I picked up my first Android phone at the beginning of this year – the Google Nexus One. Prior to that I had been a BlackBerry user and the IT Organizations I managed all ran BES servers and only supported BlackBerry devices so the transition to the Nexus One was quite a significant one!
It was only a short couple of weeks later that I had decided the Android OS was the ONLY way to go and I never looked at a Blackberry again! However, just a couple of weeks ago I got an iPhone 4 and can understand why there are some many iPhone addicts out there. The phone is very simple to use, has a very clean user inferface and really doesn’t lack a whole lot. The Android defnitely has it’s leg up in some areas, but falls way short in others.
In this post, I’d like to highlight the areas that I found the Android fell short for me in day to day use and why (while adoption rates are rapidly growing) the Android will never beat out the iPhone
1) Music Player – quite simply the Android really doesn’t come close in this department. The music player apps are very good on the Android and I like the way I can see song lyrics while the mp3 was playing (using the TuneWiki app), however sync’ing the music onto the Android is just not easy. I like how iTunes manages my music and how easy it is to set up and sync playlists. Silly things like ‘number of plays’ and ‘star rating of songs’ are just not there right now. This is a big win for the iPhone!
2) Podcasts – similarly to my comments above, I listen to a number of podcasts and the Google Listen app just isn’t up to my requirements. It’s tough to add a podcast, they are unreliably updated and the whole experience is just below the Apple one. Another big point to the iPhone!
3) Notifications – Android wins this one hands down. The Notification configuration on the iPhone is pretty basic and you don’t have nearly the control over what, where and how notifications are managed. The Android, however, had a very well designed notification system – with very granular control over how you are notified on different events.
4) Picture Gallery – I have to say the Android picture gallery is pretty good. I like the way it syncs with my Picasa web gallery and shows all my pictures. Android also makes it very easy to share your pictures with the different apps you have installed
5) Maps / Navigation – another win for the Android. The Google Maps and Navigation apps are outstanding and for the price (free) they easily beat out the iPhone Maps application. Yes, you can purchase a navigation app for the iPhone, but they are not cheap!
6) Wireless tethering – when I had my Android I used the ability to create a wireless hotspot using my phone on a large number of occasions. I almost took for granted how easy it was to so simply connect my laptop up to the phone using WiFi. I wasn’t super impressed when I found that the iPhone didn’t tether via WiFi. I did manage to get Bluetooth tethering working, but I find it very unreliable (hello Windows 7) and prefer the USB option now if I need to tether.
7) Bluetooth Headsets – I use a Plantronics Voyager PRO headset and could not for the life of me get it to pair reliably with my Nexus One. I ended up giving up on the headset until I got my iPhone and now I live on my headset again. Clearly it wasn’t the headset, but for some unknown reason the Nexus One just kept losing the pairing to the headset. And there is nothing worse than an unreliable bluetooth headset! :)
Clearly there are a number of major wins for the Android, but until Android come up with a way to easily manage music, video and podcasts there is no reason for Apple to fear the Android! The premise of the iPhone was a combination phone and music player – Android simply can’t compete with that currently.
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Steve, Long time no talk to… Just putzing aournd on linked in and came across your blog… I use an iphone for work, but wanted to get another phone for personal use…. also, want another gadget to play with… have you checked out the new windows phones? I was going to get either android or windows and am leaning towards windows… let me know if you have checked them out…
Great to hear from you Mike! I haven’t checked out the Win Phone yet, but might just have to get my hands on it at some point! The Android is an awesome device – just a couple of shortcomings for me compared to the iPhone, but still a fantastic device for both business and personal use!
PS: I’m in the middle of another NAV and CRM implementation! Bringing back lots of memories!
I’d try reproducing your tests, but I already know iTunes is a fail as a music store/app. It runs on limited platforms (who wants to reduce their future choices aka flexibility?) and doesn’t play well with other players. I’d rather manage my music with UPnP and MPD so I can listen to music in a quality form in one place and listen to high-compression music in others, depending on need/desire.
What the idevices do well is make things appear simple. Except the world isn’t simple and the appearance is only that; my observation has been that eventually the complexity catches up with the iPhone/Pad/Carpet and then it simply doesn’t work.
Chris – I definitely agree with that perspective! The iPhone does try to make things very simple and the Android (on the other hand) allows you a lot more flexibility (if you know what you’re doing)! Sounds like you’re a pretty technical guy yourself if you know about UPnP etc – the average iPhone user wouldn’t have a clue what you were talking about! They just want to listen to their tunes, make a few phone calls and show off the cool apps they have loaded to their mates!
And there must be a business model in helping iPhone users get more value and flexibility out of their chosen music player…
I just got an Android (2.2) powered phone, and I would disagree that the notifications are very granular. You get 1 notification sound for email/sms-mms and other alerts. It would be better to have configurable notifications so you can tell by sound what you’re being notified of. Apparently it’s in the hopper for a future update, but it seems like something other phones have been able to do for a long time, and they missed the opportunity to get that right on the first try.