Though it was difficult, I chose the iPhone over the Droid. The apps I use most are currently implemented best on the iPhone (corp exchange email, twitter, music, video, audiobooks/podcasts, browser).
Of course, if I’d known that AT&T wireless service would be down for a week where I live, I might have chosen differently.
I picked up a Droid on Friday. Here is how it compares to the iPhone 3GS (in my opinion).
Droid Wins: Network
The iPhone is on AT&T. In my experience, AT&T drops calls at 2 places in my commute to work. Verizon has those locations covered. [Note: AT&T wins on one count, here. AT&T allows simultaneous data usage and phone calling when in 3G. Verizon halts data usage when you are on the phone.]
Droid Wins: Podcasts
The iPhone’s built-in podcast functionality is painful (many clicks) for downloading new episodes. And if you DON’T use the built-in tools, you can’t listen to those podcasts when you are doing something else. On the Droid, you can use DoggCatcher to download several new podcast episodes at once and listen to them while using other apps on the device.
Droid Wins: Navigation
Though the iPhone has several very nice options for voice navigation, the Android 2.0 solution available on the Droid is very, very good and it is free.
Droid Wins: Customizability
I won’t get into this. The iPhone allows for no customizability where the Droid is awash in this kind of stuff.
Droid Wins: App Switching
Even if you disregard the multitasking advantage of Android, you’ve got to love the shortcut of holding down the home button to see the 6 most recent apps used. (Thanks Josh and Dave!!)
Droid (probably) Wins: Flash
Until all video sharing sites have non-Flash versions, Flash will be important to me. It seems clear that the iPhone will not have it any time soon, but it looks like Android will have it in the next several months.
iPhone Wins: Games
I don’t do a ton of gaming anymore, but I love Dark Harvest and Flight Control on the iPhone. The Droid is WAY behind on selection and quality of games.
iPhone Wins: Twitter
I can name half a dozen iPhone Twitter apps that destroy all of the Android Twitter apps. I do think, though, that this is one area where Android will catch up rapidly.
iPhone Wins: Video
Buying video, downloading video, playing video. The Droid didn’t even try to touch the iPhone on these counts.
iPhone Wins: Photo Library Browsing
The Droid needs a solution here. Maybe some Picasa integration?
iPhone Wins: Interface
Multitouch in the built in apps, particularly the browser and maps, is missing in the Droid. Also, apps are generally cleaner and easier to use on the iPhone.
Tied: Music,Battery,Email,Browser,Keyboard,Camera,Customer Service,Screen
As far as I’m concerned, the iPhone and Droid are tied on music playback, battery life, calendar, email, and browser. I’ll call the camera a tie, too, since they both have drawbacks (Droid has lower color-quality images; iPhone has no flash). I’ll call keyboard a tie since the iPhone’s software keyboard is better, but the Droid has an OK physical keyboard when you’d rather not give up the screen real estate. Customer service is another tie. I’ve had great experiences with Verizon employees and Apple employees alike. Screen: The Droid has a better screen, but the iPhone uses its better.
Not Counted: App Store Freedom, Expandable Storage, Dev Experience
I’m not counting app store freedom. I think Google’s approach is the right one, but Apple’s policies haven’t stopped tons of gems coming through. On storage: though the Droid has expandable storage, apps often use it by default to store data, blocking its usefulness. As for the Developer Experience – Android is easier to get started with and you can do more with the device, but the iPhone provides more UI glitz and its libraries are great for graphics and media.
Conclusion
I’ll keep both a few days longer, but I do have to cancel one before this time next week.
Other opinions:
My favorite: Ihnatko’s
Open Platform Perspective: Winer
Overall: Gartenberg
Some interesting reading this morning.
Shirt Pocket software is working on fixes for SuperDuper!, the state-of-the-art backup software for OS X. The biggest issue right now seems to be the unconventional system that Apple is using for hiding file compression from applications (which seems to be necessary for backwards compatibility). The great news is that even without these fixes, SuperDuper! is not experiencing any data loss. Dave Nanian’s article is here.
If you want to learn more about Snow Leopard’s file compression or ANYTHING ELSE, check out John Siracusa’s massive 23 page review at Ars Technica. While I understand that some users are finding Snow Leopard more of a Service Pack than a new OS, I have to say that I’m loving some of the features. The new changes to Expose alone are worth the $30 bucks to me. You can read up on the Expose features and other cool bits over on the TidBits blog. Try hitting the Expose key and then tabbing through your applications. FUN!
It sounds like the new hero Massively Multiplayer game, Champions Online is off to a rough start. They ratcheted down the effectiveness of players who participated in the beta. This is called a ‘nerf’ in the MMO world. Matt Franklin contrasts this with the rate at which the lead MMO (World of Warcraft) is making game play (especially beginner game play) easier and easier.
This Commodore 64 Visual Debugger is incredible. You start out with a window that shows EVERY address in memory and then zoom in to look at specific locations. The waves of memory changes during file loading are neat! I can’t wait to run this thing while playing Paradroid!
Backblaze has a how-to article up about the homebrew storage solution they’ve created. 7 terabyte 4U servers for $7,867.
JKK checked out the Nokia N900. It merges the best work they’ve done on phones and the work they’ve done on Internet Tablets (Nokia 770, N800, N810). It looks great and has a lot of power in the OS (Linux/Maemo) and the hardware. The Internet Tablet community must be really excited!
PAX, Penny-Arcade’s SOLD-OUT Video Game and Geekery convention (which started yesterday) just added 1,000 tickets.
Alex King spent some time these past few weeks trying to figure out which Network and BlackBerry Phone to use. He wanted to use a BlackBerry Bold, but ended up with a Tour on Verizon. His story is full of the idiosyncrasies of various carriers and devices. Part one. Part two.
Jack Shedd has some things to say about HTML 5. If you are watching the HTML 5 changes closely, Jack’s sentiments will likely resonate with you, including the frustration AND the respect for the team.
Lifehacker has an article on creating a Snow Leopard Hackintosh for $900 (plus the price of Snow Leopard standalone which is $169). I’d be interested in seeing a $500 model.
Categories: Apple · Coding · Conferences · Games · Make · Mobile · Visualization
To drill down and find figure out where all my disk space has gone, I use visualization apps. On the PC, I use WinDirStat. On the Mac, I’ve been using GrandPerspective. Until now. DaisyDisk’s visual representation of space is clean, intuitive and interactive. Check out this video!
Categories: Apple · Visualization
I watched the Palm Pre CES announcement. WOW.
http://www.palm.com/us/products/phones/pre/palm-pre-ces.html
I’m blown away. I read the blog posts, but even they did not prepare me for the complete package. Watch that video ASAP.
I still think Apple could win this war, but Palm is definitely showing up for the fight. Before the Palm Pre announcement I would have ranked the smartphone operating systems as Apple, RIM, Nokia, Microsoft. Now I think it’s Apple, Palm (Web OS), RIM, Nokia, Microsoft. And if everything shown in that video pans out and Apple doesn’t repsond in a major way, the ranking will move to Palm (Web OS), Apple, RIM, Nokia, Microsoft.
It makes you think. Are the other players sitting on some next gen tech, too? Will we see something earth shattering from Microsoft soon? One thing is for sure. This year, last and next are going to be historic for the phone industry.
Here are some of my observations (crossposted on Twitter) while watching the Palm Pre announcement:
Here is a report card / eye chart I put together to compare the 5 leading iPhone Twitter clients. Enjoy! Please leave a comment if I’ve made a mistake in any of the rows. Click on the thumbnail to open the full comparison chart.
My current favorite is Tweetie. TwitterFon is the best free option (and the only open source option). Twittelator is the only app with sub group support.
UPDATE 1/16/2009: Updated the chart to include the latest version of each app.
UPDATE 1/18/2009: Reading a tweet by Steve Birney, I realize I need to add offline functionality to the chart. [DONE]
UPDATE: 1/19/2009: Note to self – add Dave Winer’s link format to the list of features.
UPDATE: 1/21/2009: Added several new rows, corrected some inaccuracies.
I have one additional wish list item for Macworld 2009: the iPhone needs a better application launcher. Paging through screens to find the app you are looking for is inefficient and can be frustrating.
TUAW asks what I want to see at MacWorld. Check out their predictions. Here is my wish list in order. First is what I want most.
1. A Car PC experience for an Apple product. Voice navigation, Text-to-Speech for email and news, Voice Recorder, Traffic. App Store. This could be related to the rumored Tablet or maybe just a new interface for the iPhone…
2. 6″-9″ device. This should incorporate learnings from the iPhone, NetBooks and Mobile Internet Devices.
3. iPhone: Hulu and Netflix streaming.
4. iPhone: Background downloading of Podcasts, Twitter and Google Reader. If I understand correctly, the promised “push” functionality will be insufficient for these applications, but I’d love to be proven wrong.
5. iPhone: Copy/Paste
6. iPhone: Better calendar integration with Exchange.
7. iPhone: Email more than one photo at a time.
I’m not really in the market for an Apple TV or a Mac Mini, but there are definitely changes they could make to those devices that would make them hard to resist. The Apple Home Server product rumor is also interesting, but I’d be in wait and see mode. Especially after experiencing the flakiness of the Time Capsule product first hand this year.
Short and sweet.
Google Reader’s mobile version – This isn’t a native app. It’s the iPhone Safari version of Google Reader. I’d prefer something native, but, until background downloading comes along, it’s faster for me to just visit the site directly.
Things – a todo app that syncs with the OS X version of Things. This is the first time I’ve had a tasks application so well integrated into my daily life. It’s nice! Not cheap, though – $10 for the iPhone app and $40-$50 for the OS X app.
TwitterFon – My favorite iPhone twitter client. Twittelator is my backup, though. It supports groups so I can view tweets from a small group of people if I’m short on time. I hope TwitterFon adds that kind of functionality soon!
Amazon.com – This app is great in stores. Take photos of the things you want to see reviews on or want to price check. Moments later, the Amazon product pages for those items show up and you can make informed purchases at local stores OR do a 1-click purchase from Amazon.
iPod – The built in iPod functionality is great and I use it a lot for Podcasts, AudioBooks and Music. Still, I wish the Podcast downloading was automatic.
iTalk – Great for taking voice notes.
Yelp – Excellent source of information about local restaurants and services.
Maps – The built in Google Map functionality is great and keeps getting better.
The Creeps – My favorite Tower Defense-style game currently.
Shazam – Helps me identify songs on the radio that I’d like to download when I stop the car.
As I noted in Apple’s official discussion boards and my blog in October, the new MacBooks (late 2008 aluminum) are having a hard time with 3rd Party RAM, even when that RAM has the same specs that Apple recommends. As far as I know, noone at Apple has commented on the problem, yet, and the techs I’ve spoken to haven’t mentioned any official message.
Luckily, JKOnTheRun just took up the torch and TUAW is on the case as well. For all those who are not near an Apple store and can’t get the cheap official RAM swap, let’s hope a firmware patch is in the works!
Categories: Apple
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