Sprint’s Samsung Instinct is $129, on sale now
Yeah, you read that one correctly. The Grocery Outlet of the cellular world, Sprint, has finally come out with the Samsung Instinct at the low price of $129 on a 2-year contract after a $100 mail in rebate. This is $70 less than the initial price of $199, which was announced only a little over a week ago. iPhone 3G ripple effect, anyone? Regardless of the reason, this is certainly good news for consumers hoping to grab a touchscreen device compatible with Sprint’s network. We’ll refrain from passing judgement on the handset until we get our hands on one, but $129 for an EV-DO Rev. A, GPS, A2DP, and SprintTV-equipped device ain’t bad at all.
http://www.instinctthephone.com/?id12=UHP_Masthead_062008_instinctthephone
This is from the Sprint Site
Wow. So much fanboyism. Having this phone shows that I am too cheap to use AT&T????
What a stupid comment.
Not only am I saving money, I get bett coverage in my area, and while sprint’s customer service= teh suck, I have found you can get what you need done if you will just hang up on idiots and call back. You will eventually get someone who knows what is going on.
Being on Sprint does not say that I am too cheap for AT&T it says that I am smart enough not to pay their highway robbery prices and am willing to put up with a bit of bs along the way.
I played with one at the local store today and it was much better then I expected. The web surfing was reasonably good and over all the phone worked well. It will cost me a lot more to go iPhone, so I am not sure what to do. As a phone goes I can not imagine needing more in a phone, but if I skip the iPhone I may be kicking myself in six months.
One thing I did not try at the store was youtube, has anyone tried it?
do you think sprint/samsung will be constantly updating the software to improve your ownership experience over the two-year contract?
didn’t think so…..
this is a joke. everything is an iphone killer. yet, iphone has sold 6 million, and there will be lines out the door on july 11. samsung wishes it could have “dead” phones that sell like that….
do you guys live in the woods. im in manhattan and this bad boy was gone.
I got one of these on Thur. night and I have to admit it’s a pretty nice phone. Has some great features and the data network is very fast.
Also I have an iphone for sale.
I had a chance to see the instinct today. Very disappointing. Goofy browser. The tilt scrolling is totally wrong, you have to tilt the screen away from your field of vision to get it to work. The Sprint store at 17th and Market here in Philly had only one of these set up, and that was in a half-assed bracket/charger rig. I was very excited about this phone, but the software is very disappointing. Typing on the on-screen keyboard is just gross. W/O auto correction it’s a totally lost cause. Too bad.
@ MisRemembered, most of the updates for the iphone were to stop unlocking and it had to be done in store while Sprint does firmware and PRL OTA. I’m not saying it’s better than it’s muse, there are a number of things it does better (browsing isn’t one) and what isn’t as good or better will improve in time
Was one of the lucky customers to purchase the very last one of these yesterday at 3pm in S.F. . so far im impressed. (then again, i was stuck with sidekick 3 – LX technology so touchscreen,gps nav,mobile tv,video & playback, etc. is new to me. lol.)
i like the mobile tv feature. i never knew this existed until now. (mobile t.v. on phones) lol. love that i can picture message also since i heard iphone might not feature mms? (not sure, dont quote me)
Sprints not so bad as i thought it was. those comments how the service period, sucks by my community is waayyyyy offf. “customer service” was actually cool instead of the comments how they suck, it just depends on the rep.
Do y’all think this phone will support WiMax if they activate it nationally? sorry if that question was asked.
I happened to be the first Sprint Instinct buyer on the 19th when I got my phone as the doors opened up. All I got was a picture.
Now that I have an Instinct phone in my hands, I have mixed emotions. I’m still not totally used to this creature. My son tells me that the Iphone beats it when it is on sleep mode. The instinct gives you notification that you got something (email, text message, voice mail, phone call) but then it seems you have to push and hold the On/Off button to get to it. I find this a nuisance. Maybe it has another way of doing that but I have not found it.
The GPS is fantastic! The talk to and getting a listing of businesses with addresses, map, directions, and GPS guidance is amazing!
The email is alright. Pretty fast to get to it. Web access is alright. It has amplification zoom capabilities to be able to touch and enter data boxes (example: user name and password stuff).
I find it a little hassle to use the keyboard. I have to sometimes go back and retype words over because I touch adjacent keys. It has a spellchecker built in.
The camera is OK.
I like how combining names, pictures, voice and text is done. Intuitively.
Back to the keyboard… the backwards button to go back is close to the collapse keyboard button and it tends to drive me a little crazy. That’s bad layout design, period. That needs to be corrected soon.
I find it a little problematic to work my way back to original menu because sometimes you can go back via back arrow and sometimes you can simply go back only through menu button. I would like to go to menu immediately but sometimes cannot.
I’m impressed with getting TV and many channels like Discovery, CNN, Fox Sports, VH1, MTV, Nascar, Weather Channel, ABC sports and programs, Disney Channel, Comedy Central, and others all free.
You can also get radio stations directly by genre, geography, and if you pay also satellite radio.
I don’t like that you cannot easily install your own creations of ring tones. Apparently Sprint locked this part and you can only use their tones or proprietary of some sort.
I have not tried the calendar function yet.
The calculator is nice but the positions of the numbers is simply weird. I’m not used to those not being in traditional places.
The music capabilities is good. I loaded up a bunch of Beatles stuff and the earphones they give you are pretty good in quality.
Also, you get two batteries. I found the charger amusing being quite small. The batteries are supposed to last around 4-5 hours. I think it is closer to 4 than 5. You plug the battery into a little plastic box with a cover (doubles up as a travel case) and then plug the tiny USB like connector.
When you buy it you are warned that it is not an email machine. I got scared after committing to buying it. They call the thing an “entertainment” phone. It does process emails (sigh of relief) but they do this so that they are not liable from Blackberry fans and corporate types that might want to use it heavily for emailing tons of messages.
I will see if I get sold on this gadget. Otherwise I may try the upcoming Blackberry.
Samuel Lopez De Victoria, Ph.D.
http://www.DrSam.tv
Jordan I read your comment. I bet your dick is little and lame like your words. what astupid fuck face you are.
I bought this phone yesterday on launch date and it worked really well for the first couple of hours but all of a sudden I started to touch the screen and it wasn’t responding at all. I found out that it responds well to a fingernail but not to the actual finger touch. This really disappointed me and I am going to return the phone do to this fact and also because the phone’s browser sucks and you can’t really multi-task like I thought you could. I gave up the iPhone for this phone so I am definitely going back to at&t. Oh and for the record, the browsing speeds on the instinct are not even close to as advertised and Sprint 3G signal is all over where I live. I got on average from 100-300kbps with a burst speed of 387-500kbps. That’s pitiful by any 3G standard. So long Sprint, hello iPhone 3G!
Why would you give up your iPhone for this? Wouldn’t a better choice be the iPhone 3G. This iPhone must not be that impressive to go iPhoney.
I call shenanigans on Da TechnologyKing, either you have an inordinate amount of disposable income or your posting on what you wanted to do. Speed issues are either handset or coverage related, if it’s the handset replace it and if it’s coverage I doubt ATT would have 3g where Sprint didn’t. There’s always Wi-Fi
Hey
Let us know how the 3G iPhone works for you. I doubt if ATT has an extensive 3G ntwrk! dont want to buy a new iPhone that will have the same pathetic speed. Dont want to search for wifi hotspots again.
I always find it funny how people defend the networks they are contracted to so fervently. I work for a major carrier, I’m not going to say which one, but I have no biases for who people choose to get service with; whatever works best for your coverage/price needs should be the carrier you go with. But bashing the Instinct or iPhone because it is on such and such service, is just downright laughable. Obviously no one posting here knows whats best for every person, in every place that they may live, so let it go. As I have found in my cell phone retail travels; every company has its weak spots, every company.
Great post, bought an instict, selling ur iphone. At&t sux…
FYI. Just placed an order for the Instinct with their sales staff on the phone. Since I’m a current Sprint customer not under contract, I was able to get an additional $50 invoice credit on top of the the $100 mail-in rebate, so I was able to get the Instinct for $80 including free shipping. They said it’ll take 14 days for delivery due to the high demand.
Umm, doesn’t anyone get international information??
South Korea released this phone first, known as the Haptic, and the price was around $700 USD. I’m so anxious to get my hands on one…but I have AT&T. >_<
T-MOBILE SUCKS
T-Mobile is a poor mans company. They suck ass.
hey Gretchen, he term “Haptic” refers to haptic technology used to provide physical feedback for making a call. It was not a Korean phone, they used haptic technology in a phone though.
Go back to your college dorm, your not “international” or “worldly” just because you read a blog somewhere.
Wow! When you say the WP support team will still be monitoring servers and services, you really mean it. Last night when I logged in to edit, spell check, and schedule my post, all services disappeared for quite some time. What a time for you to have a server problem! One couldn’t even log out. I finally went to bed and got up at 3 a.m. to schedule the post. Everything was working great then. Hope the problem wasn’t too hard to fix. The WordPress team is really dedicated. Thank you very much. That’s what makes WordPress a truly great place to share with the world.
As I became a designer in the professional world I learned that the rules of design are suggestions that the novice designer should follow in order to play it safe. My professors would kill me if they heard me say this but, if there is a good concept behind your work and it’s done extremely well; the rules no longer apply.