Back in June, I switched from a first-gen Motorola Q to a non Windows Mobile phone, a Samsung SCH-u740. I’m still using the u740, and have some thoughts about how it stacks up to my previous phone.
Overall, it’s a bit of a mixed review for me.
Things that are much better about the u740:
Unlimited Mobile Web w/ VCast – Instead of paying $40 a month for unlimited data, I get unlimited Mobile Web by paying $15 a month for VCast. My phone data use centers mostly around checking email and reading RSS feeds. The mobile clients for both Live Hotmail and Gmail are very usable. I recently switched form Newsgator to Google Reader, and while I used to read feeds all the time with Newsgator’s mobile reader, the mobile version of Google Reader is painful enough to use that I hardly ever open it up. Regardless, Mobile Web is more than capable of allowing me to consume information (aka waste time) when I have a spare minute, and offset some other time that I would’ve spent staring at a regular computer.
Fast Application Startup – When you hit the camera button, the time to ready is very speedy compared with Windows Mobile.
Things that I miss about the Motorola Q and WinMo in general:
Pocket IE – As much as I cursed the partial compatibility of Pocket IE, it was leaps and bounds above the browser in Mobile Web.
QVGA Screen – Simply put, more pixels means more data on the screen, period.
Open platform – I like to tinker, and being able to try different applications, or even write some code every once and a while is nice. No such luck with the u740
Summary
If not for the difference in data costs between the two, I would probably be back on Windows Mobile already. I know Windows Mobile data users probably actually use considerably more data than Mobile Web users, so I get the reasoning behind the price differential, but it’s too big of a monthly hit for me to justify it right now.
What I’d really like to see is a Windows Mobile 6 device in the same form-factor as the u740, and then if Verizon could cut their data plan back to $20 to $25 a month, I’d probably be sold.
One Man Shouting 