Samsung Flight II Review

Introduction:

When the Samsung Flight soared into AT&T's lineup last fall, it was seen as your typical portrait QWERTY slider that didn't invoke too many glances with its ordinary and mediocre experience. Most recently, we saw the Samsung Strive burst out of the scene back in the spring to quickly capitalize on some of the few shortcomings found on the Flight with its better appearance. However, it looks like that Samsung is going into round two and giving the Samsung Flight II SGH-A927 another quick opportunity, but let's hope that it packs more force behind its punch this time around though.

The package contains:

• Samsung Flight II
• Wall Charger
• microUSB cable
• User Manual CD
• Quickstart Guide

Design:

First of all, gone is the portrait QWERTY style found with the original Samsung Flight, and instead, we're presented with a QWERTY landscape sliding one that doesn't deviate much to the chagrin of its predecessor's appearance. Sizing up almost exactly as before, we're once again not thrilled with the plastic nature of the handset – it just doesn't feel that durable. Granted though, it makes the handset extremely lightweight (3.5 oz) and almost unnoticeable in the pockets. With the rear cover, there is a chain link pattern on it to give it some appeal, but doesn't really invoke anything to sway its cheap construction.  Overall, its design fails to make any lasting impressions, but then again, it should be more than acceptable for the younger crowd it's targeted for.



You can compare the Samsung Flight II with many other phones using our Size Visualization Tool.

With its more than adequate 3” QVGA (240 x 320) display with support for 262k colors, we were very surprised to find that Samsung has decided to employ capacitive technology with this one, making the user experience way better than with a resistive screen. Still, it displays washed out looking colors suffers from some viewing angle issues – making it rather difficult to see in direct sunlight. Finally, text isn't the sharpest out there, but it's still recognizable from a close distance.


The dedicated buttons below the touchscreen are flush to the surface, but still provide for some very good feedback – these are the send, back/clear, and end buttons. Both the volume rocker and quick menu key are located on the left edge, while the microUSB port, lock/unlock button, and shutter key are found on the right side – with all of them being perfect in size and responsiveness. Considered a luxury for this handset's category, you'll find a 3.5mm headset jack solely on the top side. There are three notches on the rear cover for the speakerphone, while the 2-megapixel camera can be found next to it. As usual, yanking off the back cover will present you access to the SIM card slot, battery, and microSD card slot.




As we said, the Samsung Flight 2 decides to go with a landscape sliding keyboard that has a springy opening/closing mechanism. For AT&T customers, they'll probably be familiar with its style and look because it closely resembles the one on the Samsung Impression. It employs a 4-row layout that implements rectangular sized buttons which are faintly raised from the surrounding surface with consistent spacing in between them. Even though they have that hard plastic feel to them, they actually have a solid tactile feel when pressed. Finally, the only concern we have is the confusing look of the numbers on the QWERTY – especially when they're sized equally with the letters they're sharing the button with.

Interface and Features:

It's more of the same with the Flight II especially when it sports Samsung's TouchWiz interface, which is basically all that we see nowadays with their feature phones. Of course, you'll have three homescreens at your disposal to fill them up with an assortment of widgets – with a majority of them still being icons that simply launch apps. The main menu is laid out in three panels with large sized icons which can be moved around for a more suitable layout than the default one. Naturally, there's a lot of personalization with the interface, but doesn't have that polished peppy responsiveness that can be seen on some smartphone platforms. At this point, TouchWiz looks and feels more cartoonish than anything – which could be good for the demographic it's targeting, but definitely feels stale at this point.


If you have more than 2,000 friends, you may want to look elsewhere, but if don't, then you'll have more than enough to save on the Flight II. Nothing different here since you'll be able to add specific pieces of information for each contact in your address book.


Pretty much all of the most basic PIM functions can be found on the phone – with the majority of them found under the “Tools” icon in the main menu. You'll find a calendar, memo pad, and a task maker all on the handset to keep you organized.


Inputting messages can be accomplished by using the on-screen numeric keypad with the option of T9 to hasten the experience, but sadly, it lacks a landscape on-screen option. Instead, you'll have to rely on the physical one which surprisingly makes for one frustrating experience. Specifically, it doesn't function like a normal keyboard since you'll have to constantly press the shift button to cycle through typing lowercase and uppercase letters. You simply can't hold it down to type consecutively in all caps, so it makes for one of the most horrifying experiences we've seen of late. The same thing also affects the “FN” button where you can't just hold it down to input all punctuations or numbers – you literally have to click it every time before typing an alternate character.

Email setup is the usual routine process with the Flight II's Mobile Email app, which will automatically get your account ready by requiring only your email address and password. Most of the generic clients get set up without a hitch, but others will require additional pieces of information; like server addresses. As for instant messaging, you've got the trio of clients supported on the phone to get you in touch instantly with friends – you'll find AIM, Windows Live Messenger, and Yahoo! Messenger.


Since it's a touchscreen phone, the handset is treated to the usual line of AT&T applications such as AT&T Music, AT&T Navigator, AT&T Radio, AT&T Social Net, AT&T Maps, and AT&T Family Map. Social networking centric individuals will be pleased with the AT&T Social Net app which aggregates all of your accounts in one centralized hub so you'll be able to easily switch between any of them instantly. Other than that, the Flight II packs a myriad of third party applications that can keep you busy such as YPMobile, Where, AllSportGPS, Loopt, Mobile Banking, MobiVJ, MobiTV, My-Cast Weather, and WikiMobile.



Camera and Multimedia:

Even with its now considered below average sized 2-megapixel camera, the Samsung Flight II is able to capture mediocre images that should be good enough for the novice user. The camera interface is no different from other TouchWiz phones as its sides are littered with icons that enable different settings. Outdoor shots had some okay looking detail in them, but they are accompanied with this overcast look to them – making colors look just a little bland. Indoor shots in low lighting conditions produced an opposite effect with hazy looking images that had good natural color reproduction. All in all, most people will be satisfied with the quality the handset is able to muster.




Presented with a maximum shooting resolution of 320 x 240 pixels and a capture rate of 14fps, there really isn't much else to say about the video recording other than those striking figures. There's nothing boastful by its quality, especially when it lacks any differential detail to make it appealing. Ultimately, we really find it hard to foresee anyone using the phone to capture some memories worth keeping around.

Following the basic theme we've been noticing throughout the handset, we're presented with Samsung's typical music player – which isn't worth any praise regarding presentation. You'll find a basic looking one that displays some on-screen controls, song information, and a nice bar visualization. As for sound quality from its rear speaker, it produces some decent tones that are somewhat sharp when it's placed on the highest volume setting. However, it's more than audible to the ear and doesn't crackle.

As long as you have videos that match up in size to the display's resolution, you'll be more than happy with its video watching experience. We were able to play a video encoded in MPEG-4 320 x 240 resolution quite smoothly with no instances of any lag or slowdown. Even though colors might still look a bit washed out, it doesn't take away from its fluid playback. However, it won't be able to play any videos in resolutions higher than its display – so don't expect them to look all that detailed.


If you happen to be a media centric individual, just plan on having a microSD card on hand since the Flight II only has 65MB of internal storage out of the box. Of course you can increase that thanks to its support of cards up to 32GB in size.

Internet and Connectivity:

International travelers will find the Samsung Flight II to work in most locations across the world since it packs quad-band (850/900/1800/1900 MHz) GSM and dual-band (850/1900 MHz) UMTS connectivity. On top of that, it features Bluetooth 2.1 to get a variety of wireless devices, like headsets, to connect to it.

Now that we're finally seeing a Samsung feature phone on AT&T utilizing a capacitive display, web browsing with Opera Mini is just slightly better since we don't have to push firmly on the display to scroll – which regrettably still feels monotonous because it lacks kinetic scrolling. It's hard to fathom why it only presents you with a landscape orientation, but we can't complain as the overall experience is decent with nice goodies such as automatic text resizng  to fit the width of the screen. In addition, it includes the Dolphin browser as an alternative which surprisingly works much better with the capacitive display seeing that it runs in portrait and kinetic scrolling is supported. Although page loads are a bit longer than Opera Mini, it will load some Flash content – which makes for a satisfying overall experience.

Performance:

Calling quality was on the good side since voices on both ends are completely audible with no obtrusive static sounds being heard. Our only gripe is that the earpiece doesn't produce strong tones, so we had to constantly push it against our ear very close – even when it's set to the loudest volume setting. Additionally, the display will automatically lock after a period of time – which requires you to manually press the unlock button on the phone to access the keypad or other on-screen functions. When using the speakerphone, voices did sound a little distorted, but it didn't help either when its tone is weak sounding.

The Samsung Flight II managed to show a healthy set of signal bars in high coverage areas and didn't drop phone calls during our testing in the greater Philadelphia region.

We were actually shocked to clock in a little under 3.5 hours of talk time when we generally see good performance on other AT&T feature phones. It's a bit more disheartening when the manufacturer has it rated for 5 hours of talk and 250 hours of standby time.

Conclusion:

When AT&T's lineup is littered with a handful amount of feature phones from Samsung, the Flight II finds itself in the presence of some stiff competition from its own flesh and blood. Considering that the handset doesn't offer anything compelling over its older siblings, it makes for a difficult reason to choose this over others – especially when better handsets, like the Samsung Impression, are still available for purchase. It's hard to gather why the manufacturer decided to craft a successor to the original Flight, even when that handset didn't necessarily seem as capable as the Impression. To top things off, the Flight II doesn't do justice in being a quick messaging phone due to the annoyances we find with its text input method and keyboard itself. All in all, the handset quickly takes a nose dive straight down back to Earth as it flounders in its place to keep pace with the competition.

Samsung Flight II Video Review: