
There And Back Again: A Lengthy Weighing Of The Galaxy Nexus And iPhone 4S - aaronbrethorst
http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/04/galaxy-nexus-iphone-4s/
======
bane
I think the Siri bit is interesting. People have bought the 4s specifically
for this feature. I think the jury is still out on it, and it'll no doubt get
better over time.

But I remember lots of people buying the 4 for facetime, and I don't know
_anybody_ that actually uses it anymore.

~~~
robgough
FaceTime is the primary way in which I communicate with my parents nowadays.
The voice quality is significantly higher than via the phone network, and the
video stuff is nice.

(We're generally doing iPad2<=>iPad2 or iPad2<=>Mac rather than via iPhone
though)

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jsz0
Android is too chaotic for my tastes. The conservative simplicity of iOS just
works better for me. I would be more inclined to give WP7 a chance than
another Android device at this point.

~~~
drivebyacct2
Your comment would hold more weight if you elaborated on what is chaotic about
Android. I have my complaints but "chaotic" is not one of them.

~~~
jsz0
As others have mentioned the back button is kind of a nightmare. Rarely a day
goes by I don't accidentally back my way out of an application. That sends me
to a long-hold on the Home button to find the application again and sometimes
this involves starting from scratch and other times I just pickup where I left
off. It seems totally random to me.

I did not care for the day when my stock-ish Droid X got the MOTOBLUR update.
Any OS can be updated in a way that changes a lot of things but it rarely
happens with iOS or, from what I've seen, WP7. Basically everything stays the
same with some enhancements. This change from stock-ish to MOTOBLUR was a big
step backwards and when/if this phone gets ICS it will be another major
change.

The locked boot-loader situation is chaotic. When I go to buy a new phone I
have to study the details of locked vs. encrypted loaders. Checkout forums to
see if anyone is developing a stock-ish ROM in case there's another MOTOBLUR
type of incident with the carrier provided ROM. Motorola promised to unlock
their loaders then just never did it. Obviously now I would go with a Google
phone running stock Android instead but that was not an option when I got the
Droid X.

Battery life is not reliable. Some days I get 6-8 hours and other days its
dead by noon. I don't know why this happens. I can't rely on using my Droid X
as an alarm clock because occasionally the battery goes from full charge to
dead overnight.

Random apps in the Android Market are allowed to SPAM me with ads in my
notification bar. It feels like a massive invasion of my personal space when
this happens. I can't even stress how big of a problem this is for me. I'll
stop using any platform that allows this to happen. It's a non-negotiable
point. In general I'm also concerned about malware in the Android Market. I
don't really install many third party apps anymore. There are things I would
like to try out but hitting the install button is a difficult decision.

When it comes to games it's total chaos. You have no way of really knowing if
the game is going to work correctly or not on your phone. The Droid X isn't
all that old yet most games seem to lag on it. It ranges from annoying to
unplayable.

The lag/jitter of the UI, especially in the stock browser, is just annoying.
Some sites scroll fine and others jump around annoyingly. I can't really count
on being able to happily use the web browser.

My phone reboots a lot. A few times a week at minimum. Something to do with
being paired to a Bluetooth device. Bluetooth should never reboot my phone
randomly. Never.

Every-time I plug my Droid X into my computer two volumes are mounted. The SD
card and another Motorola Tools volume. Every single time I have to close the
window when it comes up. Annoying.

My SD card is littered with all sorts of random files. Trying to find folders
on it is pretty difficult. Some of the folders are from apps I deleted long
ago. I have to go through every now and again and clean-up all these random
folders. Annoying.

For other people these things may not be a big deal but they really deeply
annoy me. It's not so much that I can't deal with them but just that I don't
want to. I hate needing to micro-manage every little detail.

~~~
grkhetan
Wow... thats a really comprehensive, meaningful comment. Finally came to know
whats so "unorganized" and "unpolished" about Android. I upped your post, but
it was good enough to require a verbal vote of appreciation!

~~~
drivebyacct2
Really? It's a list of random complaints, most about Blur, and most of which
are a result of the freedom apps are given and the freedom of choice that
users are given. It's no more "chaos" than Windows or Mac OS X.

~~~
jsz0
Just my personal preference. I don't want or need my SmartPhone to pretend to
be a computer. I already have a computer. A SmartPhone just needs to do the
most common tasks as efficiently and trouble free as possible. Being as it's a
SmartPhone and not the constitution of my country freedom isn't really at the
top of my priority list. If it was seamless I wouldn't mind just having a list
of options to choose from but when we start talking about evaluating a bunch
of different replacement apps/ROMs/etc I lose interest. It's too much time to
invest into a device that is supposed to make my life easier.

My benchmark for SmartPhones is how difficult it is to complete some common
tasks. I've found in most cases for Android that process resembles an
if/then/else function. If I use app X then I do Y but only if A=2.2 && B=3.1
else I just give up and decide it's not worth the effort. I would prefer to
just learn the one, maybe two, ways of possibly doing it and adapt. I don't
need to modify the device to adapt to my every whim in part because that
assumes I actually know _exactly_ how I want it to work. I really don't. I
want the OS to figure some of those things out for me.

------
mikeklaas
It's weird that most of the article consisted of "android doesn't suck as much
as it used to"

~~~
Daishiman
If he had wanted to make an article talking about the specific benefits of
Android he could have gone to massive lengths about widgets, pervasive search,
intents (holy crap I can't believe anyone would go back to iOS after using
intents heavily), the stack-UI paradigm, background tasks, or any other
features that already existed before ICS, but doesn't make sense to use them
when comparing a new device that tries to polish and fix up the smaller
details which are the basic critiques of iPhone users.

~~~
megablast
You might think he would mention what features of android he missed most when
using the 4s, not need to be an idiot.

------
grkhetan
I think the article was good, and Jason tried to be unbiased (he "tried",
since he has always historically been pro-Android). However I believe an
honest comparison between iOS and Android cannot be done in less than 10 pages
of indepth review.

For example, I believe he missed the following positive points for iOS and
iPhone (just my casual thoughts): 1\. iPhone 4s is 2 to 3 times faster than
Galaxy Nexus in graphics: [http://www.anandtech.com/show/5133/galaxy-nexus-
ice-cream-sa...](http://www.anandtech.com/show/5133/galaxy-nexus-ice-cream-
sandwich-initial-performance) 2\. Software update support: The new OS updates
are not pushed fast enough to all android phones -- you may have to wait
months to get the latest OS release like 4.0 on your phone -- and for most
phones, it will actually never be released (apart from Nexus phones which have
the best experience in this regard, but when comparing Android you have to
look at all phones). Look at this:
[http://theunderstatement.com/post/11982112928/android-
orphan...](http://theunderstatement.com/post/11982112928/android-orphans-
visualizing-a-sad-history-of-support) 3\. Android market apps cannot be fully
trusted, since they may be of poor quality or may be malware -- since they
have not been reviewed, and also they can access more things on the phone.
(with permissions, but most users just say yes to all permissions) 4\. Lots of
accessories available for the iphone whereas there are so many android phones
that accessories available for each phone are much much less. 5\. Airplay on
iOS can push the screen content and video/audio to speakers/TV via apple tv.
This is a really amazing experience -- for example showing your photos and
videos to friends on the TV via airplay while flicking back and forth on your
iphone/ipad. 6\. iCloud Photo stream where your photos are synced
automatically, without you having to do anything. Same for documents in the
iCloud. iTunes match can upconvert all your music to high quality music,
without having to upload it in the first place! 7\. Fragmentation issue: Some
apps work on some phones, some dont. For example, netflix was not available
for most android phones for a long time. Angry birds also started with only a
few handsets. 8\. Galaxy Nexus is toooo big. iPhone can be used well with one
hand with the thumb being able to reach any part of the screen. iPhone's
styling and design as well is better -- though that is subjective. 9\. One of
the best quality support and service available via apple retail store. 10\.
The amount of quality apps available on the App Store, for everything, like
games, music, productivity, etc. 11\. Siri may be underwhelming, but still it
can handle a lot of tasks much more easily and in much more friendly way than
Android.

There are many more.... For android also, there would be a list like this..
but I believe the main plus point in favor of android are: free navigation app
from Google maps (on iOS, you have to buy one for atleast $20), app-to-app
sharing and more customization.

------
joebadmo
My wife and her friend each got a 4S on opening weekend, and neither used Siri
for longer that a few days. Nothing has changed since our last discussion on
that here: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3156590>

Further, I think the difference between Siri's very-weak-AI capabilities and
Apple's presentation of them as strong AI contribute to ridiculous stories
like Siri being pro-life. If you really understand how Siri works, you
understand how ridiculous that is. But if you believe the commercials, you
might think Siri has a personality and makes judgments on things like
abortion.

~~~
glhaynes
Not sure what you're referring to about the commercials and Apple's
"presentation of [Siri] as strong AI" - every commercial I've seen has been of
people issuing fairly simple queries that would be likely to succeed in the
real world.

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Tloewald
What is it with the page rendering of the linked article in mobile safari? It
comes up perfect and then refreshes to crap.

~~~
Tloewald
Reader fixes it... I must start using it more often.

------
MaysonL
For some, Siri is a game-changer. For otheres (seemingly including JK) it's a
"Meh". This is typical of reactions to Apple's many extremely successful
products: see Macintosh, iPod, iPhone, iPad. And as Siri gets better, it will
perhaps be as successful as those products.

~~~
akent
Why do you assume Siri will get better? Get better in what respect?

~~~
2muchcoffeeman
Why wouldn't it get better? Their speech recognition and ability to understand
certain contexts will almost certainly improve over time as they gather more
and more data. It's surprising to me that people dismiss it so soon. Does no
one remember how poor google voice used to be at recognition?

It's too soon to call Siri 'meh'.

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endlessvoid94
This was written by consumers, for consumers. I come to HN for things written
by producers, for producers.

~~~
wonnage
Get off your high horse, it's an phone review.

~~~
endlessvoid94
High horse? This might as well be in the consumerist. I'm not being arrogant,
and I'm not being preachy. It was an observation.

