Hands-on with Samsung's touchscreen Glyde

On paper, the just-announced Glyde has almost everything it needs to trump the iPhone, including 3G data access, GPS, and slide-out QWERTY keypad. But touchscreen phones need great user interfaces to go with them, and the Glyde's—like many of the UIs on the latest touch phones—falls well short.

Set to go on sale this month on Verizon Wireless, the Samsung Glyde (available May 9 for $250 with a two-year contract and mail-in rebate) looks a lot like the old Ultra Smart F700 that I spied last October—and indeed, a few minor variations aside, the Glyde appears to be a CDMA version of that phone.

That said, I was surprised all over again by the Glyde's light, compact shell. Most of the QWERTY sliders I see are big, bulky bricks, but at 4.1 by 2 by 0.7 inches and weighing in at 4.1 ounces, the Glyde is refreshingly small, especially compared to the LG Voyager, the popular touchscreen/QWERTY clamshell (also on Verizon).

Like the iPhone, the Glyde has a sole "home" button on its front, along with power, volume, and camera buttons along the right side. There's also a 2.5mm jack on top for wired headsets (you'll need an adapter for standard 3.5mm-jack earphones)—and this being Verizon, the headset's not included. Ugh.

Before delving into the Glyde's interface, let's talk specs. We've got 3G data access, good for tapping into Verizon Wireless' V Cast streaming videos and music tracks, along with a two-megapixel camera, GPS for turn-by-turn directions (an extra monthly fee applies), Bluetooth (including support for stereo Bluetooth headsets), and a slot for microSD memory expansion (up to 8GB)—all the ingredients you'd need for an iPhone killer (the upcoming 3G iPhone notwithstanding).

The Glyde also keeps its footing with the impressive home screen, which boasts a trio of virtual buttons along the top for access to the dial pad, contacts, and the main menu (a fourth "Messaging" button appears when the screen switches to landscape mode).

Even better—a row of icons along the bottom of the screen that light up when you have unread text messages, missed calls, unheard voice mail (sorry, no visual voicemail), or event alerts.

Ready to text? Sliding open the phone reveals the full QWERTY keypad, good for tapping out text messages and e-mails. The keys themselves are pretty small—especially the tiny space bar—but after some trial and error, I was typing away with relative ease. (POP and IMAP access is available through Verizon's standard e-mail app.)

All well and good, but the Glyde struggles when it comes to its touch interface.

First, I'll point out that the Glyde's touch UI is at its best when you're making calls; tapping the Dial Pad button brings up the numeric keys, and when you're in a call, "mute" and speakerphone buttons pop up. You can also scroll through your contact list by flicking up and down the screen.

But once you dig beyond the dialing functions, most of the Glyde's menus are made up of standard list items and sub-menus—in other words, the same kinds of menus you might expect on a non-touch phone.

Making matters worse, the phone's UI—especially when using the Web browser or diving into V Cast music and videos—felt painfully sluggish at times, often taking seconds to recognize a tap or a drag of my finger (and that's after I tweaked the touch setting to the most sensitive level).

Web browsing was a particular chore. Yes, the Glyde's Web browser can render full HTML Web pages (loading the packed NYT home page was no trouble), but the browser tends to bog down if you're scrolling and zooming too much, with any false tap turning into a lengthy waste of time.

The same goes for scrolling through lists of videos and music on the Glyde's sluggish V Cast menus; I often had to tap buttons multiple times before the phone responded, and that's a real drag when you're trying to flick through a long list of tunes. (That said, music and video clips played just fine once they got going).

After a while, I dreaded the prospect of downloading a song or pulling up a Web page, and there were times when I longed for simple a four-way navigational pad, such as the one inside the LG Voyager clamshell.

That's a shame, and in the end, I'm hard-pressed to recommend a $250 phone (and that's with a contract, mind you) that drove me so batty.

If you're dead-set on a touchscreen phone, you might want to wait for the expected 3G iPhone (on AT&T), or check out the LG Voyager on Verizon—it's bigger than the Glyde, but has a slightly better keypad, and the four-way navigational pad comes in handy when you're tired of tapping.

There's also Samsung's upcoming touchscreen Instinct (set for Sprint next month), which boasts a snazzy UI that (during my brief hands-on, at least) looks comparable to the iPhone's. That said, the still-in-alpha Instinct I tried back in March was pretty sluggish, so I'm reserving final judgment on that until I see the final shipping version.

So, what do you think—how does the Glyde look compared to the Voyager, or to the iPhone, for that matter?