Droid versus iPhone

iUnPhone

After dealing with dropped calls, no signal, and relatively poor customer service from AT&T, I decided it was time for a change.

Yes, I love my iPhone. It is by far the most functional smart phone I’ve ever owned. The UI for just about everything on the phone is well designed, making the typical smartphone apps actually usable. I’ve never used email, calendar, IM, SMS, or a phone camera this much on any of the half-dozen other smartphones I’ve owned during the past decade.

But… and this is a big but… what good is a smartphone without the phone part? Not receiving calls from clients when I’m working from the home office is a drag. Dropping calls anytime I drive over one of the 3 bridges between the house and the office sucks. And my clients receiving calls while on a lunch outing while I have ZERO bars makes it hard to justify the iPhone as a serious business tool.

However, during the past 2 years, nobody has had a decent iPhone comptetitor. Until now. Verizon’s announcement of the new Droid by Motorola certainly piqued my interest. The large touch screen, many downloadable apps, an open platform by Google, and running on one of the best networks in the area, what more could I ask for?

This month it was time to give my beloved iUnPhone some competition to decide whether I remain a begrudged AT&T customer or join the millions of Verizon fans.

A Week With Droid

Let me start with some initial feedback after my first week of playing with the Droid. In short, here I am nearly 7 full days with the Droid and already I’m thinking “how long will it be before I return it, 3 more days, another week?”. Now don’t get me wrong. This phone is not that bad. Far from it. But is certainly can be aggravating at times. It simply is not as refined as the iPhone. In some areas, not even close; and that’s a BIG deal.

Yeah, I want my phone to work as a phone. But I’ve come to realize I use it just as much as a communication device. These days that means that I use the phone part for communication about 40% of the time. The other 60% of the time you’ll find me on email, text messaging, or instant messaging. In fact I use email about 40% of the time as well, so good email features is a must. Realistically 90% of the places I’m using the other communication methods I’m in a WiFi hot spot, at my home, or at my office. Everyplace on the map seems to be bathed in open access WiFi signals, so this really hasn’t be a problem.

Droid Peeves

So therein lies a major problem with Droid. It is not nearly as refined as the iPhone. Every turn seems to bring a new challenge with Droid. There are many examples of gotchas and “are you kidding me?” moments. Some of those that have become more than a minor annoyance are outlined in the following paragrphs.

Peeve #1 : Organizing Mail

Yes, it has Google Mail which works wonderfully with my Google Apps Premium account. BUT (and there are many buts with Droid) it uses an arcane label system which does not allow for quick & easy drill-down like folders. While this may not be a problem for most users, I have over 3,000 labels to manage 5 major client projects at a time. There is nothing like scrolling through pages & pages of labels to find the one you want when sorting mail. The iPhone system also talks to Google and it turns the labels into folders. This is a clear win for the iPhone.

Peeve # 2 : Screen Response

At first I thought it was just me. Then I thought it was just the apps I was using. Then I started to realize the every-so-often, just for the sport of it, different areas of the touch screen become non-responsive. Or they do respond but respond incorrectly. For example, click on the camera icon on the home page and it launces maps. Or playing a Gems-like game and you periodically can’t interact with any element on the bottom right quadrant of the screen. Or go to work a slider and the slider moves halfway then stops. Very annoying.

Peeve #3 : Placing Icons

Where the iPhone really shines is with the UI. Everything in intuitive. Put icons on the desktop and they arrange themselves in ways that make sense. You can move them around and they stay where you put them. On the Droid, even after 7 days, I can’t for the life of me figure out why certain icons snap to certain points on the screen. It’s not alphabetical. It’s certainly not where I placed the icon. Worst of all, I can’t seem to easily move the icons where I want them other than dump them on one of the THREE (yeah, just 3) available shortcut pages on the phone. I’m sure there is an explanation, maybe even a tutorial, but I never needed to go through training to use anything on the iPhone.

Droid Shining Moments

While there are a lot of other minor annoyances with the new Droid, there are a few shining examples of better technology when compared with the iPhone. All of these elements are fairly significant, which makes it very hard to choose a clear winner between the two phones. Some of my favorite features on the new Droid are noted below.

Kudo #1 : Call Clarity

You’d think two similar phones would have similar audio qualities. They are both about the same form factor and use similar speaker and microphone technology. But alas, the Droid is a clear winner in the clarity of calls. The voices are clearer at any volume, so much so that when going back to the iPhone I feel like I’m listening to worn out cassette recording versus a top-notch production CD. People on the other end of the calls always tell me that the new phone sounds 10x better; and that may not be an exaggeration.

Kudo #2 : Screen Resolution

Damn this is a nice screen. The iPhone screen is great, or so I thought. This screen is just that much better. It’s hard to point out the exact differences but it is more than just my 3-year-old’s fingerprints all over the iPhone. The screen seems brighter and clearer than the iPhone in almost every way. The icons seem a little crisper, but where I really notice the difference is when reading email.

Kudo #3 : The Slideaway Keyboard

I’ve never been a fan of PDA/smartphone keyboards. They just never seem t work well. However I found myself using the slideout keyboard to quickly type emails on the new Droid. Though it took me a couple of days to get used to the keyboard, I can now bang out an email or text message much more quickly than on either the iPhone or Droid on-screen keyboards. I’ve read other reviews about how the Droid keyboard is lacking, but I guess since I’ve not used a keyboard like this in nearly 8 years now, this keyboard seems like a winner to me. Maybe it’s not as good as a Blackberry or other smartphone keyboards, but I wouldn’t know. Having been away from a keyboard for so long this seems like light years ahead of those I remember. It responds well and leave all that screen real-estate for reviewing my compositions on the fly. Nicely done for such a small package.

The Comparison : Pros & Cons

So while there are a few main things I like and dislike about the new Droid, there are a lot of smaller good & bad items to be accounted for. In addition, I need to decide which device to keep for the next 12 months. So here is my comparison of the pros & cons for each.

Droid	iPhone (1st Gen)
Pros
Slide Out Keyboard Call Clarity Network Coverage better, but still does not have a signal at the home office 100% of the time. App Store almost identical to the iPhone store Available Apps seems to have most of what I want even some the iPhone doesn’t like Google Listen	Multitouch Screen Screen accuracy Intuitive controls Multiple screens for apps (5+) Plug it into the dock & it’s ready to talk to the PC Tons of 3rd party device support it talks to my blu-ray surround sound system for example. App Quality not all the apps are great, but none crash my phone Available Apps There isn’t an app I can’t find, or at least a close enough clone. Except Google Listen. MP3 Sound Quality MP3 Equalizer
Cons
Screen Interaction inconsistent. great when it works. does some weird stuff. No multi-touch after the iPhone I really miss the multitouch especially for zoom in & out Odd volume settings notifications ring when in silent mode, some odd algorithm for changing volumes in apps makes things too loud or too soft too often Changing volume while locked this is a huge aggravation, if the phone is locked and I want to turn down the volume of an incoming call or alarm I have to unlock the phone first Visual Voicemail = No Wifi what?!?! when listening to visual voicemail the Droid shuts off your WiFi. You then have to turn it on manually. App Quality several apps just don’t work right, the built in camera app got stuck in camera mode today, had to reboot to get video mode back. This sort of thing happens much too often. App Screens : Only 3 available	Network Coverage it sucks, plain & simple. less bars in more places. Call Carity I thought it was OK, until I used the Droid No Videos yeah, I can fix this by upgrading to the 3GS for another $300 and 2-year contract, $600+ if I want to stay month-to-month, ouch! Expensive!

Comparison : Head-To-Head

Feature	Motorola Droid	iPhone 1st Gen
Application Quality
Device Controls (power,volume,etc.)
Photo Quality
MP3 Sound Quality
Network Coverage
Screen Resolution
Text/Media Messaging
Touchscreen
Video Recording
Visual Voicemail

The Summary

So while there are some really great things and some really aggravating issues that come with the new Droid, overall this is not an easy call. Both devices are great in their own way, and I’d not be disappointed to be “stuck” using one over the other. However, when it comes down to it, buying a new phone that locks me into a 2 year contract, costs $500 to get all new accessories plus the phone, costs $25 more/month for the same service plan; it becomes hard to justify the switch to Verizon. Maybe if the plan was less expensive. Or if more accessories were included. Or I got ALL of my calls at the home office. Bottom line, the call quality and network coverage is 10x better with Verizon. Unfortunately I use my smartphone as so much more than a phone, and on those points the iPhone wins hands down.

Who knows, since I’m on a month-to-month with AT&T, maybe Verizon will find me back on their doorstep after the v1.0 release kinks are worked out. Sometimes being the first to own something isn’t such a great thing; just ask me about my Z4 some day.

HTC Droids offered by Lets Talk

I purchased my latest cell phone (a HTC Droid Incredible) from Lets Talk. Everyone else was sold out, yet they claimed they had plenty in stock. While I was a bit skeptical at first, my phone arrived in perfect condition in just 3 days for $50-$100 LESS than any other retailer I could find. Sweet!

DROID by Motorola Swivel Holster

Carry your phone at the convenience of a holster. Built to firmly hold your phone in place your Droid is safe and protected from damaging elements. With a swivel belt clip you'll never second guess taking your Droid everywhere you go. DROID by Motorola Swivel Holster also includes:Soft black inside lining Spring loaded swivel Belt clip

USD $10.99

DROID by Motorola Swivel Holster

USD $10.99

DROID 2 by Motorola (Verizon Wireless)

The Droid 2 by Motorola for Verizon Wireless is everything you loved about the original Droid but upgraded with the latest in wireless technology. A combination of the newest version of Google's Android 2.2 with Adobe Flash 10.1 support and a 1GHz OMAP processor gives you access to the fastest Android experience possible. For example web pages load 40% faster than on the original DROID by Motorola. The Droid 2 features both a larger Slide-out QWERTY keyboard for a better physical typing experience and a Virtual QWERTY keyboard complete with the Swype method of text input. A 5MP camera with dual LED flash spacious 3.7 inch 854 x 480 resolution screen and a pre-installed 8GB removable microSD card complete the package. *DROID is a trademark of Lucasfilm Ltd. and its related companies. Used under license. DROID 2 by Motorola (Verizon Wireless) also includes:Google's Android 2.2 Operating System Adobe Flash 10.1 support Speedy 1GHz OMAP processor Enhanced Slide-out & Virtual QWERTY keyboards 5MP camera with dual LED flash Included Accessories:Motorola Device 8GB Pre-Installed microSD Card Standard 1400 mAh lithium ion battery USB data cable Wall charger User manual

USD $0.01

DROID 2 by Motorola (Verizon Wireless)

USD $0.01

Multimedia Station for Droid/Droid 2

Take advantage of all of your DROID's amazing features and turn your DROID by Motorola into your own personal multimedia station. This Multimedia Charger Dock not only charges your DROID but enables you to check the weather view photos and play your Mp3's and movies. You'll no longer need your old clock the station enables your cell phone to display the time date and doubles as an alarm clock. Multimedia Station for Droid/Droid 2 also includes:Turns your DROID into a multimedia station Displays photos time date and weather Plays Mp3's and Videos Doubles as an alarm clock with a light dimmer Included in Box:USB cable Charger User Manual

USD $29.99

0 Comment | Posted in Gadgets,blog by lcleveland on December 05, 2009