Updated with final verdict in post #21:
===================================================
Initial opinion below:
Feel free to merge with Quebert, but lots of people think we're similar because we always talk about Android's lag fest.
So I have 3 Android phones--Milestone(Droid), Nexus S, and SGS2. My SGS2 is in repair right now, and it's unfortunate because I just started using CM9 for 2 weeks or so and it was getting REAL stable after the video camera fix, etc. I used my Nexus S for the last 3 weeks until I complained enough to Microsoft about the Windows Phone challenge that they finally let me get a Titan II in place of waiting 6 weeks for a Focus S.
So here it goes. As much as my Nexus S helps me get around, and as much as I love flashing nightlies (now I'm sticking to my touchpad for nightly flashing craze), I decided to use WP7 for the next month or so until my SGS2 gets back. Expansys is repairing my SGS2, and they're sending it abroad, so I wouldn't be surprised if it took til June. Very sad because I really want a HTC One X or SGS3...
Anyway back to Windows Phone:
1) Form factor: Horrible size. 4.7" is too large for me. Sure having a large screen is nice, but I've done it all. iPhone 3GS, iPod Touch, Motorola Droid, Nexus S, and SGS2. The SGS2 was on the border of being too large, and the Nexus S was just about right. But the SGS2 screen was perfect.
Titan II's 4.7" is WAY too big. I have trouble holding it well. I can definitely grip it, but sometimes it feels clunky. For reference I wear medium sized gloves in my laboratory work. It's obvoiusly not horrible, but I think 4-4.3" is just about right for me. The phone could be thinner also. It's about 1mm too thick for me.
2) Speed: WP7 is a single core OS, and it's decent. My SGS2 can be faster in some tasks, but this clearly is a bit faster than my Nexus S. The animations do help cover up load time, but there's never a time where I'm impatiently waiting for stuff to load. It's not as fast as a dual or quad core I'm sure, but it's FAST enough where no one is complaining.
3) Screen: Low PPI for the LOSE. Also coming from two SAMOLED screens, it's hard to get used to the colors. The Nokia Lumia 900 looked better than the Titan 2 for sure. On the other hand I find it weird because in my experience with the Incredible S, the SLCD was beautiful. The Titan 2 seems to pale. Of course, a calibrated screen helps too. I've seen uncalibrated Nexus Ses and my calibrated one blows them out of the water. The same goes with SGS2s. So perhaps its the lack of punchy colors that's getting to me. I'm probably too used to better PPI, but I can definitely see fuzziness in text. I guess this is why I pushed hard for the Lumia 900 at the Windows Phone challenge but they refused to give it to me. The Focus S probably would've been a good choice given how much I love my SGS2.
4) Apps: What the hell. Apps just suck. You can't check into the Yelp app, and the Google+ app is the web app. The Twitter app is beyond horrendous. No push notifications, nothing.
I can't have a gChat app work well either. I know iOS is not known for multitasking, but the day push notifications hit the ground in 2009, we could get longass push sessions on any IM client. The push on WP7 is at best... broken. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
5) The OS: I certainly like the UI and it's a well polished OS. However, I see it as a very limited OS. I guess kinda like Apple iOS? Android you can definitely expand on it and invoke a lot of powerful features through 3rd party apps, but you're definitely more limited in iOS and WP7. The unfortunate part about WP7 is that Apple has probably spent tons of hours on focus groups and in house testing to pick a solution that at least makes sense for most people. In WP7, some of the choices just... don't make sense. Both companies clearly used the walled garden strategy. You're locked into what they think is best for you. But with Apple, they made choices that least identify with more people. In WP7, it's just pure frustration. Here are some examples:
Why can't I easily toggle between silence/vibrate/vibrate+ring? You can in Android, and part of that was made possible with CyanogenMod (for GB), and now ICS (is it in ICS or is it just CM9?). I really hate having to comb through the settings to silence my phone because I dont' want to hear emails go off at night. Yeah I can turn off the ringer with the volume rocker but it vibrates still. How dumb Microsoft.
I also hate the keyboard. I hate having to get a spacebar after selecting a suggested word. I realize Android has this too, but custom keyboards in Android at least have the option to turn it off. What the hell is the point of picking suggested words when I can't even use them in login forms because I have to remember to delete the space? Oh well. I guess this is touchscreen standard since WP7 and Android do it.
The app drawer now that I think of it is the most inefficient piece of shit ever. A list of apps is nice UI, but it's not very functional. It's a single list. In Android at least hte app drawer is a grid, just like the iPhone. You can see MANY apps at once. What if I have 100 apps on WP7? How long will I be scrolling for?
The concept of tiles is nice, but once again this is a single page. It'd be nice to have multiple pages like multiple homescreens in Android. In the end I just have to scroll too far. And since I have to pin stuff in order to get it to run in the background, there's just too much crap.
My biggest complaint (and I don't know how valid this is because the iPhone sucks at this too) coming from CyanogenMod, is the lack of a way to quickly toggle Wifi, Bluetooth, Airplane mode, etc. I absolutely LOVE the notification power widgets from CM7, and now CM9. I have people tell me to just use power widget and waste desktop space, but why bother? The notification power widgets lets you pick SO many things including flashlight, sound, brightness, etc. I just want to switch wifi on and off my stupid Windows Phone. Same with bluetooth. But given how BAD iOS is with this too, I suppose it should be acceptable. I guess this is my main complaint from Android and a major plus. I'm also glad manufacturers like Samsung really figured this out in TouchWiz and realized how important this is.
6) What I will miss out on.
So coming from Android, I feel like I do miss out on a few nice OS features, but overall, I think I won't be tweeting as much because Twitter blows on WP7.
I also probably will be updating my status on FB/Google+ a lot less simply because the apps suck too. Having a desktop widget on Android made it easy to Twitter/Facebook instantly. This is a huge plus for Android, because it's just as annoying to deal with this on WP7 as it is for iOS. I'd probably still be able to photo post though.
However, I do LOVE the 4th & Mayor App. I'm a huge Foursquare fanatic, and this was very well done on WP7. The fact you can pin the checkin page to your Live Tiles is amazing. It's like getting to skip laucnhing the 4sq app and just jumping to the Check In page. I'd like that in Android. Perhaps Launcher Pro gestures can do this? or Go Launcher? Not sure.
7) Battery drain
This has been amazing. I thought an LTE phone would kill me, but it's doing quite well. Also did I mention the 20 Mbit downloads? Hell yeah! I get through a day of use with plenty of battery left.
However I attribute this to the fact that I don't have much on my phone right now. I used to power on my Android phone to scroll around my Friendstream widget to read FB and Twitter updates. I'd also read Pulse News, and chat on Gchat a lot. Plus, my Google Latitude updated quite frequently. Comparing my WP7 to Android for Latitude updates, I got at least 10-15 location updates along a 30 minute commute. Compare that with just the endpoints of my destinations today. I see 4 spots on my Latitude map today, but like 500 yesterday. That probably cut down a lot on battery drain.
I think I ended up spending a lot less time with the phone on and screen on. The phone probably also spent less time awake simply because there are fewer wakelock events (Latitude and GChat took most of it on my Android phones).
I think the larger battery certainly helped too, but overall WP7 battery is decent for a day's use. I think it's far TOO easy to start draining your battery in no time on Android. I'd say half our friends ran out of battery by the evening when we went to NYC a few weeks ago. I did too by 10pm or so, but I had a spare battery and kept us going. I don't really see myself needing a spare battery with WP7, but perhaps.
8) Overall: I think I'll survive for a month at least on this. I know I'll have to tell my gf and other friends who use latitude to probably not rely on my location as much. Additionally, it'll be hard to keep up with gchat on my phone, so I'll be difficult to reach. But I think overall I'll survive. It does a few of the important things I like decently like 4square, and at least being able to read my Fb/Twitter updates through the People app. It's just not as convenient because it was all on my homescreen before.
I think the takeaway was how valuable my Android phone is and how I really need to get back on Android ASAP. This probably also means I can't handle iOS, but I think if I force myself, I should be able to deal with any OS...the experience just won't be that great.
===================================================
Initial opinion below:
Feel free to merge with Quebert, but lots of people think we're similar because we always talk about Android's lag fest.
So I have 3 Android phones--Milestone(Droid), Nexus S, and SGS2. My SGS2 is in repair right now, and it's unfortunate because I just started using CM9 for 2 weeks or so and it was getting REAL stable after the video camera fix, etc. I used my Nexus S for the last 3 weeks until I complained enough to Microsoft about the Windows Phone challenge that they finally let me get a Titan II in place of waiting 6 weeks for a Focus S.
So here it goes. As much as my Nexus S helps me get around, and as much as I love flashing nightlies (now I'm sticking to my touchpad for nightly flashing craze), I decided to use WP7 for the next month or so until my SGS2 gets back. Expansys is repairing my SGS2, and they're sending it abroad, so I wouldn't be surprised if it took til June. Very sad because I really want a HTC One X or SGS3...
Anyway back to Windows Phone:
1) Form factor: Horrible size. 4.7" is too large for me. Sure having a large screen is nice, but I've done it all. iPhone 3GS, iPod Touch, Motorola Droid, Nexus S, and SGS2. The SGS2 was on the border of being too large, and the Nexus S was just about right. But the SGS2 screen was perfect.
Titan II's 4.7" is WAY too big. I have trouble holding it well. I can definitely grip it, but sometimes it feels clunky. For reference I wear medium sized gloves in my laboratory work. It's obvoiusly not horrible, but I think 4-4.3" is just about right for me. The phone could be thinner also. It's about 1mm too thick for me.
2) Speed: WP7 is a single core OS, and it's decent. My SGS2 can be faster in some tasks, but this clearly is a bit faster than my Nexus S. The animations do help cover up load time, but there's never a time where I'm impatiently waiting for stuff to load. It's not as fast as a dual or quad core I'm sure, but it's FAST enough where no one is complaining.
3) Screen: Low PPI for the LOSE. Also coming from two SAMOLED screens, it's hard to get used to the colors. The Nokia Lumia 900 looked better than the Titan 2 for sure. On the other hand I find it weird because in my experience with the Incredible S, the SLCD was beautiful. The Titan 2 seems to pale. Of course, a calibrated screen helps too. I've seen uncalibrated Nexus Ses and my calibrated one blows them out of the water. The same goes with SGS2s. So perhaps its the lack of punchy colors that's getting to me. I'm probably too used to better PPI, but I can definitely see fuzziness in text. I guess this is why I pushed hard for the Lumia 900 at the Windows Phone challenge but they refused to give it to me. The Focus S probably would've been a good choice given how much I love my SGS2.
4) Apps: What the hell. Apps just suck. You can't check into the Yelp app, and the Google+ app is the web app. The Twitter app is beyond horrendous. No push notifications, nothing.
I can't have a gChat app work well either. I know iOS is not known for multitasking, but the day push notifications hit the ground in 2009, we could get longass push sessions on any IM client. The push on WP7 is at best... broken. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
5) The OS: I certainly like the UI and it's a well polished OS. However, I see it as a very limited OS. I guess kinda like Apple iOS? Android you can definitely expand on it and invoke a lot of powerful features through 3rd party apps, but you're definitely more limited in iOS and WP7. The unfortunate part about WP7 is that Apple has probably spent tons of hours on focus groups and in house testing to pick a solution that at least makes sense for most people. In WP7, some of the choices just... don't make sense. Both companies clearly used the walled garden strategy. You're locked into what they think is best for you. But with Apple, they made choices that least identify with more people. In WP7, it's just pure frustration. Here are some examples:
Why can't I easily toggle between silence/vibrate/vibrate+ring? You can in Android, and part of that was made possible with CyanogenMod (for GB), and now ICS (is it in ICS or is it just CM9?). I really hate having to comb through the settings to silence my phone because I dont' want to hear emails go off at night. Yeah I can turn off the ringer with the volume rocker but it vibrates still. How dumb Microsoft.
I also hate the keyboard. I hate having to get a spacebar after selecting a suggested word. I realize Android has this too, but custom keyboards in Android at least have the option to turn it off. What the hell is the point of picking suggested words when I can't even use them in login forms because I have to remember to delete the space? Oh well. I guess this is touchscreen standard since WP7 and Android do it.
The app drawer now that I think of it is the most inefficient piece of shit ever. A list of apps is nice UI, but it's not very functional. It's a single list. In Android at least hte app drawer is a grid, just like the iPhone. You can see MANY apps at once. What if I have 100 apps on WP7? How long will I be scrolling for?
The concept of tiles is nice, but once again this is a single page. It'd be nice to have multiple pages like multiple homescreens in Android. In the end I just have to scroll too far. And since I have to pin stuff in order to get it to run in the background, there's just too much crap.
My biggest complaint (and I don't know how valid this is because the iPhone sucks at this too) coming from CyanogenMod, is the lack of a way to quickly toggle Wifi, Bluetooth, Airplane mode, etc. I absolutely LOVE the notification power widgets from CM7, and now CM9. I have people tell me to just use power widget and waste desktop space, but why bother? The notification power widgets lets you pick SO many things including flashlight, sound, brightness, etc. I just want to switch wifi on and off my stupid Windows Phone. Same with bluetooth. But given how BAD iOS is with this too, I suppose it should be acceptable. I guess this is my main complaint from Android and a major plus. I'm also glad manufacturers like Samsung really figured this out in TouchWiz and realized how important this is.
6) What I will miss out on.
So coming from Android, I feel like I do miss out on a few nice OS features, but overall, I think I won't be tweeting as much because Twitter blows on WP7.
I also probably will be updating my status on FB/Google+ a lot less simply because the apps suck too. Having a desktop widget on Android made it easy to Twitter/Facebook instantly. This is a huge plus for Android, because it's just as annoying to deal with this on WP7 as it is for iOS. I'd probably still be able to photo post though.
However, I do LOVE the 4th & Mayor App. I'm a huge Foursquare fanatic, and this was very well done on WP7. The fact you can pin the checkin page to your Live Tiles is amazing. It's like getting to skip laucnhing the 4sq app and just jumping to the Check In page. I'd like that in Android. Perhaps Launcher Pro gestures can do this? or Go Launcher? Not sure.
7) Battery drain
This has been amazing. I thought an LTE phone would kill me, but it's doing quite well. Also did I mention the 20 Mbit downloads? Hell yeah! I get through a day of use with plenty of battery left.
However I attribute this to the fact that I don't have much on my phone right now. I used to power on my Android phone to scroll around my Friendstream widget to read FB and Twitter updates. I'd also read Pulse News, and chat on Gchat a lot. Plus, my Google Latitude updated quite frequently. Comparing my WP7 to Android for Latitude updates, I got at least 10-15 location updates along a 30 minute commute. Compare that with just the endpoints of my destinations today. I see 4 spots on my Latitude map today, but like 500 yesterday. That probably cut down a lot on battery drain.
I think I ended up spending a lot less time with the phone on and screen on. The phone probably also spent less time awake simply because there are fewer wakelock events (Latitude and GChat took most of it on my Android phones).
I think the larger battery certainly helped too, but overall WP7 battery is decent for a day's use. I think it's far TOO easy to start draining your battery in no time on Android. I'd say half our friends ran out of battery by the evening when we went to NYC a few weeks ago. I did too by 10pm or so, but I had a spare battery and kept us going. I don't really see myself needing a spare battery with WP7, but perhaps.
8) Overall: I think I'll survive for a month at least on this. I know I'll have to tell my gf and other friends who use latitude to probably not rely on my location as much. Additionally, it'll be hard to keep up with gchat on my phone, so I'll be difficult to reach. But I think overall I'll survive. It does a few of the important things I like decently like 4square, and at least being able to read my Fb/Twitter updates through the People app. It's just not as convenient because it was all on my homescreen before.
I think the takeaway was how valuable my Android phone is and how I really need to get back on Android ASAP. This probably also means I can't handle iOS, but I think if I force myself, I should be able to deal with any OS...the experience just won't be that great.
Last edited:
Facebook
Twitter