Smartphones?tend not to age gracefully, but after more than a year and a half since it was first released, the Samsung Galaxy S II has really held up well. It's finally made its way over to Virgin Mobile, in the form of the Samsung Galaxy S II 4G. That 4G has been added at the end because this is the second phone on Virgin that can tap into Sprint's abandoned 4G WiMAX network. That gets you much faster data speeds than most other prepaid phones if you live in the coverage area. You also get a big, beautiful screen, good call quality, and a solid camera. But all that comes at a steep $369.99 price. The Samsung Galaxy S II 4G is still a solid value, but the much less expensive HTC EVO 4G remains our Editors' Choice.
Editors' Note: The Samsung Galaxy S II 4G models on Boost?and Virgin Mobile are virtually identical, so we're sharing a lot of material between these two reviews. That said, we're testing each device separately, so read the review for your carrier of choice.
Physical Design, Call Quality, and Data Speeds
Lovely as ever, the Galaxy S II measures 5.1 by 2.7 by .4 inches (HWD) and weighs 4.8 ounces. It's a large white slab, made entirely of smooth, shiny plastic with gray accents on the sides and back. Keep in mind that this is a big phone; I was unable to hold it in one hand and drag down the notifications bar with my thumb. But if you like a big screen, you're in luck: The Galaxy S II has a beautiful, 4.52-inch, 800-by-480 Super AMOLED Plus display. This is lower resolution than the 960-by-540 display on the?HTC EVO 4G, but Super AMOLED Plus looks richer.
Note: The slideshow below shows the Boost Mobile model, but the Virgin Mobile model looks identical.
The Galaxy S II is a quad-band (800/850/1900/2600) CDMA/WiMAX phone that runs on Sprint's 3G and 4G networks. There's also 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi. Reception is average and call quality is good. Voices sound full, clear, and natural, with plenty of punch and volume in the phone's earpiece. The speakerphone also sounds good but isn't loud enough to use outdoors. Calls made with the phone sound clear, though voices can have a slightly muted, robotic quality in the earpiece. I had no trouble connecting to a?Jawbone Era?Bluetooth headset and calls sounded fine. Samsung uses the powerful Vlingo app for voice dialing here instead of the usual Android option. It allows you to dictate texts messages and issue other commands by voice, though it sometimes had trouble connecting me to the names in my address book.
Battery life was solid, at 8 hours and 49 minutes of talk time over 3G. But turn on 4G, and that number drops considerably, even when you aren't using the phone. You'll probably only want to connect to 4G when you know you're going to use it.
As we discovered in our testing for the?Fastest Mobile Networks, Sprint has the slowest 3G speeds of all the carriers we tested. That means that all 3G-only Sprint and Virgin phones are running at some pretty challenged data speeds. Thankfully, 4G WiMAX support offers the Galaxy S II a major boost.?Running Ookla's Speedtest.net app, I saw average 4G download speeds of 5Mbps in Manhattan, all the way up to an impressive 10Mbps. Uploads stayed at 1.4Mbps across the board. While WiMAX will get you much faster data speeds, keep in mind that it isn't available everywhere the same way that 3G is. Make sure you're covered before you buy.
(Next page: Processor, Apps, Multimedia, and Conclusions)
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