I took the Samsung Captivate out on date last night and left the iPhone 4 at home. I admit that in these early days of my experiment , I’ve been hedging my bet, lugging around both my iPhone 4 and the Captivate. Last night was the first night that I went out on a limb and gave the Captivate the entirety of my attention.
I was accompanied by a friend and long-time Droid user, so I had backup if anything went wrong. After a couple hours, and a couple soda pops, my friend had the Captivate prettied up on all kinds of interesting new apps and settings. I was especially impressed with Facebook’s most recent revamp of its Android app, which in my humble opinion goes far beyond Facebook for the iPhone.
About halfway through the night I had to admit that while the iPhone 4’s screen is beautiful, the Captivate has an altogether different kind of aesthetic. (Isn’t this always the way an eye begins to wander?) While the AMOLED may not be as detailed as Apple’s retina display, the colors on the AMOLED are, to use Samsung’s lexicon, “vibrant” and something to “behold.”
Last night was a turning point for Android and me. The Captivate and I got know one another a lot better and it was a pleasure. We got my Exchange account up and running (simple). We looked into one another’s eyes (what a beautiful display). We laughed. We cried. We Shazamed, and all while my iPhone 4 sat sulking at home. Did I feel guilty? Not in the slightest.
When the Captivate finally passed out at the bar after a long night (the battery did well considering we were up until the wee hours), I was left to my thoughts, which turned to not only the Captivate’s many exciting qualities but also its flaws. Here’s what was going through my head as the jukebox crooned some old George Jones:
“Placing a cursor on that thing is maddening. There’s no way to drag and drop it into the text. My iPhone does that so well.”
“It really sucks that AT&T has gone and limited the Captivate from downloading apps from places other than the Android Market. They’ve also blocked certain apps (i.e. Easy Tether) that are available to Android users on Verizon Wireless.”
“Oh that screen, that screen, that screen.”
“I really like all the customization apps on the Captivate. What if I were to jailbreak my iPhone 4?”
“Too bad there’s not a flash on the Captivate’s camera, and the lack of high-end photo apps for Android is a definite bummer. Still it takes great pictures.”
“The browsing experience on the Captivate, especially Dolphin HD, is really, really nice.”
“Samsung has outdone itself with this UI but where/when does the Captivate get Froyo?”
It was a night I’ll always remember as the night I gave at least a part of my heart to Android. As I plugged the Captivate in next to the iPhone 4, which at the moment is all snug in an OtterBox Defender case, I couldn’t help but admit that something had changed forever between me and my iPhone.
Check the video below for a look at how the Captivate reacts to being held. It brought a tear to my eye to see how much it reminded me of my dearest iPhone 4 (the bars are a little hard to see but they’re there in the upper right hand corner of the device).
