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iPhone or Droid? Which One Do You Personally Prefer?

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iPhone or Droid? Which One Do You Personally Prefer?

  • iPhone

  • Droid

  • other / no preference

Results are only viewable after voting.
If the iPhone5 has flash support, I'll probably consider it. I've stuck to dumbphones for a long time, and I'm actually thinking about downgrading to a flip phone (have a touch screen with qwerty slider dumbphone now). None of the current phones really interest me enough to bother switching. And I say this even while working for a major telecom company in Canada, so I get a super deal on the rate plan. I just can't be bothered enough to upgrade to, let's say an HTC Desire HD or Samsung Galaxy 4G or iPhone4. I've seen all of them in action and while sure they're nice, I really don't want to charge my phone 1+ times per day. I don't want to give up phone or speakerphone capability/quality, I don't want to give up typing ease with a good actual keyboard, etc.

However, if the iPhone5 does have flash, or if an Android phone comes out that lasts 2-3 days with similar usage to what I do now.. then I'm sure I'll be sold. I have to admit, being able to do everything one of these devices does, even if it does only last 1 day on a charge... it's still good.

Lots of people at work got the Desire HD. They all carry their charger with them. ugh... screw that. I got my mother the iPhone4, and it seems to be pretty good for the battery. The overall experience is not bad, but being forced to do apple-everything is kinda annoying. I do have to say though, what it does it does do pretty well. Very fluid experience, everything feels very premium (easy to say compared to my cheapo dumbphone I suppose lol).

You can consider me one of the anti-apple people, more or less. I think they did an excellent job on the iPhone though. Even if I pretty much hate Macs, I can admit that the iPhone is a damn good smartphone. This isn't to knock any Android phones though, but I just can't see myself being convinced to get one if the battery life isn't at least as good as the iPhone! Though.. I have to say the Super AMOLED screens are damn nice.
 
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Having owned and used both, I prefer Android, but only by a slight margin. I went from an iPhone 3GS to a Samsung Galaxy S (the first one, not the SGS II) and here's my general observations:

iOS/iPhone 3GS strengths:

-buttery smooth scrolling apps and internet
-(almost) everything just works on the iPhone
-easy to use. My dad and 60+ year old aunt can navigate their way around their iPhones no problem
-fewer crashes. I've had way too many apps crash on my SGS. Granted, I multitask a lot more on the Android, but it does have double the RAM and almost double the processor speed as the iPhone 3GS.
-much better selection of games. I can't believe Plants vs. Zombies doesn't exist on Android yet! No emulated console games on Droid either (Shining Force, Final Fantasy, etc.)
-iTunes, while annoying, syncs quickly and works 100% of the time
-Autocorrect, while at times too strong, does a good job with typos and I felt I type faster on the iPhone than the regular Android keyboard

iPhone 3GS weaknesses:

-screen is positively awful by today's standards. Low resolution, colours don't "pop" like they do on the Galaxy, and 3.5" is too small for me
-browsing the internet by WiFi or 3G is slow compared to the iPhone 4 or any Android phone from the last year and a half
-some apps that are free on Android cost $$ on Apple
-when downloading stuff from the Apple App store on the phone, you can't do nearly as much as you can on Android


Android Strenghts:

-widgets are a "killer app" that Apple doesn't have anything comparable yet
-the "pull down" menu at the top of the OS is fantastic, and a great way to change settings
-support for divX/mp4!!!!! A huge and underrated feature
-having more buttons (Back and Settings/Menu) means screen real estate isn't taken up by these buttons in the OS
-much easier to install custom ringtones, UI interfaces, etc.
-better selection of hardware, and unless you have an iPhone 4, you can get a used Android phone for $200-250 with a 4" screen, 1 GHz processor and 512MB of RAM that blows the iPhone 3GS out of the water.
-Better selection of 3rd party apps - and if you root your phone, you can even overclock and change all sorts of system settings
-In general, you can get all sorts of Android phones with a 4-4.5" screen today. The biggest iPhone is still 3.5" - a dealbreaker for me
-replaceable battery. Means you can carry 2 if you need
-faster Internet Browsing
-much more customizable screens
-3rd party keyboards; fantastic!

Android weaknesses

Buggy! I've had 10x the app crashes on Android vs. Apple. It really is like (early) Mac vs. PC all over again
-Slow/laggy page turns. Why does Android lag sometimes with a 1GHz processor when Apple works fine with 400-600 MHz. Are Widgets really that taxing?
-fewer high quality games on Android! This surprised me, but I think moving forward more games will be cross platform
-Platform fragmentation -- this is one of my annoyances with Android -- they need to nail down the interface. Should Android have 3 main buttons (my preference) or 4? Do apps need to be coded for a slide-out keyboard or not? Personally, I think the interface of the international Samsung Galaxy S II is better because it's easier to locate the button you want in the dark or any situation: big, raised home button in the middle, back button on the right, menu on the left. As Apple shows, less is more!
-for samsung users: Kies is a buggy piece of crap -- at least iTunes works! I couldn't update the OS on my wife's SGS until I figured out that it kept freezing because when I went to back up her phone, it couldn't sync contacts because no Microsoft Outlook email was configured on her PC.
-----------


Having used both phone OSes, both have a long way to go. Apple has the smooth interface, the "one-stop-shop" of iTunes (a good way to find podcasts and other fun things in addition to apps), and stability.

Android has better hardware with bigger screens, almost infinitely more customizeability with Widgets, custom keyboards and new UI's. However, with (much) more power comes lag, occasional app crashes, an App store that you need to navigate like a minefield because there are 3rd party apps (usually unreleased games and the like) that are a waste of money or worse - veiled password theft programs!

Being a PC user, I lean slightly towards Android for its power and customization, but I don't hesitate to recommend Apple for all of my elderly relatives and non-techophile friends.
 
zCypher said:
However, if the iPhone5 does have flash, or if an Android phone comes out that lasts 2-3 days with similar usage to what I do now.. then I'm sure I'll be sold. I have to admit, being able to do everything one of these devices does, even if it does only last 1 day on a charge... it's still good.

Y.
Click to expand...

One of the nice things I've seen for several Android phones that's great for battery nuts like us is extended batteries and power packs, like this:

http://samsunggalaxysforums.com/sho...ective-case-extended-battery-power-pack-combo

You can get a power pack like this one that adds a second battery and a fatter back for your phone, or a single, uber fat battery that comes with an extended cover.

While you can get an extended battery for the iPhone, it goes in the one place it can: the charge cable port. This adds an annoying bulge below the phone that a replacement battery/"backpack" does not.
 
I dunno about the Market, but PvZ has been on Amazon's app store for ages now. You should get it. 😉
 
Ksyder said:
free Amazon appstore
Click to expand...

Glad someone mentioned this. Amazon officially puts Android over the top of iOS for me. iOS may have the better app store overall, but iOS's appstore doesn't give me hundreds of dollars worth of free apps a year. The best app is one I can use freely because I don't have to justify buying it.
 
poofyhairguy said:
Glad someone mentioned this. Amazon officially puts Android over the top of iOS for me. iOS may have the better app store overall, but iOS's appstore doesn't give me hundreds of dollars worth of free apps a year. The best app is one I can use freely because I don't have to justify buying it.
Click to expand...

no smack no soul
 
I just switched to WP7(.5, I put Mango on) from Android. Happy with it.

Slick performance, no stutters or hesitations or "did it register my swipe"...email good. IE9 is very good. Been happy so far, I did buy a standalone GPS so I'm not tied to the phone anymore. Oh, and good battery life. If I had to put a non-techy person on a smartphone, I would say iPhone or WP7.
 
poofyhairguy said:
Glad someone mentioned this. Amazon officially puts Android over the top of iOS for me. iOS may have the better app store overall, but iOS's appstore doesn't give me hundreds of dollars worth of free apps a year. The best app is one I can use freely because I don't have to justify buying it.
Click to expand...

There have been several iOS apps that did this even before the Amazon store existed...

Openfeint has theirs, but that's obviously openfeint games only. Free App a Day was good but started lacking as of late because they couldn't get devs to participate. There were others as well. I got many free apps over the past few years on my phone.

Amazons app is still well done and adds a lot to android, but in this case they were certainly the follower in offering a free app a day. Hard to use that as a mobile phone comparison when the competitor had it first.
 
zCypher said:
If the iPhone5 has flash support, I'll probably consider it. I've stuck to dumbphones for a long time, and I'm actually thinking about downgrading to a flip phone (have a touch screen with qwerty slider dumbphone now). None of the current phones really interest me enough to bother switching. And I say this even while working for a major telecom company in Canada, so I get a super deal on the rate plan. I just can't be bothered enough to upgrade to, let's say an HTC Desire HD or Samsung Galaxy 4G or iPhone4. I've seen all of them in action and while sure they're nice, I really don't want to charge my phone 1+ times per day. I don't want to give up phone or speakerphone capability/quality, I don't want to give up typing ease with a good actual keyboard, etc.

However, if the iPhone5 does have flash, or if an Android phone comes out that lasts 2-3 days with similar usage to what I do now.. then I'm sure I'll be sold. I have to admit, being able to do everything one of these devices does, even if it does only last 1 day on a charge... it's still good.

Lots of people at work got the Desire HD. They all carry their charger with them. ugh... screw that. I got my mother the iPhone4, and it seems to be pretty good for the battery. The overall experience is not bad, but being forced to do apple-everything is kinda annoying. I do have to say though, what it does it does do pretty well. Very fluid experience, everything feels very premium (easy to say compared to my cheapo dumbphone I suppose lol).

You can consider me one of the anti-apple people, more or less. I think they did an excellent job on the iPhone though. Even if I pretty much hate Macs, I can admit that the iPhone is a damn good smartphone. This isn't to knock any Android phones though, but I just can't see myself being convinced to get one if the battery life isn't at least as good as the iPhone! Though.. I have to say the Super AMOLED screens are damn nice.
Click to expand...

What about flash makes it a must have on your phone? When Android first announced flash support I was excited. In actual use it sucks. Makes browsing slow and video streaming with imbedded flash on mobile browsers is mediocre at best. I keep flash turned off and the only time I even attempt to use it is for restaurant websites that are essentially all flash and even then it doesn't work well as it was designed way to much around drop down hover menu's that just don't work well on mobiles. Flash on phones is just way overrated in general.
 
GTSRguy said:
iPhone

99.5% of Droid users buy a droid becasue they dont like Apple, its not a logical choice its just they cant buy anything from Apple. Every single freind i have, who owns a droid is an "apple hater". 100% of them, there is noone who owns a droid who is neutral.
Click to expand...

i use a droid because 99.5% of apple users really are stupid enough to beleive what GTSRguy typed



however ive used a ipod touch - might as well be an iphone and TBH i fine nothing about it better then android. for me android acts more like a typical computer, desktop interface where you launch stuff from. makes logical sence to me. apple not so much

and as others have said. android has the tech lead. develops faster, more hackable, ...
 
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I like the hardware of Android, but I don't like the software. The longer I've been using my iPhone, the more I'm tied with the OS.

I play around with my friend's Android phone here and there and I can't picture myself using the OS.
 
Anubis said:
however ive used a ipod touch - might as well be an iphone and TBH i fine nothing about it better then android. for me android acts more like a typical computer, desktop interface where you launch stuff from. makes logical sence to me. apple not so much
Click to expand...

Icons existing on pages, which are like desktops, is pretty PC-like. 😛

Anubis said:
android has the tech lead
Click to expand...

The only technological advantage that I've seen an Android device present over an iOS device is a larger screen, and given all the complaining about Pentile, I don't know if I'd classify the larger screens as "better."

The A5 has been available in the iPad 2 since March, and there still isn't a SoC used in any Android device that is faster than it. The only device I see out-performing the A5 would be the Playstation Vita, and that's because it uses the quad-core version of the same GPU.
 
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