Samsung Vibrant Is The Sleekest And Sexiest One Of The Phones

T-Mobile scored the very first Android smartphone with the G1. And now with the introduction of the Samsung Vibrant, it has one of the fastest and most powerful as well.
　　

The Vibrant, as you know, is part of the Galaxy S line of Samsung Android smartphones, along with the Sprint Epic 4G, AT&T Captivate and Verizon Fascinate. Each remains the prototypical black slab, albeit with its own personality and customizations. And like its cousins, the Vibrant also sports one of the fastest mobile processors available, one of the best screens and some great software tweaks.

Design
　　
Out of all the Samsung Galaxy S series models, we'd have to say the Samsung Vibrant is the sleekest and sexiest one of the bunch. The look is rather familiar, but the combination of the slim profile, clean design, and rounded edges is really pleasing to the eye. Also, at 4.82 inches tall by 2.54 inches wide by 0.39 inch thick and 4.16 ounces, the Vibrant makes for a nice travel companion, slipping easily into a pants pocket and feeling lightweight in the hand. That said, the handset feels plasticky and slick. We wouldn't say it's fragile, but it definitely left a lot to be desired, especially compared with the solid and durable Nexus One.
　　
Features
　　
Like its Galaxy S siblings, Vibrant offers nearly all the modern cell Android 2.1 amenities – 7.2 Mbps 3G connectivity, Wi-Fi, a speedy 1GHz Hummingbird processor, 5-megapixel camera and HD (720p resolution, 30 frames per second) video recorder, Bluetooth 3.0, six-axis sensor for enhanced gaming, 16GB internal memory, and SWYPE text input, as well as Samsung’s “Social Hub,” which aggregate updates from your Facebook, Twitter and MySpace accounts.
　　 
Software
　　
The Samsung Vibrant ships with Android 2.1 and she be upgraded to 2.2 by the end of the summer. It’s running Samsung’s Touchwiz 3.0 on top, which is a drastic improvement from older versions of Touchwiz.
　　
What you’ll notice first about the Touchwiz overlay is the fixed dock bar at the bottom of the homescreen. It provides you with access to the dialer, contacts, messages, and app drawer. You’ll also get 7 homescreens to customize to your liking.
　　
Click on the app drawer icon and you’ll find a very different scene than you’ve seen on stock Android. This is where it gets iPhone-like again. Each icon is encased in a colored square, much like you’ll find on the iPhone. Unlike the stock Android, Touchwiz provides a horizontal slide app drawer as opposed to the normal vertical one.
　　
Great performance - One of the most likeable features of the Vibrant is its speed for opening apps, sending messages, viewing multimedia, and loading Web pages (when the T-Mobile network doesn’t hold it back).
　　
Minimal Android doctoring - The best thing about the Vibrant and one of the main reasons why I consider it the best device in the Galaxy S fleet, is that T-Mobile has done the least amount of damage to the native Android OS. Meanwhile, AT&T, Sprint, and worst of all Verizon, each loaded up their Galaxy S models with lots of crapware promoting their own add-on services (and made the extra crapware apps uninstallable). The Vibrant isn’t perfect in this respect. It still futzes with the Android home and apps screens and removes some of the standard Android apps and widgets, but it’s better than its cousins on the other carriers.
　　
Svelte design - For all of its high-end features, the Vibrant doesn’t sacrifice as much in design as the oversized HTC EVO or Motorola Droid X. The Vibrant is much thinner, lighter, and easier to fit in a pocket, belt case, or handbag. It also has an attractive — if not flashy — look. The designers were obviously mimicking the look of the old iPhone (pre-iPhone 4) with the chrome edge around the screen and the plastic backing.