iPhone vs Android initial thoughts

Well I’ve done the unthinkable… I’ve switched to an iPhone… for the time being.

After several months of using a rooted G1 and Cyanogenmod 6 (Android 2.2) on AT&T the phone was becoming more and more unreliable. While the last few weeks (since the stable version of Cyanogenmod 6 was released) I haven’t had too many problems, after missing a vital text message early Saturday morning, I gave into Laurie’s request to consider getting a different phone.

After all, with twins on the way and her at 34+ weeks… it’s probably best I have a phone I know I can count on.

Unfortunately my contract with AT&T is still intact and I’m not eligible for an upgrade or special pricing until April 2011. So rather than downgrading to a simple (non-smart) phone we decided to upgrade Laurie’s iPhone to an iPhone 4 and I’ve taken over her iPhone 3G.

So I’ve had the iPhone 3G for roughly a day and a half now and thought I’d share my initial thoughts on comparing the two operating systems. Of course as I make the comparisons, keep in mind that I’m comparing a hacked G1 with Android 2.2 (something Google doesn’t officially support) to essentially a stock iPhone 3G (I haven’t upgraded the iPhone to the latest OS because I hear it makes the phone DRAG horribly). I’ll try and avoid hardware comparisons as Android hardware varies from phone to phone.

• Both operating systems take a little tinkering with to familiarize yourself with them. It probably took a couple hours before I figured most of the important nuances with each phone — however Android seemed to come a bit easier for me.
• I find myself missing the back button on iPhone. Both BlackBerry and Android offer back buttons… iPhone offers buttons on most screens but I haven’t re-trained myself to look for the software button as opposed to a hardware button (which is a standard feature of Android and BlackBerry phones).
• I love that iPhone’s wall charger is essentially a USB plug. You use the same cord for connecting to your computer as you do the wall.
• I hate that iPhone uses a proprietary cord. Why manufacturers like Apple and Microsoft think they have to have a special proprietary cord for their devices is beyond me. Simply use a common mini-USB cord like the rest of the world and get over yourself.
• I love that I can Skype (text message and audio only) on my iPhone. The software is there for Android phones except that Skype has apparently made some sort of goofy agreement with Verizon that only Android phones on Verizon’s network can use the Skype software. The software should be available to any and all carriers. If it works on an iPhone with AT&T, it should also work on an Android with AT&T. UPDATE: Word out this week announces that Skype will no longer be exclusive to Verizon on the Android OS – WOot!
• Words With Friends on iPhone is great. (I’m jdblundell – look me up and let’s play.) I hear an Android app is in the works — but that’s been several months now :-(.
• Streaming Netflix to my iPhone is amazing! Again, I hear a Netflix app is in the works but it’s not available yet.
• The official Twitter app on iPhone is a lot better than on Android. I mean seriously, multiple accounts on iPhone? How can you not like that?
• iPhone has an official Flickr app. It’s pretty slick. I’d much rather use something like it on Android than pay $2 for BettrFlickr.
• The WordPress app on iPhone = FAIL! Based on the comments, it appears the app broke during their last upgrade. I was hoping to write this post on my iPhone to try it out… but every time I opened the app, it forced closed on me.
• I hate depending on iTunes to sync my music and apps. While I love that my apps are apparently backed up to my computer I prefer using Windows Explorer to drag and drop files onto my Android SD Card instead of using a proprietary software. This is also super annoying when browsing the web and you see an app you want because for some reason my computer doesn’t think I have iTunes installed… so when I click “Download in iTunes” links – I’m told to install iTunes again. Whereas with Android I can typically just scan the QR barcode and the app will open automatically in the Android Market on my phone.
• I love that I can download apps via my computer to sync with my iPhone (see above). Both iPhone and Android allow you to download and install apps over the air but with iPhone you can also download apps straight to your computer if you prefer and install them the next time you sync your phone. I understand this can be done with Android but it’s done through SDK software and something the normal user probably won’t ever do or experience.
• The iPhone just runs smooth. It’s what you’d expect from a phone. Granted, my G1 ran just as smooth when I was running Android 1.16 on it. It was just a vast noticeable difference compared to what I’ve been using. Think running Android 2.2 on a G1 as running Windows XP on a machine that’s really only built for Windows 98 (or 95). You get lots of extra features but you lose a lot of system performance in the process.
• I don’t really notice not having a physical keyboard anymore. I’ve said all along that I don’t think I could ever get used to not having a physical keyboard on a phone but in less than 2 days with the iPhone I don’t miss it. The on screen keyboard seems much more responsive than the keyboard was on the G1 (again probably related to the upgraded software) and so I don’t mind tapping out messages on screen as much.
• I really miss the voice input on Android. I was really getting used to the new voice commands and voice to text feature on Android 2.2 and that’s pretty much non-existent on the iPhone (unless there’s a great app out there that does the same thing).
• I really miss the “Share” feature on Android. I loved that from just about any app I could hit the share button and instantly share photos, audio, notes, text, etc. etc. with a huge variety of apps on my phone like Evernote, Springpad, Twitter, Flickr, Facebook, etc. On the iPhone I have to actually open Twitter or Flickr and then search for the photo in my library to share a photo.

So there’s the basic comparison. Will I stick with an iPhone once my contract is up? We’ll see. As of today I’ve still got my eye on the Samsung Captivate (Galaxy S). One thing I’ve noticed about Android as of late is that carriers and/or phone manufacturers are pretty slow to send upgrades for the OS. There are only a select few phones that are actually running Android 2.2 right out of the box… and even fewer running stock Android (thanks to the open source nature of the operating system).

But I’ll keep my list in mind and we’ll see how things go over the next few months.