1: Has iOS always been GPU accelerated?
Yes
2: Are there any current Android devices with GPUs worse than the first gen iPhone's?
This is kind of two parts, the simple answer is yes, there are some very low end Android devices in production. Even if that were not the case, even if we limited it exclusively to the fastest handsets available which are all considerably faster then that, just because a GPU call works correctly on say, an Andreno part, doesn't mean the same call will behave the same way on a PowerVR part without special coding. Then you also have the issue of each GPU has a different driver on each device and even on each device you have multiple versions of Android running which splits the market apart even further. The level of code involved with getting a cross platform piece of software working can be an exponential increase. Even when looking at CPU level performance, do you go for single core 'basic' ARM, FPU/Neon ARM, basic multi core ARM, or FPU/Neon multi core ARM. I guess the best comparison would be when looking at the consoles versus PCs. With the exact same amount of hardware the consoles will always butcher PCs precisely because of these reasons. GPU differences are far more significant then CPU architecture differences, and even then it is a considerable amount.
3: Other than 3.0, is there a STOCK version of Android that supports GPU acceleration?
That is a bit of a trick question, wouldn't you say? What you are asking is does the Nexus line support GPU acceleration, the answer to which is minimal on the S based on that latest build information I have seen. Blur, Sense, TouchWiz- none of those are stock, all of them are more then welcome to add full GPU acceleration if they so wish. SPB normally sells their products to OEMs, none of them bit with Android so they took it straight to the general consumer. Any of the handset makers could have full GPU acceleration for their parts up tomorrow(well, anything with a reasonably powerful GPU) if they wanted to. The software is up and running for anyone to check out, Android has full GPU acceleration available today.
I disagree. I would argue that Android's success is due to multiple factors, and the customization aspect is probably not that high on the list for the average consumer. Handset choice (keyboard/no keyboard, screen size, things like that) is almost certainly part of it, as is availability on all the national carriers, and lower price on some handsets than the iPhone.
All of those factors fall under customization to a degree. Form factors, manufacturers, carriers, all of those options exist because of the way in which Android was built from the ground up both as a piece of software and as a business model.
I agree that it isn't the absolute best method in the world
According to Apple, it is the best method. The big difference between Apple and Google is that Google doesn't try and tell you it is. They say 'here it is, go ahead and rip it apart and build it better, we'll even host the files for you and sell it for you if you want'. It's a different mindset.
I said that Android's problem is the same as Linux's in the regard that they both can't get enough of solving clever engineering problems while leaving usability to flounder and die.
My phone chimes, by unlocking my screen I get the weather report, updated sports scores, real time stock prices and any current texts that have been sent to me-
without touching anything after I unlock it. To me, that is usability on an entirely different level then what Apple has on offer. If I want to make my Android phones work like they were an iPhone I can- the inverse isn't remotely close to true. To me, that is a much larger usability issue then even the most performance starved Android parts have running 1.5. Even sites that have been championing the iPhone for years have started to acknowledge it as of now.
You care to clarify the statement that you made that things are playing out the same?
Absolutely. Apple decides to create a new system from the ground up with unheard of polish and simplicity for an emerging market. Google(MS) decides to take a complex piece of software with significant potential and start polishing it enough to make it useable. First versions come out, Apple nigh humiliates the competitor by being vastly superior in almost every respect. Second major version comes out, Apple changes almost nothing besides bumping up the specs a bit, competition still far behind. Third major version comes out, all of the sudden the competition has made enormous strides, still not up to the polish of the Apple counterpart, but the usability has made enormous strides and is a viable alternative. Apple has made some tweaks, and bumped the specs some more, but it is clear they aren't trying to remain competitive and are instead focusing on filling the needs of their loyal customers and only them. By the time the fourth major version rolls around, Apple has been eclipsed by a considerable margin. Apple has refused to innovate and instead just keeps offering minor tweaks and hardware bumps designed to keep their existing customers buying their products. They have shown no interest in making inroads into the broader market, even though they paved the way for that market in the first place.
I would say right at this point this is about where we are. Android is in the Win9x realm. iOS is still more polished, has a more uniform look and feel, has a much higher degree of polish on their typical applications, and is quickly being dwarfed by Android. Android has all the downsides Win9x machines had at the time too, uneven performance, shoddy hardware giving very bad impressions of the platform, sloppy builds all over the place(drivers for Win9x in the early days....ugh).
Up until this point, Apple still had a viable shot at retaking supremacy if not on a marketshare basis, at least on a technological one. But that didn't happen. Up until OSX shipped Mac OS still had manual memory assignment on a per application basis(they hid it well in later builds, but it *always* caused me problems). By the time Apple got their head out of their @ss and moved to a modern OS it was too late. Win2K/WinXP had become a very highly polished OS- perhaps not as pretty as what the Apple loyalists viewed the Mac offering as, but enough so that noone was offended by it and it worked so smoothly with everything, which Mac's didn't, that the Windows dominance was nigh untouchable.
I would say most accurately right now Android is close to the Win95 range, but not quite there(close though). Right now Google is still working out some of the serious issues of their open style architecture, but those issues raw hardware will solve most of(performance related that is). With Honeycomb requiring GPU level acceleration that gives them a base line for which to build upon even if it is limited to the tablet space atm(for another Windows comparison- it is much like Windows NT, and for the record Apple whipped NT's @ss for a while in that market until the got things sorted) and creates another fork. Long term that fork coming back around to the handset(general consumer) market is what Apple needs to fear. If they are not competitive by that point, they have lost any long term oppurtunity.
This is playing out so close to the Windows versus Macintosh battle honestly it is a bit creepy. Even the forking, all done before and each time we have an early Apple win followed by their refusal to make meaningful updates until it was far too late.
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