the phone for you. I saw some reviews complain about the software of this phone. Don't listen to those people. This is an Android phone and it's meant to be customized. I replaced the touch wiz junk with the ADW Launcher and Dialer One apps from the marketplace. It literally took under a minute to download and install both apps. And I love the way my phone works now. I split the pros and cons into two section. I felt the screen needed it's own section because there are so many different aspects to it.

S-AMOLED Screen:
*Note, LCDs is a type of display used in most cell phones today
Pros:
- Great contrast ratio, the blacks on it are a true black, and the whites are brighter than any LCD screen out there. You have to see this screen in person and make sure to crank up the brightness setting when you do.
- Has a huge color gamut, that means it can display the purest of colors in the sRGB gamut. For comparison, the iPhone 4's "retina display" can only display 2/3rds of the colors in the sRGB gamut which is less than a 1/5th of the colors that a human retina can see.
- The S-AMOLED screen is completely visible in direct sunlight. Some earlier versions of the AMOLED had trouble in sunlight because AMOLEDs lack a reflective backlight.
- Each individual pixel uses power proportional to it's brightness. This allows the S-AMOLED to use less battery power than a similar sized LCD in most situations. LCDs have to provide the same amount of light for every pixel, even if it's black.

Cons:
- Uses a pentile pixel arrangement, this basically makes black text not look as sharp compared to other phones like the Evo or Droid X even though it has the same resolution as those phones. Text is still very readable.
- AMOLEDs are not as efficient as LCDs when displaying a blank white screen. If you are viewing a web page that is mostly a white(like google) you could be draining more than twice the juice as a similar sized LCD.
- Screens seem to have a blue tint to them. Don't think there's a way to adjust the tint so if you buy this phone you will have to live with it.

All the Other Hardware:
Pros:
- The Hummingbird processor in this phone is extremely fast. Along with Droid X's processor, it's the fastest processors you can get in a phone right now.
- Uses the same processor as the iPhone 4 and iPad. And it's 200-400 Mhz faster than the iPhone 4(Apple underclocks their iPhone's processors to get better battery life). Samsung actually fabricates these processors for Apple.
- This phone has the best GPU(graphics processor) out there. All the 3D benchmarks rank the Samsung Galaxy phones as the fastest.
- Battery life is as good as my old HTC Hero even though the Epic has a huge screen and a faster processor.
- Has a front facing camera for video chat.
- The 5MP rear camera takes good shots, for a cell phone.
- Has a LED flash for night shots.
- And of course, it has a keyboard!

Cons:
- Only 1GB ROM, the rest of the storage used a cruddie class 2 - 16GB micro SD card. Come on Sprint, you charge an extra $50 for this phone and you gut the ROM!
- The front android buttons are capacitive. This means they aren't real buttons, they are actually just symbols printed on the touch screen. Some people are having issues with their responsiveness. Hasn't been a big issue for me.
- Slider mechanism feels too loose for some people. It's the nature of having a sliding keyboard. If this is something that might bother you then try this phone out at the store before you buy.
- GPS isn't working properly on some phones. Sprint is working on the issue and it should get fixed in a month or two.
- 4G and Wifi don't work at the same time. They both use the same antenna.
- Need to pay an extra $10 a month for 4G even if your city doesn't have 4G.

Highly disapointing April 17, 2011

Reviewer:  jennyjo 

I purchased it in January, I was so excited to be able to upgrade and wanted a phone that had a camera with a flash, my sole purpose for picking this phone was the camera I heard was great. Well it was good for about a month,then an update came out and since then its just been horrible, the camera is blurry, the flash is blinding when you rotated the phone the screen doesn't rotate right away sometimes not at all, the text messages now looks like it would be for a 10 year old, bubbly and blue and yellow and seems to be no way to go back to the pre update style. The camera sometimes you press the button and it doesn't work, It is easy to hang up on someone while talking if you are walking around, the end call seems to be the only touch part that works 100% of the time. Sometimes if you touch messages it will go to call log. (this is also since the latest android update) I didn't try everything out with the phone at first, just last night tried to record a friends band at a club and the audio was distorted to the point you cannot stand it, So I went to android forums and found out this is a problem with the audio quality of this phone when its a higher sound level. Guess I will have to start using my old phone to record videos again, and the pictures were better quality also
Please just google search and check around, go to android forums and read what people are saying about this phone before you go and pay $300 and a 2 year agreement before purchasing.

Extremely Nice Phone September 16, 2010

Reviewer:  Skwerl 

I upgraded from a Palm Pre to the Epic 4G, after having been a die-hard Pre user. I've only had the Epic for two days, so it's a bit difficult to not compare the two devices. I'm used to the feel and functionality of the Pre, but as time goes on I will get accustomed to the Epic.

All in all, this is an incredible device. It's very snappy with the 1ghz processor and 512mb of RAM. The only time I had a hangup on it was trying to listen to music and upload photos to Facebook at the same time. Otherwise, everything responds nearly instantaneously.

The build is very high quality, and everything is very smooth. Compared to the Pre, it's a little heavier and a lot bigger. It also has a very flat surface, which is no fault. I'm just used to the slightly curved shape of the Pre. The Super AMOLED screen is a sight to behold. The picture is as sharp and crisp as you could imagine, particularly on a hand-held device. The screen is extremely bright, extremely clear, and highly responsive. The screen is a tad less sensitive then the Pre, so I've had to get used to pressing a little bit harder. Again, nothing bad, just an adjustment I have to adapt to.

The keyboard on this phone is huge, and very solid. I'm used to the tiny keyboard on the Pre, so it has taken me a considerable amount of adjusting. Everything imaginable is on this keyboard (including navigation arrows, which is actually really handy). The keys provide an emphatic click when pressed. The keys are well spaced out, allowing for fewer typing errors. The virtual keyboard is solid, though I haven't used it a whole lot. Swype confused me a little, as I couldn't figure out how to navigate between keys without pressing them. Maybe it'll get better once I've played with it more. For the moment, I don't really understand how Swype works.

I've never used Android prior to this phone, so I'm in the process of getting to know the layout and where everything is. Everything I want to do seems to be there, though it may take a couple extra steps then I'm used to. Overall, the interface is smooth and simple. There are plenty of home pages to add links, shortcuts, widgets, and so forth. The live wallpapers look awesome, particularly the grass one that changes based on the time of day. The app market has boatloads of apps, and the phone comes pre-loaded with Asphalt 5, which is pretty awesome. I've played a little with Qik (thought not the video-conferencing part yet) and it works well. I particularly enjoy the front-facing camera and being able to take self-shots and videos. I've wanted to start up a vlog, mostly for my own entertainment, and now I can actually shoot self-video and be able to see what I'm doing.

I don't live in a 4G area, so I can't comment on the 4G experience. And yes, despite not living in a 4G area, we still pay $10 for the 4G service. Many people have considered this a negative, and I don't completely disagree. On the flip-side, I look at it as the more people using 4G devices in a given area, the more likely they are to get 4G service sooner, rather than later. 4G is still in its infancy, and Sprint has to determine where the most profitable markets lie. If no one buys a 4G phone (either the Epic, or the Evo, currently) in an area, chances are good that Sprint will save them for later when an interest develops.

Overall, this phone rocks. It sports a very solid build; a beautiful, crisp screen; one of the best physical keyboards available; extremely responsive (including a performance monitor that shows what is taking up resources, and lets you close things to save battery/performance); all the apps you could want access to; and a very solid camera with an assortment of photo and video capturing settings to customize plus a front facing camera.

Also I should mention (being that this is a phone, after all), that I rarely ever make phone calls. I literally don't think I've made one yet with it, so I have no idea how the call quality is. If it's like the rest of the device, I would assume it's solid at the very least. I've been a long-time customer of Sprint, and their services have improved greatly over the years. So it's probably safe to go out on a limb and say the call quality is good.

I highly recommend this device if you have Sprint, are looking to switch to Sprint, are looking to tap into 4G, or just want a Smartphone that does nearly everything.

Super AMOLED made me switched September 15, 2010

Reviewer:  D. Keh "Electro-wireless Gadget Lover"  (OC, CA, USA) -

My eye sight is not that great, so a big but well contrast screen is important in my phone seletion. I dumped.the iphone for The EVO for its huge screen, a month later when the Epic showed up, I am so impressed with the AMOLED screen, I switched on the same day it was available, well actually the night before...

The biggest selling point is, of course its screen. The color is crisp and clear, like constantly holding an HD TV in you hand, you can adjust the brightness to the lowest, yet the contrast is still there to make anything on it lively.

The second impressive feature is the keyboard. For people who text a lot, you're in heaven. The keys are spaced so it is not easy to type two keys at the same time, good for clumsy fat fingers like mine.

Number 3 reason? The speed. The cpu really flies while browsing or running apps.

Belos are some complaints my friend and I have:
Android 2.1 still have the battery life problem, but 2.2 should come soon, I hope, to fix it.
WiFi seems not too stable so I get disconnected sometimes, but the 3G(no 4G yet in my area) is fast enough so it is hardly noticeable.

Phone cannot be operated while charging using the AC adapter, meaning no fun while battery is low, because USB charging is slow.
Finally, voice dialing not working with my bluetooth headset, while EVO works perfectly, not good if I need to call someone while driving, and Samsung never seems to be able to do thus right base on my experience with their phones.

9/17/10 -I used to give it 5 stars, but am downgrading it to 3 star: too nany little problems. Samsung tends to rush product out so it can be no. 1 of something. The release it first, fix it or maybe not later attitude really spoiled a nice device like the Epic. The biggest stupid problem I have is the voice search/dialing. If the bluetooth headset is on, it will not work, now that is something I can't figure out for the life of me. Even the cheapest Sony phone can do voice whatever easily. If not for the screen and keyboard, I will switch back to EVO, at least EVO has no problem with it.

On a side note, if you prefer touch screen keyboard and slimmer phone, EVO is still the NO. 1 choice. Now, if HTC is going for LED...

9/21/10- Just updated to the new DI07 kernel; don't know if something else I did or what, battery life improves tremendously, I had it on and check emails from time to time, make calls at least 1.5 hours a day, from a 97% full charge (the blue led is not that accurate) 4 AM in the morning to 10 PM, I still have 70% battery juice left, quite impressive that deserves 1 star upgrade. If they fix the voice dialing problem, I will definitely give it back the 5 stars!!!

Too heavy, Short Battery Life, Horrible Software Updates, It's a Conspiracy! April 4, 2011

Reviewer:  Meredith Sivick "Meredith" 

My husband and I have had our phones for about 3 months now and I can't find anything I like about it. Here is my short list of things that I hate:

1. You download software updates and suddenly LOUD tranquil music starts playing continuously and there is no way to stop it. Unbelievable. It's like being trapped in an elevator forever! Seriously, it woke me up at 3am. The phone was on the charger (that's where it stays 99% of the time) and this lovely music was playing - no way to turn it off. So, the phone stays off now. Maybe it's a Sprint conspiracy so you'll pay the huge monthly bill but not use the air ways.

2. Short, short, really short battery life. During an emergency, where was my phone? Dead! It only last 20 hours if I DON'T use it or have any of the cool apps running. So, I bought the extended life battery. Now it's huge and heavy. Lucky me, now it lasts about 36 hours if I DON'T actually use it for anything and turn almost all of the apps off.

3. Too touchy! I can't stand how you have to swipe to answer a call. No more one handed operation like my "old" phone. You must have two hands for this phone at all times (of course I bought the blue-tooth ear piece). If I finally get to swipe and answer the phone, when I hold it up to my ear my face hits the "End Call" button. Unbelievable. Did they do any human testing for this thing? I must be an alien because half the time the phone doesn't even know I'm touching it!

4. My hand is not a rectangle. Well, sort of, right? This thing gets a big fat zero for any type of ergonomics. This thing squirts out of my hand like a wet bar of soap all the time! So, I bought the body glove super grip gel cover. But wait! Now that I bought the bulky extended battery the cover no longer fits.

5. Lots of cool apps but...It is so much fun to play one of those cool apps, for five minutes! Oh yes, and all the while that tranquil music is playing. What is this, some sort of brain washing? Maybe it's a government conspiracy to try to keep us all calm?

I can't wait to get a real cell phone.

Not worth it at all March 15, 2011

Reviewer:  R. D. Christian "Bushman"  (Boise, Idaho) -

Okay, to me a cell phone is a tool, a tool that must work, at least most of the time. My old Blackberry went three years without a hitch. Same with the one before that. I thought I would try the Epic 4g with Sprint. Nothing but troubles. First, not only does it not come with synchronization software, the only such software that is available costs $40.00 and will never work if you even think about using any of Google's stuff. Sure, you can synch with Google Calendar. Have you actually tried that? It's a toy, not a tool. It is at best 40% reliable, especially with Macs. Second, poor coverage. My Blackberry with the same plan got way better coverage. Third, three months into using it, it just stopped charging. It would say it was charging. It would even say it was all the way charged sometimes. But, then it would almost immediately die. Took it in, and they said it was the battery. The new battery worked for an afternoon. Said it was fully charged, and then started doing the same thing. Then there's all those wonderful "updates," ala Microsoft. The updates usually just screw things up, just like Microsoft. I paid $400 for this? I will go back to Blackberry, even if they don't have all those bells and whistles. If Sprint would get its act together and provide an I-phone, I would use that. At least Blackberries actually function. If you want a fun toy, for lots of money, that works for a short time, buy an Epic, or any other Android. If you want something you can count on, buy something else.

Fine for home, horrible for work September 9, 2010

Reviewer:  User "User"  (USA) -

We paid nothing for these phones - Sprint has actually given us 10 units for free just to try them out to see if we want to upgrade our Bold and Tour Blackberries. We have the best support from Sprint possible, they send techs to us if we have a problem :) And still, I can only give it a 3 star rating. Most likely, my review may look strange to you if you a home user, but we get the most modern equipment from Sprint for free all the time to test and I can only say "works fine, very reliable, users like it" or "it is POS, users don't like it". Well, our users didn't like it, but you still may like it even if you pay $200 for this device and then pay for 2-year contract.
Pros are obvious - I will not talk about those, read 5 star reviews about pretty screen, 5-meg camera and fast internet. But I had a chance to setup these for Blackberry users (who don't want to pay for iPhones and want to get something similar from the company for free, and want to use email for work and depend on that) and had all of them returned in a week, even after we fixed some of the bugs.
4 serious cons:
1. Hardware keyboard doesn't have a spell-check (you may be fine with that :). It has some basic check to fix the most obvious typos, but it works only for the most simple things; we had to run a test to find a single instance of it really working. If you need spell-check, like our users, Google for "[MOD] HTC_IME" It enables HTC like spell-check when you create emails using hard keyboard and works really well. Problem: we don't know if the software is OK to use for a corporate. Was the code stolen from HTC? My users want to know and I can't answer that question.
2. Android email client loses connection with our Exchange 2007 server 2-3 times a day (you may be fine with that :). You have to manually reconnect to the server to get the connection back, but you need to know, that there is no connection. "Hey, no emails for 40 min... Let's check... Sure, here we go again..." Sync is not working right sometimes, so some emails just don't make it and nowhere to be found. We have HTC Evos, all setup the same way, and those are rock solid. And no, it is not a bad data service - we have a dedicated Sprint antenna on the roof of our buiding and there are 6 bars even in the basement. Our Sprint rep is aware of the situation and Sprint knows, that Samsung phones have issues with Android email client when using Exchange. The only fix they have suggested to us is to use TouchDown client. We tried that and it is working perfectly fine. Problem: that's a $20 program
3. It doesn't work in Europe, it is not an International device - no GSM here (you may be fine with that :)
4. Expected by many (you may be fine with that as well, plus some people just hate those boring Blackberries that hold charge for 5 days :) - battery life is much worse than on Evo phones (my idea was that it is very hard to beat, but Epic did it). After talking to many people and using Evo myself for a week, I can say that HTC Evo has about 30-35% better battery life that Epic. I have yet to see 24 hrs of use with Epic (GPS, 4G, Bluetooth etc disabled) - Evo phones can do that easely with the same settings after the latest update.
We don't have 4G here yet, but I can't see our users enabling it - they depend on their email working and the battery life is already pathetic.
The phone may be just fine for an average user, but if you need a more reliable service, try Evo first (also not an ideal choice) or stay with your Blackberry (that's what we will do for now most likely). For now, all the returned Epic phones are taken home by users for their children. We were told that they watch YouTube and play "Talking Tom cat" on the phones and are very happy with everything :)
Did I keep my phone? Yes, but only because Internet is so much faster even on 3G on Epic than on BB, and because we are out of Evo phones at the moment. 30% of battery life is too much for me to pay for a hard keybord on Epic that Evo doesn't have. But as soon as we get some extra ones the next month, I'm switching back to Evo.

good but with issues October 18, 2010

Reviewer:  chris roberts  (Orlando, Florida) -

I've had my Epic for a about a month. It's pretty awesome but has a few major annoyances.

The screen looks amazing.

I had 2 blackberries before I got this phone. I was worried I would miss the keyboard. I quickly adapted to Swype/touchscreen keyboard. I do still have issues moving around in text I already typed though. Surprisingly I very rarely have to use the hard keyboard on this.

The three main issues I have with this phone are:

1. The screen orientation, when I take a picture straight up and down not sideways and then try to upload it to facebook, there is no way to rotate it 90 degrees to be the correct orientation. You can edit the picture using the gallery and rotate it save it and then when you try to upload it to facebook it is back in the same wrong orientation. So the way around it is to just always take your pictures with the phone sideways.

2. when I reply to work emails the recipient, who is using Eudora email on their computer, just gets a bunch of encoded characters no readable text. Most people won't encounter this but I also saw it when I replied to a facebook mail that bounced back to me with a bunch of strange encoding that apparently I had written.

3. The battery burns quick if you use the phone much, especially if you are in an area where there isn't good signal. I walk around different buildings a lot for work and I've had to start carrying my charger with me and plugging it in whatever room I'm in, which is really annoying.

This phone really is awesome, a couple of my apps don't work as expected, specifically the built in facebook and yelp ones. The yelp one crashes often which is sad, I think it has to do with the GPS.

I really love being able to upload pictures to facebook and twitter directly from the camera or gallery menu. I love having the GPS and wifi built in.

My favorite apps are:
the amazon wish list - being able to add items I find at stores right to my amazon wish list is almost life changing.
pandora - lots of great music, most anywhere, anytime
easytether - use your phone as a wireless modem! wow
imdb - movie info anytime!
yelp - I use this many times a day, very useful

Great screen. Too short battery. Lots of signal issues. April 13, 2011

Reviewer:  John Smith  (Virginia) -

Some background:
I switched from iPhone 3GS (AT&T) to Epic 4G (Sprint). Prior to the iPhone I had an AT&T Tilt and Samsung Blackjack (AT&T).

I was reluctant to order this phone. I was quite happy with the iPhone but I was tired of the locked-down approach that Apple has. So this was my "first" Android phone and I definitely had very high expectations from it.

Both Epic 4G and Sprint disappointed me to the extent that I am going back to AT&T with an Atrix 4G.

Pros:
1. Crisp high resolution screen. It is comparable to iPhone 4.
2. Great integration with Samsung TV/Blu-ray (if you have them).
3. Haptic feedback on the screen is great. Makes it feel more interactive.
4. Overall voice quality is good - except for the speakerphone (see below).
5. I recorded some 720p videos and I was impressed with the result. The cameras on this phone are great.

Cons:
1. I cannot stress this enough: Battery! Battery! BATTERY! It lasts for less than 4 hours under normal use. By "normal" I don't mean playing YouTube videos constantly. I mean just browsing the web, using Facebook, and setting email to check for every 15 minutes. Under heavy use (e.g. live video stream), the battery wouldn't last for more than an hour. You have to keep charging it whenever you can or you'll have nothing but a brick in your pocket once the battery is dead unless you have a spare one fully charged and ready.
2. Battery recharges is very slow!!! I mean extremely slow!! You have to keep it plugged in all night to get it to fully charge. And no, I am not plugging it to a computer's USB port. I am using Samsung supplied wall adapter.
3. 4g signal is spotty even if you live in the downtown area where Sprint advertises full 4g coverage. The 4g signal keeps going to sleep (showing Zzz). When it does go to sleep, it will NOT wake up even if you try to use the Internet. You have to actually disable and then enable 4G to wake it up. And then it will go back to sleep within minutes even while you're using data. Completely useless. Not sure if this is a device issue or something with Sprint 4G services. But it is not good.
4. Speakerphone on this phone does not perform well in slightly noisy environments. It has to be completely dead silence for you to be able to use speaker phone or you'll be constantly repeating to the person on the other line. When the speaker phone is turned off, the call quality is good.