Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket User Reviews

ShaolinShade posted on 22 Jan 2013, 17:12

9

A great, but not perfect, smartphone

ShaolinShade has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

I'll start by saying that overall, this is a fantastic phone. The camera provides excellent quality photo and video, front and back, it runs smoothly and quickly (for the most part), and offers just about all the features you would want from a smartphone. I was originally worried about the relatively low PPI sported by the display, but all of those worries left when I saw it firsthand - it provides beautiful colors and HD quality definition. I believe this is because the display technology increases the perceived resolution (by up to 50%, apparently). The Super AMOLED Plus display also gives the best contrast, colors, and viewing angle that you'll see on a smartphone, and if you use black backgrounds you'll actually save battery life.

Something that surprised me about this phone was the fact that it doesn't have a notification LED. I didn't realize this until after purchasing it, and was awestruck that they would make such an advanced phone and leave out something as basic and inexpensive as a notification LED. Really annoying of them to leave this feature out.

Battery life could be better, but it's still reasonable enough and should last most users throughout their entire day. Battery life can also be improved by buying batteries with higher mAH (the original battery is 1850 mAH, and I managed to grab a set of 2 2250 mAH batteries + an external charger off amazon for $20), so this isn't really a negative point to me.

Call quality is occasionally spotty, with people on the...  

I'll start by saying that overall, this is a fantastic phone. The camera provides excellent quality photo and video, front and back, it runs smoothly and quickly (for the most part), and offers just about all the features you would want from a smartphone. I was originally worried about the relatively low PPI sported by the display, but all of those worries left when I saw it firsthand - it provides beautiful colors and HD quality definition. I believe this is because the display technology increases the perceived resolution (by up to 50%, apparently). The Super AMOLED Plus display also gives the best contrast, colors, and viewing angle that you'll see on a smartphone, and if you use black backgrounds you'll actually save battery life.

Something that surprised me about this phone was the fact that it doesn't have a notification LED. I didn't realize this until after purchasing it, and was awestruck that they would make such an advanced phone and leave out something as basic and inexpensive as a notification LED. Really annoying of them to leave this feature out.

Battery life could be better, but it's still reasonable enough and should last most users throughout their entire day. Battery life can also be improved by buying batteries with higher mAH (the original battery is 1850 mAH, and I managed to grab a set of 2 2250 mAH batteries + an external charger off amazon for $20), so this isn't really a negative point to me.

Call quality is occasionally spotty, with people on the other end not being able to hear me well or vice versa. It's too early to say if this is a problem with the reception in certain areas where I've used it, the reception of the person on the other end, or possibly even the case I'm using - so I'm going to hold off on judging this aspect for now. It mostly works great, though. I will perform more tests on the call quality / reception and update this review with my findings.

My only other qualm involves occasional freezup and slow performance, but honestly I've had these types of problems with every android phone I've owned, so I think this isn't a problem with this specific phone so much as it is with the Android software (/ its interaction with poorly coded apps?)

If you can afford a Galaxy S3, I would recommend that - since it improves on every weak point of this phone (stronger battery, faster processor, higher resolution, more storage, notification LED), but if you can't, the Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket is still an excellent choice (as is the original S2).

Build quality 8/10

Reception 8/10

Call quality 8/10

Internet 9/10

Multimedia 9/10

Camera 9/10

UI speed 9/10

Everyday usage 9/10

Text input 9/10

Display 9/10

Battery 8/10

Pros

• Beautiful Display
• Fast
• Plenty of Space
• Up to date OS
• Excellent Camera

Cons

• No notification LED

metalmilizia posted on 05 Jan 2013, 21:50

9

Good phone

metalmilizia has owned it for less than 3 months before publishing this review

I was a little disappointed in the plastic case but after a few drops, it seems to hold up. Upgraded to Jelly Bean shortly after receiving which eliminated TouchWiz. The little bit I used it, it seemed to be a lot better than than Motorola Blur and HTC Sense.

Build quality 7/10 Plastic case

Reception 8/10

Call quality 10/10

Internet 10/10

Multimedia 8/10 Average, use Google Play Music

Camera 10/10 8MP rear camera

UI speed 8/10 A little slow after jelly bean upgrade

Everyday usage 9/10

Text input 10/10 Great after upgrading to Kii Keyboard

Display 10/10

Battery 6/10 Awful for consistant use

Pros

• Size
• Gorilla Glass
• Dual Core Processor

Cons

• Battery
• Build Quality

metalmilizia alternatives:

Samsung Galaxy Express I437

peermhdrak posted on 18 Dec 2012, 06:24

9

Samsung galaxy s2

peermhdrak has owned it for less than 3 months before publishing this review

I bought this smartphone 2 months ago. it is very nice interface and features in cheapest price I bought this smartphone 2 months ago. it is very nice interface and features in cheapest price I bought this smartphone 2 months ago. it is very nice interface and features in cheapest price

Build quality 10/10

Reception 10/10

Call quality 10/10

Internet 10/10

Multimedia 10/10

Camera 10/10

UI speed 10/10

Everyday usage 7/10

Text input 10/10

Display 9/10

Battery 3/10

SamsungBeast23 posted on 08 Jul 2012, 23:57

9

Samsung Galaxy s2 skyrocket review

SamsungBeast23 has owned it for less than year before publishing this review

Its big and good but the battery could be better and plus I would want something bigger like the Note which I will get the second one. The battery life sucks really bad and its get to hot to fast. I hope it goodluck because I will be getting Samsung galaxy Note2 for my next phone and will be expected to get the 3rd one. I love the screen size.

Build quality 10/10

Reception 10/10 Amazing and 10times better then my Iphone 4s

Call quality 10/10

Internet 10/10

Multimedia 10/10

Camera 8/10 The IPhone is better at camera which should not be true because the phone is bigger so they should work on it, im upset.

UI speed 9/10

Everyday usage 10/10

Text input 9/10

Display 10/10

Battery 7/10 Come on! with the phone being big it should have a big battery life like the Note.

Pros

• Display
• 4G LTE
• Speed
• Customizable

Cons

• Battery
• Camera

b1gd47 posted on 19 Mar 2012, 17:34

10

lte FTW

b1gd47 has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

Phonearena's poor score for this amazing phone is unreal, it makes me think they are owned by rival companies.. I say this having tried LG Nitro and iphone 4s. Processor holds up to the seceral pages of shortcuts and apps I flip through at once. Has everything but an HD screen and that's not very important to me. The GPS locks you in within 2 seconds time and inside of 2-3 meters distance. Root it and ditch the bloatware and you are g2g. Love it mane..

Build quality 9/10

Reception 10/10

Call quality 9/10

Internet 10/10

Multimedia 10/10

Camera 9/10

UI speed 10/10

Everyday usage 10/10

Text input 10/10

Display 10/10

Battery 8/10

Pros

• no freezing, able to root

Cons

• none

MikeysSmartPhones posted on 28 Feb 2012, 20:18

6

Samsung Skyrocket

MikeysSmartPhones has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

Got this phone feb 5th 2012.. already reaplaced 3 times that make this my 4th brand new skyrocket... I am impressed on many features, but the battery life is horrible, if you really want to use it and not just have in its holster... sound to others while talking / many people say they hear them selfs talking, so their is a nasty feed back on the other side of calls, not just a few but I now ask just about everyone how I sound and more than not they all say they hear themselfs talk, or that it sounds like I'm in a tunnel...not good, after all we want to use as a phone right!!... next is the automatic restart that happens, and again usely while I'm on PHONE OR TEXTING..not good... my second replacement had speaker that crackled and same as above with those problems , plus bluetooth did not work at all...that led to this 3rd replacement...bluetooth works good and speaker is better, but still reboots as it wants and call quility is horrible. These phones display are awesome and games are fun on it. I personally think they need to upgrade it to the ICS "Ice cream sandwich" and I think it might help a lot...I'm off to get the Samsung Note as my last replacement, I hope it will be last replacement anyway.. I will post back here on what I think of the Samsung Note, played with it in ATT store for over an hour and loved it...we shall see about things like call quaility and the rebooting thing....That too needs the ICS and I'm not sure why in the world they wait on these important releases...  

Got this phone feb 5th 2012.. already reaplaced 3 times that make this my 4th brand new skyrocket... I am impressed on many features, but the battery life is horrible, if you really want to use it and not just have in its holster... sound to others while talking / many people say they hear them selfs talking, so their is a nasty feed back on the other side of calls, not just a few but I now ask just about everyone how I sound and more than not they all say they hear themselfs talk, or that it sounds like I'm in a tunnel...not good, after all we want to use as a phone right!!... next is the automatic restart that happens, and again usely while I'm on PHONE OR TEXTING..not good... my second replacement had speaker that crackled and same as above with those problems , plus bluetooth did not work at all...that led to this 3rd replacement...bluetooth works good and speaker is better, but still reboots as it wants and call quility is horrible. These phones display are awesome and games are fun on it. I personally think they need to upgrade it to the ICS "Ice cream sandwich" and I think it might help a lot...I'm off to get the Samsung Note as my last replacement, I hope it will be last replacement anyway.. I will post back here on what I think of the Samsung Note, played with it in ATT store for over an hour and loved it...we shall see about things like call quaility and the rebooting thing....That too needs the ICS and I'm not sure why in the world they wait on these important releases when we are all paying top dollars for these devices and we desire only the best of features and service. Look I love Samsung products I am just being 100 % honest about what I think here and what I have dealt with on this device... Hopefully those of you that have this will get the ICS soon and any problems you have will fade away... have fun

Build quality 7/10

Reception 3/10

Call quality 2/10 calls on other side say they hear themselfs or that I'm in a tunnel and this is my 4th shyrocket...

Internet 7/10

Multimedia 9/10

Camera 9/10

UI speed 8/10

Everyday usage 5/10

Text input 5/10

Display 10/10

Battery 3/10

Pros

• Nice display great for games light weight

Cons

• call quality is horrible, reboots when ever it wants, battery is horrible, all and all way over rated..

jronnen posted on 04 Feb 2012, 10:50

10

Awesome Phone

jronnen has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

Love Android OS, allows full customization of everything. Along with google providing me a safe cloud storage of pictures, music, and contacts all for free made transitioning from old android to new android easier than ever. Along with a 1.5GHz dual core processor and 1 Gb of ram, the phone has no problem keeping up with as many tasks as i throw at it.

Build quality 10/10

Reception 9/10 At&t to blame not samsung

Call quality 10/10

Internet 10/10

Multimedia 10/10

Camera 10/10

UI speed 10/10

Everyday usage 10/10

Text input 10/10

Display 10/10

Battery 10/10

Pros

• Fast.
• Small.

Cons

• None.

Mylesh55 posted on 01 Feb 2012, 01:52

9

Very outstanding phone! Never knew AT&T had this quality!

Mylesh55 has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

After my time with Verizon and having a long list of phones; Droid 1/2/3/X/X2, Thunderbolt, Rezound, and LG Ally; I finally moved to AT&T and this is far better usability wise. Great quality, my first Samsung, great speed and great build. The only outstanding issues is the speaker because its not loud and the resolution should be higher. Besides that great!

Build quality 9/10 Very good quality! But personally I'd like some strong metal parts, at least the edges or the back panel so it wouldn't scratch. And so reinforced glass on the front would be nice.

Reception 10/10 My first AT&T and I have 4G in the middle of no where at home, that defiantly deserves credit.

Call quality 10/10 Working. Clean mobile to mobile.

Internet 10/10 4G and 4GLTE when ever it comes out, very fast for mobile.

Multimedia 9/10 Video player is GREAT! Music player feels complete but feels like a last generations of phones quality, little to no animations and seems primitive to the video player. The gallery is stock android which is great and I love it itself, but it hasn't been toned to the phones speed and RAM, it seems to be running at hyper speed and simple presses can register as long presses and normal swipes can register as fast flicks and slide past the destination.

Camera 10/10 Start-up is quick. Focus is quick. Preview speed is average but below standards for a dual core. And time between pics are average, but i feel an update could pump that up. I would give 9/10 but the quality is outstanding!

UI speed 8/10 The speed at the home screen and the app drawer is there. The short cuts in the notification bar are great. everything else seems unfinished and not matching the quality of the rest the phone. It feels incomplete compared to other phones and market launchers out there. Definetly needs a face-lift to get up with the times. The lock-screen needs work, laggy at times.

Everyday usage 8/10 Easy to use and set up. Im not a fan of pre-installed apps but a lot of them are actually useful. But some system apps that are going to be used daily are poor. the Text app is low quality, everything is too big and really slows you down through-out the day fighting with it.

Text input 7/10 The stock keyboards are bad, they take over half the screen and the auto correct selectin bar keeps expanding and collapsing and really messes with typing.

Display 9/10 AMOLED is amazing and I love the color. Great frame-rate. Low power consumption. Resolution is low, 4.5 inches needs a bigger resolution or things start looking blurry.

Battery 10/10 No issues and gets me through a full day from 8am to 11pm with 5% to 15% left with constant use.

Pros

• Screen size.
• Speed!
• 4G and 4G LTE.
• Camera is cool!
• Stock apps are useful.
• Battery is good.

Cons

• Screen resolution.
• Horrid keyboards.
• Touchwiz needs a update.
• Not very loud.
• System apps need revamped and need to get out of 2010

softballgod1014 posted on 31 Jan 2012, 14:24

8

Phone freezing too often

softballgod1014 has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

I recieved this phone on January 10th. had all of my andoird apps installed that day and that is when the issue began. I used less than 2 gigs of the onboard sd card but it was constanly freezing and power cycling by itself. Very irritating when it did this in the middle of calls, ATT then sent me out a new device on January 26th. As soon as I turned it on out of the box without even installing any apps at all it began power cycling by itself. Very displeased with how this device works. Great size,weight and procesor but the downfall is the constant power cycling.

Build quality 9/10

Reception 9/10

Call quality 9/10

Internet 9/10

Multimedia 6/10

Camera 9/10

UI speed 9/10

Everyday usage 4/10

Text input 8/10

Display 10/10

Battery 1/10

Pros

• Call quality
• Procesor speed
• look
• feel
• Graphics

Cons

• Battery life
• use

kylie posted on 22 Jan 2012, 06:33

5

kylie

kylie has owned it for less than 3 months before publishing this review

i had this phone but it had several problems . i hate this phone. It caused me a loss of money :-( because it malfunctioned. you should better buy an iphone or a windows phone. Do not recommend it to any one.

Build quality 5/10

Reception 5/10

Call quality 5/10

Internet 5/10

Multimedia 5/10

Camera 5/10

UI speed 5/10

Everyday usage 5/10

Text input 5/10

Display 5/10

Battery 5/10

prdmshrl posted on 03 Jan 2012, 16:20

10

My favorite phone so far!

prdmshrl has owned it for less than 3 months before publishing this review

This phone is simply amazing. Great build quality, reception, call quality. Excellent camera and multimedia performance. Nice 4.5" display allows you to enjoy and have a great multimedia experience on this phone. The LTE speeds on this phone are amazing. I have gotten speeds up to 57 Mbps down and 15 Mbps up in Phoenix.

Build quality 10/10 Even though the phone is mostly plastic. It is a solid construction. The phone does not feel cheap.

Reception 10/10 Excellent reception, not a single drop call.

Call quality 10/10 Clear voice quality excellent speaker.

Internet 10/10 Both HSPA+ and LTE are very fast. Browser very responsive and reliable.

Multimedia 10/10 Music and video display excellent. Great recording quality at 1080p

Camera 10/10 Excellent picture quality on photos. Both low light and light.

UI speed 10/10

Everyday usage 10/10 Previous experience with other handsets require the handset to be power cycled a few times through out the day. I don't have to do that everyday with this phone. Solid performance.

Text input 10/10 4.5" screen allows easy text entry and screen very responsive.

Display 10/10 Super Amoled Plus display gives a nice and crisp quality to photos, videos and every day usage. Display very responsive.

Battery 10/10 Good battery life. It lasts a whole day with a full charge.

Pros

• Amazing LTE Speeds
• Super Amoled Plus
• 1080p video recording
• Expandable memory up to 32 GB
• 4.5" display

Cons

• Touchwiz should have a facelift..

prdmshrl alternatives:

Samsung Galaxy S II AT&T

LG Nitro HD

perdyone posted on 19 Dec 2011, 17:29

10

I totally love this phone... AMAZING

perdyone has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

I love this phone. The front camera. The screen shot capability.. white in color... OMG I no longer miss my iphone 4... I love android phones BUT THIS PHONE is def. the best i've ever had!!!!!!!!! BOMBSKI

Build quality 10/10

Reception 10/10

Call quality 10/10

Internet 10/10

Multimedia 10/10

Camera 10/10

UI speed 10/10

Everyday usage 10/10

Text input 10/10

Display 10/10

Battery 10/10

senozlu1 posted on 12 Dec 2011, 14:25

10

Senozlu1

senozlu1 has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

AT&T Samsung GS2 and AT&T Samsung GS2 Skyrocket
I currently have both of these devices of course Exynos chip set just little bit on the faster side when you flicking screens side to side if you have the devices sitting next to each other other that there is no lag at all it a very fast responsive device at&t GS2 has smaller screen skyrocket is bigger when it comes to graphics display size matter chipset,cpu and gpu all must work harder due to skayrocket screen is 4.52" vs at&t GS2 4.3"

Build quality 10/10

Reception 10/10

Call quality 10/10

Internet 10/10

Multimedia 10/10

Camera 10/10

UI speed 10/10

Everyday usage 10/10

Text input 10/10

Display 10/10

Battery 10/10

Pros

• Big bright vivid screen
• Fast cpu,1gb ram 16 gb storage
• Owsome camera and camcorder 1080p@30fps
• On 4g 10mb down 2mb upload in my area

Cons

• Battery and power management
• Allaorund plain looks
• No Exynos chipset but it's very fast
• Touchwiz 4.0 UI not my taste

senozlu1 alternatives:

Samsung Galaxy S II AT&T

MYTHiKAL posted on 15 Dec 2011, 23:32

10

ROCKET ON STEROIDS!!

MYTHiKAL has owned it for less than month before publishing this review

I'm Extremely Glad that I waited long enough to compare an awesome lineup of phones now available. and even more glad that I didnt get discourage by the Such Unbelievable Low Score that PhoneAreana gave to this phone, IMO that is UNSAT...

This is phone is by far IMHO the better one of all I tested.. I even tested the LG Nitro and for some odd reason it just didnt do it for me, not to mention the LG Nitro gave me slightly slower data speeds then the Skyrocket.. Must had been bad timing or something.. Anyways, after having the Samsung Infuse 4G, HTC EVO 3D, HTC EVO Design and the Samsung Epic Touch 4G, the Samsung Skyrocket was by far the "best" of them all.. and to make things better, I live in an area that has the new LTE 4G, which took me by surprise cause it was never announced, and the Blistering Data Speeds are out of this world @ 22mbps to 26.5mbps during different test..

Hard to find any issues on this phone so far. The UI response is just perfect, and regardless of what i have read, the Beautiful SUPER AMOLED Plus Screen is phenomenal. I almost score the reception down at a 9 instead, only cause i had an echo once, but it only happened once and during a time when the phone had just been turned on and I had to make a call ASAP.. LOL Other then that,, the reception is just Perfect and I finally been able to get the indoor penetration that I needed at my work area/building. Have had NO dropped calls, not even once, which is unheard of for me cause with Sprint,...  

I'm Extremely Glad that I waited long enough to compare an awesome lineup of phones now available. and even more glad that I didnt get discourage by the Such Unbelievable Low Score that PhoneAreana gave to this phone, IMO that is UNSAT...

This is phone is by far IMHO the better one of all I tested.. I even tested the LG Nitro and for some odd reason it just didnt do it for me, not to mention the LG Nitro gave me slightly slower data speeds then the Skyrocket.. Must had been bad timing or something.. Anyways, after having the Samsung Infuse 4G, HTC EVO 3D, HTC EVO Design and the Samsung Epic Touch 4G, the Samsung Skyrocket was by far the "best" of them all.. and to make things better, I live in an area that has the new LTE 4G, which took me by surprise cause it was never announced, and the Blistering Data Speeds are out of this world @ 22mbps to 26.5mbps during different test..

Hard to find any issues on this phone so far. The UI response is just perfect, and regardless of what i have read, the Beautiful SUPER AMOLED Plus Screen is phenomenal. I almost score the reception down at a 9 instead, only cause i had an echo once, but it only happened once and during a time when the phone had just been turned on and I had to make a call ASAP.. LOL Other then that,, the reception is just Perfect and I finally been able to get the indoor penetration that I needed at my work area/building. Have had NO dropped calls, not even once, which is unheard of for me cause with Sprint, Verizon and even ATT, i have had dropped calls at random times, but since i have had this phone that has not been an issue at all.. The Battery has been much more reliable and long lasting then I expected, cause on all my previous smart phones that was an issue. I think that cause the reception is so good around here or with this phone that the battery does not get wasted by the phone looking for signal all the time.. The average i have been getting on this phone are between 9 and 10 hours of above normal usage. I use my phone for games, a lot of internet, stock trading and some music, and the battery in this phone have been lasting me that long which is by far much longer then any phone i ever had..

I will do my best with the PROS/CONS but it will be hard for me to really find anything wrong with this phone.. sorry.. :)

Build quality 10/10

Reception 10/10

Call quality 10/10

Internet 10/10

Multimedia 10/10

Camera 10/10

UI speed 10/10

Everyday usage 10/10

Text input 10/10

Display 10/10

Battery 10/10

Pros

• Excellent Signal - Indoor Penetration is Awesome
• Super Fast with NO lag
• LTE 4G Speeds are mind blowing.. Currently Averaging 22 to 26.5 mbps download
• HUGE Super AMOLED Plus Screen @ 4.5

Cons

• I wanted a Quad-Core.. So I guess this will do for now.. LOL!!