Edwyn Chan's Weblog

(this is probably gonna be a rant as I’m pretty frustrated right now)

I’ve been an iPhone user since the first one came out and have been pretty happy with it.  When my brother first got a HTC Myphone it was my first experience with an android phone.  I played with it every so often and it seemed like a okay OS that perhaps if I didn’t have an iPhone I might use it.  My first real experience with the android is with my Galaxy Nexus S which I got last year for Favspot 1.0’s android testing.  I chose this phone because a) it was made by google to showcase their vision of the phone and b) it was manufactured by samsung, whom seems to make the best Android phones out there.

It would seem weird to be writing a review of my experience of a phone/operating system after a year and not sooner, but the reason really is although at first it was a quite a novelty to use and a fresh breath after using iPhones for 3 years, there was nothing that spectacular.  

Pros: 

Its really customizable and if you are willing to use the MIUI ROM its every more customizable.

Cons: (lets start with the smaller ones)

1. The interactive design is not as good as iPhone.  I know they are upgrading with each new version but its not good enough.  Why is there an option button?   I always have to guess if there are hidden functions!!!

2. Lack of quality apps.  yes all the major apps are there, but everything else is crap.

3. Apps crash alot and they need to be optimized for each android phone or else the camera/gps/screen alignment might have problems (ok that might be the developer in me talking)

4. Performance is slow.  Transitions are just not as smooth as the iPhone, even for the ones that have multi-cores

5. (Deal breaker and reason for this post) the OS is not upgradable!!!  after being accustomed to the iPhone being able to upgrade (at least two versions before the model is phased out)  I chose a Nexus series of android which I believed would upgradable.  Small upgrades OTA were fine and were really cool (iPhone didn’t have this pre 5.0) but from 3.1.2 to 4.04 this was the worst experience I had have ever had.  There is no excuse for it not to work.  I got a system message alerting me of a OTA upgrade that was already downloaded and verified.  Upon upgrading the phone bricks and can’t be used anymore.  I looked online and there is something called clockwork or something that I need to do to reset it.  This is pretty unbelievable and a pretty big fail.  I could probably look into this and get it fixed but for most users this would probably be the end.  Also I could not imagine if this was my main phone and I was out of town, how extreme frustrated I would be if my phone bricked on me.

I know there are some Android lovers out there, and when the phone works it is kind of usable.  However, phones are like computers now, its not only about what the phone can do itself now but also how it could be expanded by apps and future firmware upgrades.  Because of this I would not recommend android to anyone.  I can’t be sure the Windows mobile phones won’t have a similar issue but from microsoft’s prior experience with windows PCs and xbox, I don’t see them making such a big mistake.  

Bottom line there is no Android vs iPhone iOS argument.  Android still has alot of work cut out for them.  If budget was an issue I would rather by a previous generation iPhone then a new Android, regardless of manufacturer