Got my Sprint Samsung Instinct Phone!

I walked out of the store a happy customer, only paying $129. Sites like Gizmodo and Engadget are calling this an iPhone killer/competitor. Honestly, and I love my new phone, no. Let's face it, the iPhone is in a class of its own. Because the iPhone will seamlessly integrate with iCal, Address book, iTunes, etc, in my opinion it will always be slightly above the rest. That and the developer community writing great apps for the iPhone. Even if the functionality of the iPhone is more limited than the rest (hypothetically) the fact that it integrates with your operating system is key. Something, at least to my knowledge, the Instinct does not do well for us Mac users.

So as great as the iPhone is and all, it's not great enough to make me switch carriers. I've been with Sprint for 8 or 9 years, have the family plan, talk to my family for free, etc. Not going to switch all of that for an iPhone.

Things I really like

The GPS Navigation - It's super snappy. The phone pays for itself in this one feature. We were going to buy a navigation system but we don't need to now. It has all of the features you'd find in a Garmin or Tom Tom. Not only does it navigate, but you can find Food/Coffee, Hotels, Gas Stations (and filter by price), WiFi spots (filter by free/pay) and more.

The Web & Email - I've heard that the web was the weakest part of this phone but I'd have to disagree. Maybe that's because I'm coming from the perspective as a former Treo user, who knows. The web works perfectly; it's fast loading, multiple views and zooms, I love it. Same with email, I have 2 of my email address plugged into the Instinct and it works perfectly.

TV - Wow. That's all I'm going to say. Well I will say that you have a ton of channels including live news channels like CNN at your fingertips. It loads fast, great picture. Wow.

Keyboard - The keyboard is awesome. Gone are the days of my tiny Treo buttons. The keys take some getting used to though. The phone gives off a small vibrate to confirm each key press. It's a handy feature but I wonder what that does to the battery life.

Things I don't like

1.) I don't like the fact that the software they send with the phone is for PC only. Not sure if that's meant to be some sort of jab or what.

2.) After using the camera I'm not sure it's THAT much better than my Treo camera. It's higher res but that just means more pixels of the same fuzzy pic. We'll see I still need to test this more.

3.) I'd like to see some more apps. If I'm correct the platform was built by Samsung/Sprint using Java so I'd expect to see some better apps?

Helpful Links

• Gizmodo covers Instinct Phone
• Gizmodo picture gallery
• Cnet video review
• Sprint's marketing site for the Instinct
• Specs on Mobiledia.com