The Lust

Posted By: Adam 6 Comments

Nexus One, by GoogleYes, it is that time again.

I am once again lusting after a new gadget. This time, it's the Nexus One cell phone, by Google.

Don't get me wrong, I love my iPhone. It's the best phone, and the best mp3 player, and the best mobile web browser I've ever had. But that doesn't mean there isn't room for improvement. Every now and then I think, "I wish it would just do this one little thing in this slightly different way…"

When the Motorola Droid came out, I was tempted to take a close look at it — and in a sense I did — but our contract with AT&T still had around a year remaining, and I didn't see any need to pay early termination fees. The "droid" also has its own problems.

For starters, its bigger and heavier than an iPhone. While I might enjoy a slightly larger screen, the droid was also thicker. One of the things I love about the iPhone is that it doesn't add a lot of bulk to my pocket, or necessitate a belt clip/holster (like my Treo did). Getting a big, heavy phone to replace a small light one would go in the "con's" column, not the "pro's".

While I do sort of miss the hardware keyboard of my previous Treo and Blackberry phones, I get by just fine with the "soft" (touch-screen) keyboard in the iPhone. It's not perfect, and having seen some of the replacement keyboards available on Android OS (the operating system used by the Droid and the Nexus One), it could be better. But that said, I never find myself cursing the iPhone's soft keyboard. Well, I take that back. I curse it when it gets in the way. Especially in landscape view, the keyboard and system bar at the top combined take up somewhere around 75% of the screen, by my estimates. That leaves just enough room for 1-2 lines of text. So while it's nice to be able to use the landscape keyboard when writing text messages, it makes scrolling up to read previous messages a bit painful.

Multi-touch (pinch-to-zoom, for example) was also not available on the Droid until recently. Updates are still being sent out to users, so there are still some Droid phones in the wild without multi-touch. Going forward, I can't imagine a new touch screen smartphone that doesn't use multi-touch being successful.

I also feel like there are some things the iPhone could do better, but don't have much to compare them with on Android (that I know of). For example, Apple added "push" notifications to the iPhone, so that new email, facebook, etc, can all do immediate notification when something happens. That's great, but I don't want to get woken up at 3am because the latest Snow Thrower Enthusiast Newsletter is out. The only time I want the phone to make noise between 10pm and 6am is for phone calls. Is that too much to ask? Apparently.

Flash on the iPhone (by TuttleTree)There are other things that tick me off about the iPhone, too. The lack of Flash Player support is an often cited case of Apple seemingly arbitrarily blocking applications from the phone. The reasoning is not truly known to the public, but there is speculation that it's because Flash support would lead to applications developed in Flash and available on the web, where Apple wouldn't get a cut of any revenue the application developer earns. The why isn't terribly important, but what is important is the fact that nearly every other smartphone platform supports Flash, including the Nexus One.

Another example of functionality blocked from Apple's "Walled Garden" is Google Voice. And yes, it's true that Google has figured out a way to make it work via the web, but it's not the same experience you get from a native application. And in my opinion, what I'm paying for is the experience.

Of course, no list of complaints about the iPhone would be complete without a gripe or two about AT&T's service. Dropped calls are ridiculously frequent, and they'll be charging extra for tethering (connecting my phone to my laptop to get the laptop online when away from WiFi — like on the train), when in reality the only thing that I would get for the extra money is the right to tether. Data won't come any faster or be much different from just using the browser on the phone, it's just got a full size screen and keyboard. Essentially, charging for nothing. I don't know what the tethering situation is for the Nexus One, but it couldn't be worse than the iPhone. The Nexus One will be available on Verizon in "Spring 2010".

Of course, the Nexus One isn't perfect. I don't have the slightest idea why the Blackberry-style track-ball was included. Even Blackberry isn't using it any more — the latest Curve uses a small trackpad, and the Storm only has a touch-screen, like the iPhone. That said, the Nexus One is the most powerful phone on the market today, with the fastest processor you can find in a cell phone. It has an expandable memory slot that supports Micro-SD cards twice the size of my iPhone's hard drive. It has a better camera, an LED flash, and a 2nd microphone used to cancel out ambient noise from phone calls.

So far, when weighing my options, I'm leaning heavily toward switching to the Nexus One and Verizon when our AT&T contract is up in October. Maybe — if I'm lucky — they'll have a new model out by then without the ridiculous track ball.

6 responses to “The Lust”

  1. If you sell your iPhone, let me know :)

    MomT

    MomT ~ Feb 13, 2010 at 12:22 PM

  2. I'm at work so I can't get too in depth about this but I noticed a few arguments that are really not worth arguing.

    Multitouch on the droid isn't native - and isn't pushed out to each phone to fully enable it in everything. Certain applications (I don't know which) are capable of utilizing it. Which I feel means that its reasonable to say that its on point with or slightly behind the iPhone, since it comes by default with the iPhone.

    Push Notifications - I don't know what you've been doing but the only notifications that make noise for me are text messages and phone calls. Facebook, FML and all the other apps I have that do push notifications (several) tend to be silent. It prompts you on the idle screen and the lock screen that you have new notifications but is otherwise completely ignorable. L2set settings.

    IIRC, Google Voice was barred from the appstore. I'm not really sure why but it's regardless, the important thing is that it was. Skype and several other VoIP web based calling services including Vonage are available and advertised through the appstore. Just because they have a gripe with Google doesn't mean they're holding out on the end user from having the same functionality.

    Tethering is the SAME COST at AT&T and Verizon. You may complain about the extra $30 but its gonna be the same $30 at VZW anyways. Same as it is on Blackberry's, same as it is on every. other. dataphone. Data xfer isn't free on networks like text messaging is. It's prohibitively expensive for someone to use their phone to tether a computer when they don't realize that its meant for more moderated use - someone torrenting for 12 hours costs themselves and the provider a lot of money. If you're going to gripe, gripe about paying for text messages because they cost next to nothing for the provider. Data isn't free.

    Flash I don't have much info on so I'll pass on that.

    You mentioned the mSD slot to expand the memory on the phone. It's been a while but last time I checked on a 32g mSD card it was $100. Don't forget to include that in the cost of the phone ($299 most likely) so you're paying $100 more for the same storage capacity. Difference being its not covered under the phones warranty and if you ever take it out take care not to lose it. Oh wait, my bad - Amazon doesn't HAVE any 32g microSD cards; the 16g cards range from $100-200! I think thats what you have now anyways - isn't this supposed to be an upgrade?

    (http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_4_7?url=search-alias%3Delectronics&field-keywords=microsdhc+32gb&sprefix=microSD)

    Dropped calls happen - in my experience they happened more when I had Verizon than since I've had AT&T but thats just me. If you're having problems maybe you should go to a local (Corporate) store and see if there is something that can be done. Usually signal and dropped call issue's are solved by simply changing the SIM card (which is free).

    I haven't checked the hardware of the Nexus One at all but you seem to have more info than I do on that and its pretty straightforward. But we both know that come this summer Apple will have something up its sleeve to counteroffer any phone running Android - it's bound to happen.

    justinT

    justinT ~ Feb 14, 2010 at 12:07 PM

  3. And one more comment to the point of dropped calls: It even happens with Verizon. Instead of getting a new SIM card they ask you to dial *228 and reprogram the phone. Not much difference

    justinT

    justinT ~ Feb 14, 2010 at 1:04 PM

  4. I read an article regarding the lack of Flash on the iPhone recently. On the technical side there's problem with power management when Flash is active, but the more likely reason was that Flash apps take a lot of control away from Apple. But the author went on to say that the next version of HTML will include functionality that is only available now in Flash. Once that's out then Flash will be just that - a flash in the pan. Can't say if that's true but its something to think about. One last tidbit was that Apple may be in talks with Microsoft to make sure they get an edge up. Seems that Google may be a big enough threat to Apple that they would be willing to court an old enemy to stay out in the leadership role. What times we live in!

    GranDad

    GranDad ~ Feb 14, 2010 at 3:57 PM

  5. I just saw this news story about the screen http://gizmodo.com/5477320/the-nexus-ones-dirty-display-secret if that helps any. I got the droid and I really enjoy using it, so much better then my Storm. I imagine in the coming months there are going to be even better phones coming out, the new HTC Legend or Desire look good.

    Pepp

    Pepp ~ Feb 22, 2010 at 1:32 PM

  6. Justin:

    * Multi-touch: you agree that the Motorolla Droid is inferior to the iPhone; Nexus One is in the process of getting updates, and I assume the next revision will include it from the start.

    * Push notifications: I'm talking specifically about email. I'm connected to an exchange server, and was getting email at all hours of the night. I ended up having to turn off email push and only do manual pull, because even doing a 15 minute poll would be annoying overnight. I **have** to have my phone on in case I get called for work, but I don't want email noises to wake me up for no reason. Android is supposed to have location-aware profiles (so that there's no need to remember to set the active profile, it just knows) and I should be able to get push email alerts at work, and no alerts at home.

    * Google voice was indeed barred from the app store, and although Vonage and others still exist, they are not free (to my knowledge). Google voice is free, and native on Android.

    * Tethering we should talk about offline... ;)

    * Memory: Well, for starters, it comes with a 4gb mSD card, which will be enough to hold me over for a few months. Here's a 16gb card for just over $50:

    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820161340

    And just because 32gb cards are super-expensive _today_ doesn't mean they always will be. Remember when 128-megabyte thumb drives were (amazing! omg! omg! and...) $30? I do. That was ~2004. Technology moves fast. Storage prices drop like bombs. So I'll be happy with a 16gb card (or two, which I can swap as desired, essentially doubling the capacity of the iPhone) until the 32gb cards come down to reasonable prices.

    * Yes, dropped calls happen on every network. In my experience, having used both Verizon and AT&T in Philadelphia and in its western suburbs, they are more frequent on AT&T.

    Adam

    Adam ~ Mar 9, 2010 at 10:48 AM

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