What phone should I get: iPhone 4s or an Android Phone?
So do I get an iPhone 4s or some Android Phone (like maybe the Galaxy Nexus). I'm familiar with iOS already (have an iPad and wife has an iPhone), but I've only played with Android phones for about 5 minutes at a time.
I'm mostly looking for opinions of people that have owned both an iPhone and Android phone since they'll know the positives/negatives of each.
Thanks!
Why I don't use an iPhone
gdgt.com/discuss/why-i-don-t-use-an-iphone-gpg
Why I don't use an Android-based phone
gdgt.com/discuss/why-i-don-t-use-an-android-based-...
Personally I'd go with the iPhone 4S (speed, retina display, app ecosystem, etc) but I'm pretty die-hard Apple...
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That said, the iPhone 4S is great. My issue is that I'm not sure when the next iPhone will be released. Are they going to do a short schedule and release one in June, or are they now on a 1 year cycle and the next version won't be released until September? If I had a 4S and the next iPhone came out in June, I would be pretty mad.
As far as OS features go, the two systems seem to be a wash. Something to consider: do you rely heavily on Google's services? If so, Android is going to give you an infinitely better experience with those apps. If not, iOS should be fine and you get the benefit of the App Store which has a greater number of well-designed apps (even if their content isn't that great).
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What Android phones lack in the games and media department they excel at in the telecommunications department, especially if you use Google services a lot. The baked-in nature of GMail, Calendar, Voice, and Talk make this stuff as natively part of the phone's function as phone calls. Plus you get a choice of screen sizes and keyboards to best suit you. You can also intermix widgets and icons and actually arrange the icons in a way of your choosing. Third party mail, messaging, or social clients also tend to hook into the notification system very well. You also get access to the filesystem internally and externally to move data of any type into or out of the phone or between programs on the phone that may not be mutually aware. Lastly, at least in my experience, non-game apps tend to be cheaper or free on Android much more often than they are on iOS, so the whole "save money by having all your devices on a single account" thing doesn't really add up to much. IOS proponents are absolutely right about the games being better though. It's just no contest. But then you've got an iPad for that. Finally, tethering. There are more ways to tether that iPad to an Android phone for free without rooting than there are to tether it to an iPhone without jailbreaking. (For this, I'd recommend a Nexus phone in particular.)
In summary, I think you'll find a lot of redundancy between the iPhone and iPad if you have both, whereas with Android+iPad you'll find them more likely to compliment one-another and you'll get more of your money's worth out of each. If you didn't already have the iPad I'd say it's a toss-up based on what functions you most want out of your phone. Though if you're coming from BlackBerry I'd guess that's telecom.
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I've used some of my friends Android phones and while they've got impressive specs and larger screens the iPhone's there really just aren't as many apps for Android. Software is probably where the major innovation will be made over the next few years as we've seem to be hitting the wall for portable computing power (do I want a quad core processor in my pocket? heh).
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iPhone if you want a huge app store, tightly knit user experience and simplicity of use.
Android if you want tight Google integration, variety of form factors/sizes of phones and/or are a power user and want to experiment.
I am a huge Google person and love Android and the phone selection I get. With my big hands and thick fingers, I want to throw my wife's iPhone 4 across the room when I try to type on it. That being said, if the iPhone 4s came with a larger screen/form factor, I would be hard pressed to choose, but I think I would still go Android since I love their services.
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iPhone vs Android
I have used both Android and iPhone pretty extensively. I have to say that the iPhone has better overall experience. For instance, I love to listen to music and podcasts. iPhone handles these tasks easily with very few glitches. Android? I would start playing a song on Google Music player and within 10 minutes it stops. Couldn't find the cause. Typically, you get a crappy set of earphones with Android, and usually they don't have controls like the iPhone 3GS and newer earbuds have. Why can't any hardware manufacturers for Android provide you with decent sounding, easy to wear and use earphones out of the box? Next, the Galaxy S 2 will be worth $250 off contract a year from now. After a year? Who knows? The iPhone will hold it's value. Also using a much bigger Android keyboard of any kind is more difficult than the smaller iPhone keyboard. iPhone just has a better design. Finally, if your Android malfunctions where do you take it? Android smartphone manufacturers pretty much abandon their phones once you buy them. The iPhone? They have problems too, but all i've ever had to do was take it to the nearest Apple Store and they exchange it for a working iPhone without drama. In these tests, iPhone wins!
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