If you asked me a couple of years ago, which smart phone was the best I would have answered immediately it was the Palm Treo. Back then, Palm was a time tested operating system that rarely crashed and was the most reliable for mobile devices. That reliability came from their head start with the Palm PDA.
Does anyone remember the devices we called PDA's (personal digital assistants). At the time they were very cool. Every up and coming executive, or wanna-be executive carried one. I was surprised to learn that new PDA's are still sold. PDA functionality is now built into all mobile operating systems, and smart phones double as PDA's. Once the market was essentially cornered by Palm. Not so anymore.
About 18 months ago, I tired of the aging Palm operating system and took a chance on Windows Mobile. I was concerned that Windows Mobile had an unreliable reputation, but made the move anyway so that I could use new applications that were not available on the Palm. I found Windows Mobile to be serviceable. The shine wore off pretty fast because it's unreliable reputation was based in fact. The phone would reboot itself if allowed to run continuously for more than a day. As Apple and Blackberry built solid mobile platforms, the allure of Windows Mobile faded.
Earlier this week, I took a chance on another mobile operating system - the Android (Google phone). While early, I am very satisfied with what I have experienced so far. Many of the Android features mimic what I have seen on the iPhone. Much like the iPhone, it is highly configurable for individual tastes, and offers a huge library of application to choose from. Many of the applications are free or add supported.
A few features I like better than the iPhone. One feature is what I call the applications drawer. Every application available on he phone can be access from the drawer and dragged to your main 3-pane desktop, where you can arrange applications and gadgets across the 3 panes. The application icon remains in the application drawer until the application is un-installed. Gadgets are another nice feature. I have a clock gadget, a weather gadget, and a calendar gadget that keeps me informed of my next meeting.
Setting up the phone only required about 30 minutes. Within that time, I had configured 2 personal and 1 business email account, transferred my contacts and calendar, and downloaded a couple of free card games. The hardware I selected was a Samsung Moment. The Moment has a slide out keyboard, much like the HTC Touch Pro I moved from. The Moment has a much larger and brighter display. So far, my only complaint with the phone is it's weight. It feels twice as heavy as the HTC, and is probably 3 times that of the iPhone. Becasue of my 3 email services I am hard on batteries, and find the battery life of the Moment almost identical to that of the HTC Touch Pro. I must recharge every day, and sometimes in the middle of the day if I have used the browser or email a lot.
The future of mobile operating systems is controled by Apple. Blackberrys, Windows and Android devices have significant market share now, but only because Apple has an exclusivity agreement with AT&T. If that agreement expires and iPhones are made available on the Verizon and Sprint networks, expect Android, and possibly Blackberry, to collapse. Apple could own the mobile computing world if they would just divorce AT&T.
Emmy's First Birthday!
9 years ago
Samsung Moment is the one I've been looking at, but hoping the new Sprint phones on the horizon would drive the costs down before making my purchase. But, you know you can wait forever for that type of thing to work to your advantage.
ReplyDeleteLet me know what you think of the Samsung Moment after a month or so. And if you have some insight on the release timing of some of those other devices, I'd be interested in that too. Like you said, if iPhone were to pop onto the Sprint network, that would be the direction I'd be heading.
It is improbable.
ReplyDelete