Switching to the Verizon iPhone, or any iPhone, from BlackBerry or Droid (or another Android phone) and curious how to transfer your data over? We’ve already told you how to switch from AT&T iPhone to Verizon iPhone, but crossing platforms can seem like a bigger headache. It isn’t. There’s lots of services available to help you transfer data from one device to another. Keep reading for some simple suggestions that can make the process of going from BlackBerry or Droid/Android to the iPhone just a little easier for you.

There are two main ways to move all your data over to iPhone: desktop sync via iTunes and cloud sync via Google, Yahoo!, Exchange, etc.

iTunes

If you want to move your music, TV shows, movies, photos, and other media over to your new iPhone and you already use iTunes on Mac or Windows PC then it’s pretty easy.

1. Just plug the dock cable into your iPhone and into your PC and your iPhone will show up in iTunes.
2. Go through the tabs and choose what information, media, and photos you want to sync.
3. Press sync

You can sync multiple iOS devices (if you already have an iPad or iPod touch) with one iTunes library or set up multiple iTunes libraries to keep things extra neat and tidy.

Google Sync

Here is a way to use Gmail or Google Sync to transfer your data. If you’re already using a Gmail or Google Account to sync your mail, contacts, and calendars, this process is dead simple. Just make sure you’ve done a sync on your current BlackBerry or Android device.

1. On your new iPhone tap Settings and go to Mail, Contacts, Calendars.

2. You’ll need to add your new account to your iPhone. Simply tap the new account and then Gmail option.
3. If you want full push, you can also set Gmail up as Exchange as well. Visit Google’s Exchange page for instructions on setting up this way.
4. After your account is verified, you can simply choose to sync what items you would like to sync by turning those options On.

5. If a message pops up asking what you’d like to do with the data, choose to replace your iPhone data.

Yahoo! Sync

To perform a sync with Yahoo!, you are essentially going to repeat the same steps you would for Google sync (see above), except you’ll choose Yahoo when you choose your new account type. All the options should be identical when it comes to syncing contacts, calendars, and email accounts.

Exchange and Hotmail

If you’re using Exchange at work, and/or Windows Live Hotmail at home, again the instructions are the same as above just choose Exchange ActiveSync as your account type. (If you have problems with a work account, check with your IT department for the proper settings)

Transferring contacts and calendars from your computer with iTunes

If you don’t use any Google, Yahoo!, Exchange or any online service and you’re just looking to transfer your contacts to your iPhone, you can do that too. Whether you have Windows or Mac, you can transfer contacts from your current smartphone to your iPhone pretty easily.

1. Plug your old device into the computer and sync them with either Outlook, Exchange, or Mac Address book. This process is pretty easy but varies from device to device, so you may need to refer to your specific device instructions in order to do this. If you still have an issue doing this, head on over to the Verizon iPhone Forum for some expert switcher advice and help.
2. Once your contacts are already on your computer, you can plug your new iPhone into your computer.
3. Open iTunes and click the Info tab under your iPhone sync settings.
4. You will see a Contacts option. Select that and choose what contacts you would like to be synced to your phone.

5. Click sync and wait for iTunes to do its thing. When complete, your contacts should now be on your new iPhone.

Note: You may have noticed iTunes has native options to configure Yahoo! or Gmail sync. You are more than welcome to use these options as well. They are just as easy. You can also choose to sync calendars via iTunes as well. Use whatever process is going to be more convenient for you on an ongoing basis.

Transferring photos from your old device to your new iPhone [PC users]

1. Simply sync or transfer the photos from your old device into your photos on your Windows PC. Whether you choose to do this with your actual device, or from removable storage like an SD card is your choice.
2. Plug your new iPhone into the computer and open iTunes and navigate to the Photos tab.
3. Navigate your way to where you save your photos to your PC when choosing what photos to sync and make sure to choose the pictures you’d like on your phone.
4. Click sync and wait for iTunes to finish. Your photos should now show up in the Photos app on your iPhone.

Transferring photos from your old device to your new iPhone [Mac users]

1. Plug your old device into your Mac and open iPhoto. (If iPhoto doesn’t recognize your Android or Blackberry, simply transfer the pictures from the removable storage in your device, if you have that option.)
2. Your device should show up in the left navigation pane of iPhoto.
3. Name your album and import the photos. Alternately, you could select just the photos you’d like on your new device if you want.

4. Open iTunes and go to the Photos tab. Select the albums or events you’d like to sync to your new iPhone.

5. Click sync and wait for iTunes. After the sync is complete, you should see your new Photos in your Photo app on your iPhone.

Next steps

The iPhone is a pretty easy device to transfer data to. Once you’ve gotten all your data from your other device into a cloud service or on your computer, it should be easy as pie. If you guys have any issues doing any of this, feel free to check out the TiPb Verizon iPhone Forums for answers to many questions.

For more on using your new Verizon iPhone, check out our iPhone Starters Guide.

Tips of the day will range from beginner-level 101 to advanced-level ninjary. If you already know this tip, keep the link handy as a quick way to help a friend. If you have a tip of your own you’d like to suggest, add them to the comments or send them in to news@tipb.com. (If it’s especially awesome and previously unknown to us, we’ll even give ya a reward…)

Switching from Droid or another Android device like the Samsung Facinate to the iPhone — maybe the new Verizon iPhone? — and curious which are the best, most must-have apps you need to make yourself feel at home? Well read on for TiPb’s top 5 most recommended, most must-have apps to get your Android experience maximized on iPhone.

Google Mobile (Voice search + Google Goggles)

Unlike Android, iPhone doesn’t (yet) have broad and deeply integrated voice features in iOS. While there’s some Voice Control commands for making calls and playing music, that’s about it. Enter Google Mobile which not only adds voice search but also bundles in Google Goggles functionality. From location and maps to contacts and the web to most anything you can say or point your iPhone 4 camera at, Google Mobile gets you answers and fast. [Free - iTunes link]

Also check out:

• Siri was bought by Apple for a reason. If you’re in the US, Siri is your voice-activated artificially intelligent assistant. [Free - iTunes link]
• Vlingo not only lets you use your voice to call or search but tweet on Twitter and update your status on Facebook. [Free with in-app purchases - iTunes link]

Google Voice

Yes Google Voice is finally available for the iPhone. MInd you, it’s still US only but if you want the app you probably have an account already. It’s not as deeply integrated as Android but it has all the features you know and love, including push notifications for new SMS text and voicemail messages, listen and/or read voicemail, Google Voice number displayed as Caller ID, access to your iPhone contacts, and it will run in the background under iOS 4 or later. [Free - iTunes link]

Also check out:

• Line2 isn’t free but it is business-centric with full on VoIP functionality, cheap rates, and international availability. [Subscription - iTunes Link]
• Skype lets you make free VoIP calls between devices/computers — including video calls! — and cheap calls to landline. Free/credits – iTunes link]

Mailroom (Gmail)

You can access your Gmail account via IMAP or with full push via ActiveSync right from Apple’s built-in Mail app and while you’ll get unified inbox and threaded messages you won’t get Stars and you won’t get labels. Likewise Gmail.com won’t give you the ability to access contacts or view attachments. Enter Mailroom, essential the Gmail.com webapp inside a native iPhone app wrapper that gives you most of the best of both worlds. (See our tip on using Mailroom for a better iPhone Gmail experience.) [$2.99 - iTunes link]

Also check out:

• Google Mobile, mentioned above, gives you push notification for your Gmail. [Free - iTunes link]
• Boxcar not only gives you push notification for Gmail but will open it for you in Mailroom. [Free - iTunes link]

Waze (Google Navigation)

Google hasn’t yet made a version of their free Google Navigation app for iPhone but Waze provides a free crowd-sourced alternative. It’s full on voice, turn-by-turn directions that learns as you drive and will even let you munch tokens and reward you for your contributions. Yes, it’s navigation gone social. [Free - iTunes link]

Also check out:

• NAVIGON MobileNavigator if you want to go up to a premium navigation experience with all the onboard maps and bells and whistles that come with it. [$39.99 - iTunes link]
• AT&T Navigator, powered by TeleNav, keeps your maps online, your downloads small, and is subscription based so your upfront costs are much less. [Subscription - iTunes link]

Safari (Porn and everything else)

Apple’s iTunes App Store is curated and Steve Jobs says that’s to protect you from porn. He also says the Android Market is a porn store. He neglects to mention iPhone has pretty much the best browser in the mobile space (Flash aside) and the web, it be filled with porn. It also be filled with pretty much everything else, including many awesome Google web apps like Google Docs that work just great in Safari. If you can’t find something on the App Store, launch Safari, hit the Google search box (irony!) and chances are you’ll find it on the web. [Built in]

Also check out:

• Skyfire is a browser that does server-side translation of Flash to iPhone-friendly H.264 so if you ever think you’re missing your favorite Flash video, this could fix you up. [$2.99 - iTunes link]
• Apple’s iPhone web app directory has a great list of web apps should you want to find a bunch more. [Web link]

More Google

Google has a bunch of apps in the App Store, including Google Places, Google Latitude, Google Authenticator, Panoramio, and Google Earth. If you really miss your Google fix, check them out. [Free - iTunes link]

More iPhone apps and games

Once you’ve gotten that Google fix and you’re ready for the best of the rest, check out TiPb’s Top 10 iPhone apps where we list off some of the best, most must-have social networking, communications/IM, productivity, music/internet radio, photography, utility, and location apps, along with casual, time management, and hard core games. We’ve also got an ongoing series of top app lists in different categories and we’re adding more all the time, so keep your eyes peeled!

Bonus: Jailbreak

If you’ve been rooting your Droid or Android and don’t want Apple telling you which apps and hacks you can install on your device, allow us to introduce you to the wonderful world of Jailbreak. We’re talking the Cydia Store, themes and customizations, notifications and easy settings access, and pretty much everything else you can think of and Apple would never approve. Check out our Jailbreak Starters Guide to get you going, our Top 5 Jailbreak apps and Top 5 Jailbreak themes for some of our favorites, and head on over to the Jailbreak Forum for expert help and discussion.

Your top apps?

So there you have them, our top 5 best iPhone apps for Droid/Android switchers. Be sure to check out our Picks of the Week and iPhone App and Games Forum for more recommendations, and if we missed any of your favorites leave them in the comments below!

The Verizon iPhone is almost upon us and it looks like many of you are making the big switch! Whether you’re leaving the AT&T iPhone or moving from BlackBerry or Droid, you’ll have to move your data over and maybe look for ways to keep some of the functionality you’re used to. That’s the topic for this episode of TiPb TV!

Sure the iPhone is popular and famous for being easy to use but It can be stressful to leave a network or device you’re used to and comfortable with and pick up something new. The good news is if you’re going from the AT&T iPhone to the Verizon iPhone you’re just an iTunes backup and restore away from the simplest switch imaginable. If you’re going from BlackBerry or Droid, however, the differences will be more pronounced.

Rene and I go over how cloud services like Gmail can help you get your contacts over (and provide push email, contacts, and calendars!) and App Store apps like Kik Free – (iTunes link], Waze [Free - iTunes link] and others can help replace things like BBM and Google Navigation.

If you’re used to rooting on Android or themes on BlackBerry we’ll also introduce you to Jailbreak and the new ThemeIt store for iPhone. And if you need any extra help we have Verizon iPhone Forums just waiting for you as well as our TiPb Guides and TiPb Tips and How-to sections with tons more info.

So are you ready to make the switch? Watch the video above and let us know how it’s going for you in the comments!

The Verizon iPhone is coming February 10 and some of the big questions are: who will leave the AT&T iPhone for the Verizon iPhone, who will leave the Verizon Droid for the Verizon iPhone, and most importantly, what will the next huge wave of Verizon feature phone upgraders choose?

AT&T’s reception — or the lack thereof in some areas — will certainly propel some current iPhone users to switch networks (our poll shows about 19% of TiPb readers are considering doing just that). Some wanted the iPhone badly enough that they tolerated a poor network experience for years but now that they have the choice they’ll switch to a network that better suits their needs as soon as contract and/or cash allow.

On the flip side some wanted the iPhone but just couldn’t or wouldn’t live with AT&T service in their area so stuck with Verizon and got BlackBerry Storms or, especially lately, Verizon Droids. I’m deliberately using Droid and not Android because, like it or not, Android is not a mainstream brand. And no matter how much market metric companies like to graph it, it’s not a phone any consumer can buy. Droid is, in several models, and thanks to Verizon’s massive advertising campaign coupled with Google’s powerful software, it’s a phone that gained some mainstream mindshare.

(Samsung’s Galaxy S, while popular, has a fragmented brand with different names on every carrier so despite incredible sales it collectively doesn’t enjoy the same level of mainstream mindshare.)

No doubt many people bought Droids because they love Android. They’re probably the same people who know what Android is and specifically why it’s great at what it does. They also know Galaxy S and the other models. Many others just wanted a smartphone and Droid did — original, Pro, 2, Incredible, Bionic, etc. They went into the store and it was a brand they recognized thanks to Verizon’s advertising and, with the only other recognizable brand being BlackBerry, they probably picked one or the other (increasingly Droid based on the share numbers).

Now those same customers will walk in and see iPhone. Money Verizon used to spend on marketing Droid is now also being used to market iPhone on Verizon. Apple is also marketing iPhone on Verizon. AT&T will continue to market iPhone (Verizon and AT&T will be competing not just for users but for iPhone users and that benefits the iPhone brand). No one else is marketing Droid.

Some who previously bought BlackBerry Storm or Droid will switch to iPhone, also when cash and/or contract allows. Some will stay with both (productivity mavens and power users), but those who wanted the iPhone and couldn’t get it will switch when they can.

Existing smartphone users are also only the tip of the iceberg. The giant, ship-crushing base of the iceberg is feature phone users who either waited for the iPhone or see the iPhone as just another phone they’ll enjoy using (as opposed to other, more complicated even if more powerful smartphones). The partial migration of AT&T iPhone users and Verizon BlackBerry and Droid users is one thing. The inevitable migration of mainstream feature phone to mainstream smartphone users is another. Because right now iPhone is almost synonymous with mainstream smartphone.

Right now Verizon customers going into a Verizon store to get a new phone might recognize BlackBerry or Droid. Next month they absolutely will recognize iPhone. Just look at how Verizon is positioning it:

• iPhone is front and center on the Verizon home page
• Click on Verizon’s Phone menu and what choices do you get? iPhone, smartphone, feature phone.

Not only is iPhone listed first, Droid and BlackBerry aren’t listed at all. You have to dig for them. [Daring Fireball]

The number of Droid users — of all Android users — on Verizon today is small compared to the number of iPhone users on AT&T. Collectively, across all US networks, Android phones have numbers that equal or beat iPhone just on AT&T. [New York Times]

Next month iPhone will be on Verizon as well. How many will switch to iPhone from Droid? How many will switch to the Verizon iPhone as their first smartphone? No one knows for sure but the number will pass 1 million very quickly, probably in the first week, and several million, probably the first quarter.

Up until now the choice may have been iPhone on AT&T or Droid on Verizon. It also may have been iPhone on AT&T or no-iPhone on Verizon. We’ll find out which next month. My suspicion is Apple’s investment in brand will pay huge dividends and will be something other OS makers and manufacturers will have to start taking much more seriously.

The TiPb forums are naturally a great place to talk, commiserate, celebrate, get help, and offer advice to your fellow iPhone users. In order to create a new thread of your own or reply to any of the existing threads, you must be a registered member. Becoming a member is easy and free so if you haven’t already, head on over and register now!

• For your chance to win your very own Verizon iPhone 4 that we are giving away, visit this thread right here!

• Let’s say you win the Verizon iPhone 4 we are giving away, you’ll need a new case to go along with that phone so drop by this thread and see what’s currently available to you.

• Are you planning on purchasing an iPad 2? Visit this thread and tell us why or why not.

• Help forum member nibbz430 make a decision, iPhone 4 or Droid Bionic?

See you in the forums!

Phil Nickinson from Android Central has done a full review of the Verizon Motorola Droid 2, the second coming of the first Android phone to really rocket into the mainstream. With a big screen, ample app marketplace, full hardware keyboard, and Android 2.2 Froyo, it seems to improve upon the original in every way, even if it now faces stiffer competition from its own sibling on its own network, the Droid X. How does it net out?

If you’re coming from another platform, you can’t go wrong with the Droid 2. And the same goes if you’re comiing from another carrier. If you’re already on Verizon? It’s a bit of a tougher choice. The Incredible is another solid phone and has the HTC Sense customizations on the same size screen. The Droid X has a larger screen and the same customizations as on the Droid 2. (Anecdotally: We watched on launch day as the second person in our Verizon store — we were the first — traded in a Droid X for a Droid 2.)

It will be interesting to see what, if anything, changes in that equation if rumors of a Verizon iPhone 4 pan out this January

Here’s our question — if an iPhone 4 really does show up on Verizon in January 2011, how many Droid users would switch to iPhone?

Original Droid, Droid Eris, Droid Incredible, Droid X, upcoming Droid 2. The whole Moto/HTC/Lucasfilm line. Vote in the poll above and give us the details in comments!

Even as iPhone 4 goes out for delivery, and reservists start lining up at Apple Stores, Motorola, Google, Adobe, and Verizon announced the Droid X, the latest, best Android on the planet.

Our good friend Phil from Android Central was there to live-blog all the news live as it happened, and even now is going hands-on with the Droid X, but we managed to tear the spec-sheet away from him long enough to update our joint fact sheet on all things iPhone 4 vs. Android.

For easy reference, here are the Droid X stats gone solo:

• Huge 4.3″, 16:9, 854×480 screen (that’s 400,000 pixels)
• HDMI out and DLNA support
• 1GHz TI OMAP processor
• Full Flash 10.1 (not available at launch, waiting on Froyo 2.2)
• 8 gigs on board and a 16gig card included, but compatible with 32gig SD cards for a total potential memory of 40 gigs
• 512mb RAM
• 8 megapixel camera that captures 720p HD video
• Three microphones (outward-facing for video, noise-canceling, and regular)
• a 1570mAh battery, which should be ‘comparable to the Droid 1′ on battery life
• GPS, Bluetooth, WiFi, naturally
• Wi-Fi Hotspot with support for tethering up to 5 devices will also be available for an additional $20 per month with a 2 gig cap.

Good on Android for getting around previous app storage constraints, and for keeping the push on for Wi-Fi Hot Spot. It won’t be released until July 15 but announcing now lets them get b-roll on iPhone 4 coverage so, smart. (Though some are playing this off as more competition to the Evo 4G than the iPhone 4).

Anyway you slice it, this is a big Droid. But is it big enough to go one-on-one with iPhone 4 and iOS 4?

Verizon has a teaser up for their new, big DROID X which is claiming a 4.3″, 720p display (which is usually 1280×720) — a significant challenge to the iPhone 4‘s 3.5″ 960×640, LED IPS Retina Display.

It’s more pixels but it’s also a bigger display, so it could net out to the same pixel-per-inch count — somewhere above the magical 300 mark. It’s also teasing HDMI out.

Begun these display density wars have?

UPDATE: Engadget, who had a brief hands on, thinks it might have the same 854 x 480 as the original Droid and Verizon is referring to some video functionality that’s 720p. Verizon does say 720p display however, so at the very least it’s confusing.

UPDATE 2: Verizon has updated their site to correct the erroneous claim. 720p is video recording, NOT display.

[Verizon via Android Central]

Our sibling site Android Central has just published a full review of the Verizon Droid Incredible — the latest Google superphone Android competition to the iPhone. (And yes, it does seem like they’re coming more than once a month now — we feel bad for Phil!).

It’s pretty much a gussied-up Nexus One with Sense UI, which you’d think would make it a Desire but it bumps a few specs (like an 8mp camera with dual LED flash) and a CDMA radio (which the Nexus One was supposed to do but hasn’t yet, and the iPhone keeps being rumored to do but hasn’t yet either).

All three devices are by HTC, who Apple is suing for patent infringement, and their ability to keep dropping high-end Android bombs like this is likely the reason why. Say what you want about software fragmentation, highly restricted app storage, and OLED screens you may or may not be able to see out in the daylight, the absolutely relentless improvements in UI and hardware both is very much in keeping with the robotic nature of the brand.

Apple of course is widely expected to counter this summer not only with the multitasking iPhone OS 4 (see our complete preview and feature walkthrough), but with 4th generation hardware leaps of its own — front facing camera, huge 960×640 display, and only Jobs knows what else.

Whether those iPhone on Verizon rumors finally pan out along with it, or in September, or only in 2011 we don’t know, but our advice to potential buyers remains the same as in our iPhone vs. Nexus One: which should you buy?. Check that post for details, but in broad strokes:

• If you have to get a new phone right now and you want AT&T, the 2009 iPhone 3GS (see our review) remains head of that class. If you want Verizon, however, the Incredible is certainly a credible choice. The original Droid has a hardware keyboard (lackluster though it may be) and the Nexus One has the Google rather than HTC Sense UI (though who knows when it will actually ship?) so it’s an embarrassment of Android riches over in Big Red land. (If you’re on Sprint, it’s EVO 4G ‘natch).

• If you can wait until the summer and aren’t fussy about carriers, Google may have another (two, three?) Androids on the market by then, but we have a sneaky suspicion Apple and iPhone HD (it won’t be called iPhone 4G) along with iPhone OS 4 will be the ones to watch in 2010. Again.

Head on over to Android Central’s complete Verizon Droid Incredible coverage for more, and let us know what you think — is it incredible?

The MOTO Development Group is back with another round of capacitive touchscreen tests. This time they have stepped up their game by using robots to ensure the accuracy of the results. MOTO even tossed in a few extra handsets such as the Palm Pre and Blackberry Storm 2 for good measure.

You may remember that the original test that saw the iPhone take top honors. However some of you out there cried foul because of the fact a human finger was used in the tests. Hopefully this particular test helps put that all to rest as once again.

Now TiPb won’t spoil all of the results for you (as if we could!) but wait until you see what happened to the Moto Droid, ouch…

Full video after the break!

[MOTO via Engadget]

YouTube link

Engadget confronted Android Founder Andy Rubin — by all accounts a brilliant and passionate guy who really wants to make great products — about why the US versions of the Droid and Nexus One don’t use the Android 2.0 supported multitouch keyboard and gestures, while the non-US versions do. The response:

“It’s not an America versus outside America kind of thing. It’s a decision that is a result of the OEM model. I personally don’t like two-handed operations… there is no conspiracy.”

Both TiPb (because Apple’s name keeps come up on the suspect list) and our sibling site, Android Central have been covering this story and it still makes the kind of sense that doesn’t. “Like” or “dislike” seems an odd way to talk about something that so affects usability (pinch-to-zoom is intuitive and ingrained enough that it should just be a standard). There were rumors that Google didn’t want to violate Apple’s multitouch patents in the US, but Engadget looked and couldn’t find any that applied to these specific implementations.

Perhaps, as otherwise rumored, there’s a gentleman’s agreement between Apple and Google, and since Google’s CEO, Eric Schmidt was on Apple’s board of directors (even though he reportedly recused himself from iPhone discussions), Google could be playing it extra super safe.

Whatever the answer is, however, the founder not liking something is an odd answer as to why it doesn’t exist only in his own country. Remember, RIM’s CEO doesn’t like typing on glass and even he made the BlackBerry Storm…

The very first time I used the capacitive touchscreen of an iPhone it was clear that there was no other mobile device on the market that could match it’s performance. Now, a few years later, that still holds true for most of us and if you’d like proof labs.moto.com has performed a touchscreen stress test.

The iPhone’s touch sensor showed the most linear tracking with the least amount of stair-stepping. The Droid Eris and Nexus One tied for second with only faint wiggling – but actually performed best at the edge of the screen. Last in the line-up was the Motorola Droid, which demonstrated significant wavy artifacts or “stair-stepping.”

Something to keep in mind, the MOTO Development Group used more sophisticated tools to test touchscreen accuracy but the above video simply demonstrates a technique any of you can use to evaluate the accuracy of your own device.

At the end of the day it all comes down to touchscreen hardware and the integration of that hardware with software and user interaction development. Was there really any doubt of which device would come out on top?

Video after the break…

[labs.moto.com via Techcrunch]

Google’s Android was last year’s “new thing”, and while Palm’s webOS takes that place this year, Android Central brings us their second generation hardware with the likes of the HTC Hero, and the 2.0 version of its OS with the Motorola Droid. That Google enjoys massive tech-geek cachet while at the same time maturing into two such different (potentially fractured?) sets of hardware and software, while being the cloud company and yet not enjoying the most cloud-centric OS in the 2009 Smartphone Round Robin are what make it potentially the most interesting platform this year.

To help me figure it all out, Casey Chan went over the finer points for me and the Android Central Forum members provided tons of great feedback. Thanks to all the ‘droidekas!

(And just a reminder, every day you post on my Android Central thread, or any of the official Round Robin threads, is another day you’re entered to win one of six (6!) new smartphones!)

Okay, time to get Androidy with it… after the break!

Android: Take Two

First, here’s the Droid and Hero tour I got, courtesy of Casey.

[YouTube Video link]

And here are the rest of the contextual links:

• Android Central’s Phil Nickinson, Keith Newman, and Rene on the iPhone Live! podcast.
• Android Central Motorola Droid review.
• Android Central HTC Hero review.
• 2008 TiPb Smartphone Round Robin Android G1 video
• 2008 TiPb Smartphone Round Robin Android G1 review

Hardware Design

Android’s two entries in the 2009 Smartphone Round Robin couldn’t be any more different. One is made my Motorola, the other by HTC. One runs on Verizon, the other on Sprint (or also on Verizon under the name Droid Eris — more on that later). One is vanilla Android 2.0, the other is HTC’s Sense UI. One is an HD slider, the other an SD slab. One’s design harkens to the hard edges of the Millennium Falcon (if MC Hammer had repainted it), and the other the softer lines of the princess (if that irony isn’t too rich).

Droid

More specifically, the Droid is a well built slider, impossibly thin — iPhone thin — for a device with that type of keyboard. However, that type of keyboard is woefully inadequate on the Droid. It’s so flat and so lacking in separation, it really feels like little more than the stick-on it is. If having a better keyboard would have meant having a thicker Droid, I would have been fine with that. Oh, and that 5-way? Yeah, it’s a 5-way. It confused all of us. It looks like the chip on our new credit cards, feels like it should be a a touch pad, but it seems to be a 5-way. I’m still not sure though. All I know is that it shoves an already poor keyboard all the way to the even-less functional left.

Again, the irony of mocking Apple as having form over function should not be lost. Other than that — and it’s a big “that” for the hardware keyboard set — the build quality here is top notch. (Okay, maybe the camera is disappointing given its specs, but like others I hold hope for a software fix).

The screen is fantastic, however. Big and bright and 16:9, it’s very much what the next generation of smartphones should be.

Hero

The Hero is just as well built. Depending on what version you get, it can be chinned or chinless, but the basic clean curves and clear screen is the same. It isn’t the monster the Droid is — it doesn’t have the huge keyboard or screen or camera, but that’s the point. Not everyone wants a monster, and for those who want more of (I’ll say it!) an iPhone form-factor, the Hero might just be the better Android hardware.

Software Experience

Where to start? Android is now on version 1.5. Or 1.6. Or 2.0. Or maybe 2.1 in beta. And its UI is the Google Experience. Or HTC Sense UI. Or MotoBlur. Or some other stuff like Samsung or Sony are spinning. Is that a software experience or software schism? More on that later.

Droid/with Google Software

The Motorola Droid runs a Google version of Android 2.0. Compared to previous “with Google” devices, it’s good if not great, powerful if not polished. Lightyears ahead of the G1 I tried last year (where it would ask for input when none was possible), but it’s still not the iPhone US. It’s still inconsistent, and for whatever reason, even though Android 2.0 supports multi-touch, the Google apps on the Droid don’t. (And yes that makes a difference on a capacitive device).

If you’re heavily invested in Google services (like I am, and like most geeks are), you won’t find a better shipping device that supports those services. From a real, honest-to-threads-and-labels Gmail app, to free Google Maps Navigation in the US, if you’ve decided Google’s convenience is worth more than your privacy (and it’s a very convenient convenience, which is why most of us have), then deciding Google’s own platform best leverages that isn’t a hard second step.

As to the rest of the OS, it’s pretty much what we saw last year. It’s got multitasking but not as well visually represented as Palm’s webOS. It’s got far better notifications than the iPhone, even if again they may not be as well handled by the UI as webOS. It’s also got apps. Not as many as the iPhone, of course, but building quickly and given the open nature of the Android Market, while the apps may not be as many or as polished as the iPhone, they have apps Apple won’t even let in the store. (Not coincidentally Google’s own Latitude and Voice.

Hero Sense UI

Unlike the Google experience on the Droid, HTC has wrapped up the Hero in Sense UI, an evolution of the TouchFlo UI they previously lacquered on top of Windows Mobile (and will be using going forward on that platform as well).

It’s widgety and beautiful, and works much better on the Hero’s capacitive screen than its predecessor did on the Touch Pro in last year’s Round Robin. The weather animation is still something I unabashedly hope Apple somehow integrates into the iPhone OS. It’s still slightly less intuitive and consistent to me than the iPhone UI — but the eye candy alone balances the scales.

The tradeoff — and there’s always a tradeoff — is that it takes time for HTC to spin their Sense UI on top of Android updates, so while “with Google” devices might go to 2.0 sooner, HTC might only get a Sense UI version out later.

And This is Where it Gets Interesting

To recap: Google offers Android on a liberal, open-source license. Motorola makes MotoBlur for their Android devices, but not for the Droid which uses the Google experience. Actually, Verizon owns the Droid trademark and they also offer a Droid Eris, but that’s made by HTC and is otherwise called the Hero and runs Sense UI. HTC also made the G1 and myTouch which don’t run Sense UI. Oh, and the Droid off Verizon will be called the Milestone.

Apple has the iPhone.

Brand-aid

Contrast those two paragraphs. As a consumer, if you want an iPhone you get an iPhone. As a consumer, I’m not even sure if you know what an Android device is. I’ve seen Droid commercials here in Canada, but that device won’t exist in Canada. I go to my local carrier and try to buy one and get what… confused? And if HTC runs Sense UI on top of Android and Windows Mobile, do I buy an HTC device and not even notice what’s running underneath? Or do I just get a Verizon device like Droid or Eris and never know they’re Android or are the Milestone and Hero?

What I’m getting to there is branding. Apple offers a single, consistent brand. Google’s Android is sundered amid who knows how many brands and while that doesn’t hurt individual devices, could it hurt the platform as a whole? (We’ll be covering Windows Phone next week, which Micrsoft is now calling Windows Phone because it seems many people who had Windows Mobile devices had no idea what platform they actually had — does that answer the question? We’ll see.)

Frak-ture

So the Droid outside Verizon will be the Milestone. And the G1/myTouch off T-Mobile are the Magic/Dream, and on my carrier they might be stuck on Android 1.5 forever, because Google only updates “with Google” devices and HTC may only be updating Sense UI devices, and Rogers certainly doesn’t seem to care. These are devices sold in 2009.

To contrast again, even an iPhone 2G from 2007 is currently running the latest iPhone 3.1.2 software.

I’m tempted to say for an average consumer it won’t matter because they won’t even be aware of updates. They’ll buy the device they want and when and if it doesn’t update (if they even know it didn’t update) they’ll just buy the next device. But I don’t think many average consumers buy Android devices yet (possibly with the exception of the much-hyped Droid on Verizon, who had a paucity of smartphone selection previous to its release).

In general, I think more savvy, geeky users seek out Android, and seek it out specifically, and they’re exactly the type of user who will and should care.

And not just because they may not get the latest Android OS, but because the breadth of Android platforms out there, from 1.5 to beta 2.1 makes a huge target for developers, and not in the good sense of the term. With the iPhone (and iPod touch) there are 50+ million users most of whom updated to 3.x at some point when they plugged into iTunes (and we won’t get into Google still lacking an offline sync/backup/media management tool like iTunes). So the choice for developers is targeting tens of millions of almost identical Apple devices, or nearly a dozen Google phones on 4 different versions of the OS, running one of 3 different UI layers, with at least two different screen resolutions and an odd assortment of input methods (touch only, touch and keyboard, touch and keyboard and trackball/trackpad/etc.)

To put that in some form of end-user perspective, when I first got the G1 last year I went to Android Market and downloaded a Snake game and was told to “push up to start”, and it took forever for me to figure out what “up” they meant. (The screen, the keyboard, the trackball?)

When one of our writers got the Droid, she tweeted exactly the same problem.

It’s hard enough to make a truly spectacular app. It’s harder still to make it when you can’t count on consistent hardware specs or software implementations. Users may not know or notice this, but they feel the lack of great user experience it can lead to.

(Apple needs to pay attention to at least part of this as well if they intend to compete in screen resolution this year).

That Android Thing

Let’s be clear — as much as Apple runs iTunes on low-margins to promote the sale of iPods (including the iPhone), Google gives away web services to promote the attraction of our eyeballs to their advertising. They’re just as happy if those eyeballs are looking at Google services on an Apple or Microsoft or Rim or Palm or whatever platform, but if Microsoft or Apple (for example) ever locked Google out to promote their own services (like Bing or MobileMe), Google would have a problem. (Just look at how Facebook locks out Google for an example).

Enter Android. By having their own platform on the market, Google knows there’s one place from which they can never be locked out. And more than that, they can use it as a lever to promote the technologies that best serve Google services — things that make the web, and hence WebApps run faster and more reliably. That’s good for everybody, but make no mistake — Google does it because it’s good for Google first and foremost.

I state all this not because that makes Google any different from any other for-profit company — or platform in the Round Robin — but because it makes it the same, and for some reason the technorati often likes to assume Google is different. No company is. I’m not sure any company can realistically afford to be.

Which brings us back to Android. Google’s current Mobile OS is a conundrum. It’s a traditional platform OS from the company that’s usually anything but. I still half-suspect Android was acquired solely for the reason stated above — to guarantee Google couldn’t be locked out of the mobile space. Then when Palm released webOS, Google smacked their head and Chrome OS was born. That the most traditional of all smartphone companies beat the new kid, Google to the web-ification of mobile is amazing, and it raises some interesting questions and concerns about the Android platform.

Apple made the iPhone because Steve Jobs wanted an iPhone. Yeah they figured they could sell 50 million of them, but primarily Jobs is a diva who wanted to dent the universe one more time. I’m guessing RIM makes BlackBerrys because they’re just as passionate about that pushy little platform. Elevation Partners may be sinking money into Palm in a bet to get a part of the huge mobile pot of the future, but if Rubinstein hadn’t have wanted it he could have stayed retired on his giant pile of Apple-bucks and let Palm churn out the Treo 900. And Microsoft… well I don’t really get the feeling Ballmer cares about Windows Mobile any further than he thinks Microsoft needs that screen in its collection, and I think that’s part of their core problem (but we’ll get to that next week).

Google has much the same problem as Microsoft — the people at the top don’t seem to be, and really don’t need to be, as passionate about their platform, and that shows. Now I’m not saying Andy Rubin, who founded Android isn’t passionate, and I’m sure many of the Googlers are deeply passionate about Android, but at the top Android doesn’t exist because Eric or Sergey or Larry just had to have that phone. It exists, like I said, so that Google can’t get shut off from mobile eyeballs by a competitor.

And that’s what the Android thing feels like to me. Not the product Google wants themselves (that might be Chrome OS), but a strategic move they decided to make.

Conclusion

Yes, Android offers killer Google services integration. If Google is your life, Android is clearly the OS for you. If you don’t use Google, I’m not sure there’s any reason to get Android over another device. Don’t get me wrong, it’s good at everything, but unlike the other devices, it’s not killer at any of them.

It doesn’t have the UI or handle media as well as the iPhone, it’s not the communications monster BlackBerry is, it’s not full-on Linux like Nokia’s Maemo, and it doesn’t make the web manifest, nor handle multitasking or notifications as elegantly as Palm’s webOS.

If you’re on Verizon or T-Mobile or Sprint and want something iPhone-like. If you can’t stand Apple’s dictatorial control over the iPhone app ecosystem. If you want a hardware option other than the full-screen slab. If there’s some dealbreaker for you about the iPhone then Android is a good alternative.

Which is crazy when you think Google makes this OS. They’re the megacorp of the 21st century. They’re a verb. They have more money and talent and reach than almost any other company. They make Android… but I think the problem is they don’t champion it. Again, their ultimate C-level goal isn’t to make the best smartphone on the planet, they’re goal is to get the most eyeballs on the planet, and that means making great stuff for every platform.

Now it’s quite possible that Google will keep iterating and by this time next year it could be head and shoulders above everyone else. It could be the “iPhone killer”, swarming over Apple’s device with a hive of Android-powered alternatives, some of which are clearly better in many or most ways. Anything is possible when it comes to Google. (Though people used to say that about Microsoft as well, but again we’ll visit that next week).

In the end, this is a very different review than I expected to write, and I think that’s because of how much I expected from Google this year. Arguably Android has as much if not more potential than any other platform, yet now in year two it still doesn’t seem to fully realize it. It doesn’t seem as ground-breaking as it should. Just look at how far Palm has come with webOS out of almost nowhere. Google’s had longer than that with Android and far more resources than Palm. That makes no sense to me, except that it’s exactly how Google has positioned it. For now.

Next year Google might just announce free cell service for everyone in the US. Then it’s game over.

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Join Rene and special guests Phil Nickinson of Android Central and WMExperts and Keith Newman of the PreCentral.net PalmCast Round Robin Android Droid and Hero vs. iPhone and Windows Phone HD2 and Touch Pro2 vs. iPhone, more iTablet, iPhone HD, and iPhone 4.0 rumors, and all the week’s news and opinions. Listen in!

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Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

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• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

So, according to Verizon, the Motorola DROID is for wannabe male porn stars and the iPhone is for the beauty queens they demean?

Okay, I love iPhones and this is an iPhone enthusiast site, fair enough. But I have to admit that when Jeremy first posted the above video a few days ago, my initial reaction was simply that Verizon was taking a shot at the iPhone and going after the young male demographic again. Hey, the Lucas-licensed DROID name makes that clear enough, and obviously Motorola’s brand spike shows it’s working.

Getting together with my fellow SPE editors this weekend, however, Dieter made me watch it again, and pay attention to imagery and metaphors.

And oh, those metaphors: we get the race horses, Skud missile, iPhones reduced to puddles, shears tearing gashes, saws ripping through ripe bananas, and a multitude of splatter effects on mannequins/dolls and, frankly, the screen in our face.

The iPhone is marketed to appeal to the mainstream, from kids to grandparents, both men and women, for getting things done and for having fun. Spending some time with Casey’s Android Central DROID this weekend, I’m curious to see if it can’t be just as mainstream in its appeal, and if not, if Verizon really feels they have to counter-program the iPhone this forcefully, why they’d want to go in such a misogynistic direction?

UPDATED: Hey, looks like All Things Digital decodes it the same way…

Actor Luke Wilson and AT&T are at it once again and this time they want you to know all about AT&T’s rollover minutes. Yes, it is true that AT&T lets you use your unused monthly minutes but keep in mind, they eventually do expire after a year if you do not use them. We do not mean to keep beating the same drum but come on AT&T, quit spending money, time, and effort on these mediocre commercials and spend time on making your network better for everyone.

As AT&T keeps pumping out the commercials Verizon/Motorola are not sitting quietly on the sidelines. They’ve gone and released another Droid commercial that takes aim at, you guessed it, Apple’s iPhone. This latest commercial caters to the male consumers and pretty much paints the iPhone as being nothing more than “pretty”. Smart move as Motorola continues to beat Apple in brand loyalty with males 18 years old and up.

[Thanks to matrix2004 for the tip!]

View the new Droid commercial after the break!

According to a study, Motorola recently surpassed Apple in brand loyalty among men 18 years old and up since the release of the Droid on the Verizon network. The study by YouGov’s BrandIndex scale ranges from -100 to 100 and is based on weekday interviews with 2,000 interviews per day from a panel of 250,000 people.

This past week Apple has dropped from a November peak high of 48.1 to 22 and Motorola is staying strong with 29.3 with an error margin of +/- 2 percent. The real loser in all of this? Research and Motion and their BlackBerry smartphones as they have dropped to a lonely 9 in the study.

All of this may have started from the much talked about Verizon map and Droid commercials. It would seem that the first round of the Verizon vs AT&T battle has gone in favor of Big Red and Motorola. It should be interesting to see if the latest iPhone commercials will be able to swing things back into Apple’s favor.

[Via AppleInsider]

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Join Rene, Chad, Dieter, and the Cell Phone Junkie, Mickey Papillion, for iPhone vs. Droid, AT&T vs. Verizon, Jailbreak SSH attacks, the week in apps, and your questions live! Listen in!

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

Much has been said about Verizon’s latest addition to their smarthphone arsenal, the Motorola Droid, some good and some bad. I decided to pick one up and decide for myself. It’s been a little less than a week that I’ve spent with my Droid and I must say, I’ve actually come away quite impressed. Now by no means am I saying the Droid is the best looking device on the market, nor is it the perfect smartphone — that simply does not exist. But what we have here is a very solid effort by Motorola. Sure Apple is at the top of the game in regards to UI, ease of use, speed, etc… but they have to play some major catch up with the release of their next iPhone — namely on display, notifications, and multitasking.

For the full run down follow me after the break!

Display

I want to start with the first thing that really pops out when you turn the Droid on — the display. I will admit I never had issues with the screen on my iPhone… until the Droid came along. The Droid’s display has a resolution of 480×854 and is 3.7-inches of pure delight. So much so that after using the Droid for almost a week now when I look at the screen on my iPhone everything on it comes across as being blurry.

Apple, we all beg of you, please make Rene’s dream of an iPhone HD come to life by giving us a better screen on the next version of iPhone. Pretty please…

Notifications

The way the Droid handles notifications is not something new but rather a staple of the Android OS. Like many of you, I feel the iPhone does a very poor job with any sort of push notification whether it is a incoming text message or a sports score. So poor in fact that if I receive a sports score and then a text message right afterwords I have no way of knowing the sports score ever came through! On the Droid I can get all the scores pushed to the device and have email, text messages, etc and a simple swipe down on the screen reveals every single notification. I’m not sure about any of you but how the iPhone handles push notifications is getting pretty old at this point.

Multitasking

According to our poll of what Droid feature would you like to see on your iPhone, many of you would like to see the ability to multitask 3rd party applications. Apple’s response to your request has been that multitasking will kill your battery faster than you could ever imagine. Are they correct? Yes and no. Multitasking will have a negative effect on your battery but it’s not as much as Apple claims it to be. Apple needs to let the consumer decide for themselves. If they’d like to take a hit in the battery life department to be able to multitask 3rd party applications, why not let them? Give us the option and make everyone happy.

Conclusion

So what does this all mean for Apple, and for me? Will I be ditching my iPhone for the Droid? No. I could never leave all of you behind. But I will be keeping the Droid as it definitely has my attention. I can’t say it’s the Verizon network as AT&T service is top notch where I live, but the three things I discussed above have me hooked and good. The Droid really is Apple’s wake up call in a sense. It’s finally a competitive enough device that it should force them to step up and greatly improve upon the iPhone next time around. While I would never tell any of you to do away with your iPhone I will tell you this, if you have a chance to pick one up and give it a whirl, do so as you are sure to enjoy it.

If you are interested in learning more about the Droid be sure to check out Android Central’s full hardware review as Casey knocked it out of the park. And if you’ve already tried the Droid, drop us a note in the comments and let us know how it treated you.

Orange UK sold 30,000 iPhones on release day, despite their dodgy unlimited data = 750MB, and despite the iPhone already being available on rival O2 UK since 2007. By contrast, Verizon launched the much-hyped, geek-liked Droid for the first time on any network, anywhere, ever, and sold — according to Bloomberg — 100,000 over the weeked. Three and a bit times as much sounds almost as good as their “5x the 3G coverage of AT&T” commercials. But then the US is a much bigger market and Verizon a much bigger carrier, and Orange has only a day, not a weekend, but whatev…

The iPhone 3GS, as a third data point, sold over 1,000,000 it’s first weekend out the gate (300,000+ of those estimated to have been on AT&T). Sure, that was international, but then the iPhone 3GS was available internationally, all under the same brand, in several countries at the same time. Verizon licensed the Droid trademark, so even when the same device rolls out in Canada and Europe, it won’t be the Droid but the Milestone, which is 5x less the geek name sex-appeal.

What does this all mean? iPhone mindshare is still huge and demand in countries that were exclusive to one carrier is still high. In part, this may be because there’s a single, global iPhone brand (and feature set) for consumers to identify with, and rather than controlled by a carrier (like Droid), it’s controlled only to Apple — so it might just appear on your favorite carrier one day as well, be it Bell/Telus, Orange/Vodafone, or Verizon…

[via AppleInsider and BGR]

I’m a big Facebook user, and I’m guessing many of you are as well, given the interest in our Facebook for iPhone posts. Well, I was able to spend a little time with the Droid in a Verizon store on launch day, and while I wouldn’t call this a full-blown comparison, it is a quick overview of some of the similarities and differences I noticed between their Facebook applications.

The setup is a little different than the iPhone. For starters, it was reminiscent of the Palm Pre; the Droid will sync your contacts to your address book. After the initial setup, I was eager to get started using the app.

At first facebook for droid looks like its iPhone cousin; very familiar news feed page. After that however, is where the similarities start to diverge. Let us take it back a step. The facebook app has a “launcher’ page with News Feed, Friends, etc. The Droid app is missing Inbox.Yup. You read right. There is no Inbox on the Droid app. Ok, moving on…

So, like on the iPhone, the Droid shows links in posts and status updates. So, I went to click on a link one of my friend’s posted web links and it took me directly to their profile. Odd. I then tried to click on the post again and it created a vicious circle. Conclusion with links? It appears you cannot launch them from the Droid app. Hard to believe, I am sure.

I was also unable to switch between News Feed, Pages, Status Updates and custom groups I created. I am not saying there is not a way to do this, but I could not figure it out and the Verizon representative was less than helpful. It displayed News Feed in the top-right corner, but it was tiny and I could not find a way to switch with the brief amount of time I had with the device.

Oh, and one more thing: the app seems to cache really well, but also does not seem to refresh on launch; there is no refresh button and shake to refresh does not work like on the iPhone. So, I walked away unimpressed, but I can’t believe the Droid suffers from all of these short comings. I am looking forward to clarification and inquiries in the comments!

Verizon’s Motorola DROID, launched November 6, 2009, wasted no time taking it to Apple’s iPhone 3GS, starting with a pre-emptive iDon’t TV commercial that mixed unflattering fact and fiction to appeal to geeks and general consumers alike. Many have now hailed it as the best competition to the iPhone to date, and the first flagship device to match it. Are they right?

If you’re interested in either an iPhone 3GS or DROID, here are some points to consider:

Network: AT&T vs. Verizon

Many would say pick your network before you pick your device, but sometimes we love a device so much we’ll put up with limited or even lousy networks. However, it’s important to remember that Verizon has better 3G coverage than AT&T. CDMA/EVDO (the technology Verizon uses) simply has greater range, and there are so many millions of data-hungry iPhones on AT&T that their GSM/HSPA towers can get overwhelmed (especially New York and San Francisco). So, yes, you will get more bars in more places with Verizon.

On the flip side, AT&T’s GSM/HSPA network is the same standard used in almost all of the rest of the world. This means that you can use your iPhone when you travel (though you’ll pay a premium for the privilege) on carriers from the US to Canada to Europe to Australia to… you get the idea. Verizon’s CDMA/EVDO network, on the other hand, might roam in Canada, but that’s it. If you go DROID, you’re not taking it with you.

Lastly, AT&T’s GSM/HSPA can handle simultaneous voice and data, so you can talk on the phone while surfing the web, emailing, or using apps over 3G. Verizon’s CDMA/EVDO can’t do that. If you’re on the phone, you’re off the 3G internet. Wi-Fi can make up for this if available, but if you’re on the road you’re out of luck — and yes, that includes Google Maps Navigation for anything but cached data. (That is, if you have an AT&T 3G connection to work with, remember our first point above).

So if network matters to you — and it should! — figure out the best carrier for where you live, work, and travel, and that will help you figure out the device, be it iPhone or DROID.

Hardware: Slab vs. Slider

The iPhone 3GS is all about the singular slab, black and silver and glass, with rounded corners and ultra-slim profile, and only the Apple logo by way of branding. The DROID is in two “licorice and brown-sugar” parts, screen and sliding keyboard, with sharper angles, and Verizon, Motorola, and Google proudly etched all over it. Both are solid; both are well built.

Inside those bodies, the DROID boasts a 3.7-inch WVGA (480×854), 16:9 capacitive touchscreen with a 550 MHz processor, microUSB slot (comes with 16gb microSDHC card), user-changeable 1400 mAh battery (rated at nearly 6 and a half hours of usage time), and 5 megapixel camera with image stabilization, 4x zoom, dual-led Flash, and auto-focus. Oh, and a physical keyboard.

The iPhone is 3.5-inch (320×480) capacitive touchscreen with an undisclosed but snappy processor (600MHz Cortex A8 when investigated), no removable storage but 16GB or 32GB of internal memory, built-in battery with 5-hours of talk time, a 3 megapixel camera with auto-focus, and no physical keyboard.

So, DROID wins the spec battle, but there are a few caveats. Though capacitive and touchscreen, the Verizon DROID doesn’t support multi-touch gestures. Yes, Android 2.0 supports them, yes the DROID’s Euro-counterpart, the Milestone, includes them, yes developers can make apps that implement them, but for some reason, the DROID’s built-in apps don’t let you do things like pinch-to-zoom or multi-touch typing. The iPhone, on the other hand, is a multitouch monster. It’s fully and uniformly supported on every iPhone, in every app.

Though it can use up to a 32GB microUSB card, unless you “root” (hack) the DROID, you can’t store apps on that card. Supposedly due to piracy concerns, Android 2.0 only allows you to install apps on 256MB of internal memory (some developers work around this by installing a small host app, then downloading extra data to the card). Depending on your usage pattern, that may not affect you, of course. But for gamers who want lengthy adventures with tons of textures, or offline navigation with all the localized maps, it could be an annoyance. The iPhone, by contrast, lets you use almost all available space for apps — up to just shy of 32GB on the high-end model.

While the DROID has a 5 megapixel camera, we’ve learned via the megapixel wars on point-and-shoots that size doesn’t matter. Quite often small sensors are cut up far to much, sacrificing quality for quantity. When it comes to the DROID camera, while it’s far from terrible, it’s pictures aren’t as pretty as the iPhone 3GS’. At least not yet. iPhone 3GS is currently auto-focusing better and its software is processing better looking stills.

Lastly, the DROID has a physical keyboard and a virtual keyboard. The iPhone only has a virtual keyboard. Early reviews suggest the DROID physical keyboard is a little flat, a little hard to differentiate one key from another, and a little off-center to accommodate the 5-way control. In other words, it’s no BlackBerry. Likewise, the virtual keyboard is good but not iPhone great. If you care about physical keyboard, however, DROID has one and iPhone doesn’t.

Both have top-of-the-line hardware, with the DROID raising the stakes to tip-top. It’s not what you have, however, but what you do with what you have, and in that regard the scales look pretty well balanced.

Software: iPhone 3.0 vs. Android 2.0

Android is an open-source, Apache-licensed operating system that Google makes available free of charge to device manufacturers who can add their own proprietary “secret sauce” to the mix. So, there’s no single, unified Android platform like there is for iPhone. On the plus side, you get a much greater amount of diversity, hardware and software, then the iPhone. On the minus side, it means what you see on one Android device may not be what you see on another. In terms of the DROID, this means you won’t see HTC’s Sense UI or even Mototola’s own Blur social networking interface. What you do get is Android 2.0 Eclair with Google’s proprietary Push Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Voice, YouTube, and Google Maps (now including the incredible looking Google Maps Navigation) rolled in. If you’re heavily invested in the Google experience, that alone is compelling.

The iPhone doesn’t offer as much Google goodness — certainly and controversially not Google Voice for example, and not Navigation (yet?) either. It does offer some, however, including push Gmail, Calendar, and Contacts via GoogleSync, and built-in Google Maps and YouTube. By contrast, the iPhone has tons of Apple’s very best software, and Android/DROID has absolutely none of that. For prime example, no awesome iPod app and everything that goes with it. The iPhone also supports MobileMe, which might be meaningless unless you’re a multiple Mac user who lives on iDisk, Mac Sync, and Back-to-my-Mac.

Apps: iPhone App Store vs. Android Market

Apps are the current killer-app. Sounds funny, but from “app for that” commercials down to blogs keeping running tally of which platform has how many (100,000+ for iPhone vs. 10,000-ish for Android if you’re curious), arguably nothing is supposed to matter more to consumers right now.

To be fair, not all those iPhone apps are what we’d call high quality. Apple’s mature, well polished Xcode and Cocoa touch development environment and iPhone SDK makes it easier to build iPhone apps — maybe too easy at times. By the same token, not all the Android apps are exactly golden either.

DROID’s advantage is that Google offers a more open development environment, meaning they don’t moderate their marketplace the way Apple does the App Store. Developers are free to make and upload pretty much anything they want, and only if there is a complaint will Google investigate and potentially remove it. Also, developers can provide “side loading”, or apps that can be installed outside the market. This may appeal more to pro-level or geekier users, but it should be a consideration for everybody.

Apple only allows apps that Apple approves into the App Store (and limits side-loading to 100 “ad-hoc” seats, or custom Enterprise deployment). While this should theoretically make for a “safer” environment, the capricious nature of what’s accepted and what’s rejected really just makes it more frustrating. Again, for geeks. Most users, however, will never notice this. With 100,000 apps, chance are you’ll find what you want and never notice what makes all the bloggers crazy. It’s just not a consumer issue.

What’s more noticeable is that DROID allows you to multitask all of its apps, built-in and 3rd party alike. You can keep apps open and running in the background, and with the press of a button, bring a 6-way app selector up for easy switching. If you want to run Pandora Radio while surfing the web or navigating a trip (as long as you don’t take a phone call), or keep your Instant Message app open all the time, this may be a big deal to you.

Apple’s iPhone only lets the built-in apps like Mail, SMS, Phone, iPod, etc. run in the background. So, you can listen to music on your iPhone, or streaming via Safari or iTunes, while you use most other apps (even the phone), but you can’t do likewise with a 3rd party app such as Pandora. The iPhone does implement “push notification” to alert you to activity in Instant Message clients and other apps. It works in most cases, but lacks Android’s more sophisticated notification management as well.

So — and it’s a theme that will come up over and over again — Android offers the potential for more kinds of apps and more ways to get them, but the iPhone’s controlled environment currently offers a greater quantity of apps, and among them many higher quality, highly polished 3rd party apps.

Ecosystem: Cloud vs. Cloud+

Google has virtually become the internet and their range of services from search to Gmail to Google Calendar to Google Voice… we’re not going to list them all again but suffice it to say if there’s a web-based service Google isn’t currently offering they’re planning it — or planning to buy it. And all of those will, as mentioned above, work first and best on Android and DROID.

On the other hand, as mentioned, the iPhone supports most of those services and supports them good enough for many users. In addition, it plugs into Apple’s cloud and client based iTunes ecosystem. It can’t match Google on pure cloud, but it offers local sync many users still want and need. And just like Google works best on Android, iTunes and Apple works — and just works — best on the iPhone, that includes all the music and media, the Mac and Apple TV, and all the accessories that years of iPod dominance have made so popular.

If you love the freedom of a wireless world filled with free Google services, you can go all in with DROID. If you want most of that, and are heavily invested in iTunes and Apple, then iPhone might be a better fit.

Media: iPod vs. ??

The iPhone is, according to Apple, the best iPod they’ve ever made, and if you’re interested in a media-equipped phone, that’s hard to ignore. As we just discussed, the iPhone enjoys incredibly easy and increasingly robust sync with iTunes, and the massive music, movie, TV, podcast, and other content the iTunes store provides. And that’s not even counting your existing iTunes content, if you’ve already ripped your CDs, DVDs, and other media into iTunes-supported format.

That last part is just as important, however. Not all media is supported by iTunes, and so it’s not all supported by the iPhone. If you’ve built up a collection of Xvid, DivX, MKV, OGG Vorbis, etc. content (all from legitimate sources, of course), the iPhone won’t play them unless and until you convert them to MP3/AAC or H.264 MP4. And that can be a hassle.

Now, Android’s built in music player is… anemic, and its movie player even more so, but given their open environment if there’s a format they don’t play, there’s a good chance you can find an app that will play it (or that one will be developed). It might not be as slick or elegant as the iPhone’s iPod player, but if you need to play those formats, does it really matter?

User-Experience: Design vs. Engineering

There’s no simpler way to put it, Google is an engineering company while Apple is a design company. The DROID was constructed to meet a set of features. The iPhone was crafted to meet the exacting tastes and incredible demands of one Steve Jobs. That might sound funny, but it’s the difference between something that sounded usable in the schematics, and something that just works in the real world.

Android 2.0 is no doubt leaps and bounds ahead of Android 1.x (which famously presented users with a Google Search box and flashing cursor when no keyboard was present with which to enter any input), as DROID hardware is ahead of the original T-Mobile G1. It will even recognize desk and driving docks and become “finger friendlier” on contact.

Notwithstanding the lack of multitouch mentioned above, however, there’s a reason why even the original iPhone revolutionized the smartphone space long before the App Store showed up — it’s interface is pure usability. From 2 year old to octogenarian, it’s intuitive and consistent, and you can never underestimate the importance of — or difficulty in achieving — both of those.

Again, many consumers may not care. Good enough is often good enough.

Conclusion: Which One Should You Buy?

If you have to have Verizon, don’t need to travel internationally, love you a physical keyboard, want everything Google has to offer, are a spec-fiend, chronic multi-tasker, and want a device that’s arguably more complex but also arguably more flexible, this — cliche warning — might just be the DROID you’re looking for.

If AT&T and international GSM compatibility is your priority, you consider virtual keyboards to be the future, are invested in the Apple/iTunes ecosystem, want those 100,000 apps unlimited by storage concerns, are a multitouch fanatic, want to talk while you surf 3G, and want a device that arguably is controlled and compromised but is also arguably the most usable on the planet, the iPhone 3GS could be what you want.

Try both. Try the Palm Pre as well while you’re at it. Take them home if you can and use each for a while. Return the one(s) that doesn’t suit you and enjoy the one that does. And just remember — the smartphone space is evolving rapidly again. You can bet both Google and Apple are both hard at work on the next, even better version(s) of their devices.

Android Central has posted up their iPhone 3GS vs. (Motorola) Droid vs. (HTC) Droid Eris, and — spoiler alert!!! — the iPhone 3GS is still king of the browser hill:

Bad news for Droid lovers: the iPhone 3GS beat the heck out of the Droid in the above test. Other tests taken after the video weren’t quite as dramatic as what you’re seeing here, but facts is facts: the iPhone 3GS does load and render pages faster than the Droid.

(It’ll also load pages over 3G while you’re talking on the phone, whereas he CDMA Droids’ effective render speed under those conditions is zero. Multitask that!)

And yes, we’ll boast while we can, because we’re sure as the weekend progresses, the Droids’ will beat the pants off TiPb’s flagship device in other areas…

For now, click the above link, go check out the video, and let us know what you think!

A new, phantom menace emerges today in the iPhone world. Verizon’s massive network has opened their drop-bays, and the DROID invasion has begun. Android Central is providing Generally Grievous-level coverage, while SPE’s own Darth Tyranus, editor-in-chief Dieter Bohn deployed at 5 am to find… no line ups, but hopefully a lot of new gadgets to power his darkside.

Nokia Expert‘s Matt Miller is concerned about Verizon’s pricing, as is PreCentral.net‘s Keith Newman, at least compared to Sprint, though he seems happy enough with the device itself. Malatesta from WMExperts… is still nonplussed. CrackBerry Kevin of CrackBerry.com? He’s busy with the BlackBerry Bold 9700 and Curve 8530 launches. (He loves his berries. A lot.) And TiPb, well you know where to find our coverage so far.

If you get a chance to try out a DROID or DROID Eris this weekend, let us know what you think!

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Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

The 5 megapixel, dual LED flash Verizon/Motorola Droid camera beats the iPhone 3GS 3 megapixels on specs alone, right? Not according to the Chicago Sun/Times’ technology columnist, Andy Ihnatko, who put some side-by-side comparison shots up on Flickr.

Ihnatko also seems to share many of my opinions about the Droid’s dubious introduction commercial, though he writes it out ever so much better. About the camera specifically, he says:

But does the Droid actually take better pictures than the iPhone? Overall, no. Over the past few days I’ve shot lots of scenes with both phones and the iPhone consistently produced prettier images. Where software inside the Droid is easily bamboozled by uncooperative lighting, the iPhone’s camera app almost always finds a workable and attractive solution.

Droid Day in November 6th. Android Central has one in the house, and Casey’s already crowing about it, so stay tuned for more!

[Via Daring Fireball]

Verizon and Motorola’s upcoming Droid handset is getting a lot of press, here, there, everywhere, and one of the negative points that’s come up — in relation to the iPhone — is the Droid’s lack of multi-touch gestures like pinch-to-zoom. (TiPb mentioned it a couple days ago as well).

Some might complain about Verizon nickel-and-diming users by charging an extra $15/month for Exchange support, or that given Verizon’s CDMA technology the Droid can’t multitask a phone call and a data connection (so if, for example, you’re using the new Google Maps Navigator and a need to talk on the phone at the same time, you’re only as good as your last cache). Others are honing in on the Android app space limitations, or just the limited apps (NSFW). But what makes multi-touch so intriguing is that it’s a bit of a mystery as to why the Droid doesn’t support it. Of course, the G1 didn’t support it either, but Android 2.0 is supposed to contain the API’s to do it, and the non-Verizon (GSM, for sale outside the US) version — called the Motorola Milestone seems to do it, if not smoothly (yet?).

Apple’s massive multi-touch patent portfolio is cited as a reason, both now for the Droid and then for the T-Mobile G1. Either Google, while CEO Eric Schmidt was still on the board, agreed not to violate them, or fears litigating them. So, they build in the functionality and let 3rd parties take advantage — and the risk that goes with it — if they so choose.

But why then does the Palm Pre have multi-touch gesture support on Sprint in the US? Wouldn’t the same patents apply? Sure. However, patents are like nukes. They can be deadly unless the guy you’re pointing yours at is pointing equally deadly ones back at you. As both TiPb and PreCentral.net have posted for a while — and Palm has explicitly stated — Palm has a heckuva mobile patent arsenal.

Blustering about lawsuits aside, Apple suing Palm (or vice versa) brings mutually assured patent destruction down on the both of them. While Apple is arguably filthy rich and Palm pauper poor, they might not want the expense or the hassle given Palm’s current market position. Verizon and Google, however, is another matter, especially since Google has been in the mobile space nowhere near as long as Palm, and likely doesn’t have the same type of core mobile patent portfolio in their pocket to assure the same type of stalemate.

At the end of the day, only the top executives (and their lawyers) at Apple, Google, and Palm know for sure, but that’s our guess.

It’s a shame, of course, because the iPhone’s multi-touch gestures are natural to the point where they should arguably be considered default for all capacitive touch screen devices. Apple settled “look and feel” lawsuits with Microsoft over the windows/mouse/pointer interface over a decade ago. They likely consider multi-touch a similar competitive advantages, however, and Steve Jobs said as much at Macworld 2007 when he introduced Apple’s implementation of it:

“And boy, have we patented it.”

Verizon and Motorola have taken their shots at the iPhone, and TiPb has offered some counter points, but truth be told there’s not a smartphone on the planet that’s anywhere close to perfect yet, so even our signature device, Apple’s iPhone, has plenty of room for improvement. Since Steve Jobs is a firm believer in “great artists steal”, which feature do you think Apple should consider stealing from the Droid for the next version of the iPhone?

(We’ve already asked for an iPhone HD going on a year now, and don’t get us started on notifications again…)

Did Verizon and Motorola forget to include a few things in their iDon’t attack ads, like iDon’t render web pages as slowly or badly, iDon’t arbitrarily restrict the amount of apps users can install to 256MB, iDon’t fail to implement multi-touch, and iDon’t have a worse user experience.

We can’t blame them, of course. They were focusing on the iPhone’s weaknesses, as the geekier among us (nitpickers included!) would have to admit, and not the Droid’s. It was their ad, and fair enough.

However, for those considering the Droid vs. an iPhone, we should lay all the cards on the table. Sure the iPhone lacks a physical keyboard (that irks some users, pleases others), doesn’t have Google Maps Navigation (yet), doesn’t match all the specs, and has issues with App Store approvals (though that doesn’t effect most users). But what about the Droid?

(And no, we don’t mean that horrible devil-red eye graphic that’s kind of the opposite of “not evil” and makes that incessant “DRRROOOOOOIIDDD” chime pretty much indistinguishable from “REDRUM!”)

First, in the perfunctory Browser Battles, it turns out the almost two month old iPhone 3.1 Safari is still king of the mobile mountain, according to MobileCrunch:

On the popular web-standards test known as Acid3, the iPhone scores a 100/100 while the Droid caps out at 93/100. [...] Once you’ve grown accustomed to pinch-zooming, the level of accuracy provided by tap-zooming alone simply doesn’t cut it. [...] The iPhone browser is also considerably faster, with page loads completing anywhere from 15-30% more quickly with both handsets on WiFi.

Second, we all know the Android Market doesn’t have as many apps as the App Store, but maybe that’s a good thing since Android 2.0 still doesn’t fix its app space limitation, leaving Droid with a paltry 256MB for apps according to AndroidandMe.com:

Google does not support installing apps to the SD card (and likely never will), so developers are limited in what they can create. [...] For most applications, we want a small file size to limit the download times. When it comes to 3D games though, we need a ton of space for all the high-res textures, audio, and video. [...] Have you seen all the awesome iPhone and iPod Touch games? Hardly any of them would fit on an Android phone.

This problem, of course, also plagues the Palm webOS and BlackBerry platforms. NokiaExpert and ZDNet‘s Matt Miller’s been told it’s a security issue, but does that matter to end users when iPhone’s can go up to (almost) 32GB?

Third, if you’re a fan of the iPhone and iPod touch’s (and Magic Mouse‘s!) multi-touch, don’t think the Droid will have your fingers covered. According to Engadget:

As you have probably heard (or guessed), there’s no multitouch on this device. That’s clearly an issue with Android 2.0 and choices that Google is making about user interface

Fourth, the user interface, while definitely an improvement — and maybe even a refreshing change for some — still doesn’t rise to level of usability as the iPhone. Like MobileCrunch (and every other review we’ve seen), we’ve given our iPhones to toddlers and they’ve been able to use them well.

That’s still Apple’s killer app. And that’s likely why, even after going all in on Droid and throwing BlackBerry under the bus (even canceling their BOGO!), Verizon still wants the iPhone…

[Thanks to Tom for the app limit tip!]

Update: Boy Genius has an advanced preview up for the Droid rocking Android 2.0. His take away:

The Droid isn’t an iPhone competitor because nothing at this point in time is an iPhone competitor besides the new iPhone. And things don’t have to be right now. Everyone can eat. So will the Motorola Droid be successful? Absolutely, we think. It will eat in to BlackBerry sales, Windows Mobile sales, and positively murder any lingering Palm Pre sales. It’s that good. Did you notice how Verizon still hasn’t announced the BlackBerry Storm2?

Original: This time it wasn’t the blogshinobi who leaked more details on Verizon’s upcoming Motorola Droid “iPhone Killer”, but good old Moto itself, according to Android Central:

Motorola just went live with the official Droid webpage and it went into beautifully excruciating detail about this most anticipated device. The early publishing of the website is no longer available but Motorola’s mistake is our gain, now we don’t have to wait til October 28th to get the nitty gritty specs.

And those specs are a fairly impressive:

• Android 2.0 ‘Eclair’
• 3.7-inch WVGA (480×854), 16:9 touchscreen
• 550 MHz processor
• 6 oz (169g)
• 2.4 x 4.6 x.5 inches (60×115.80×13.70mm)
• 3.5mm headphone jack (yes, HTC has now made this a feature for Android)
• Broswer will support Flash 10 in 2010
• Wi-Fi, 3G, GPS, Bluetooth, microUSB (comes with 16gb microSDHC card)
• 1400 mAh battery (rated at nearly 6 and a half hours of usage time)
• 5 megapixel camera with image stabilization, 4x zoom, dual-led Flash, and auto-focus
• the color is listed as: ‘Licorice w/ brown sugar accents’

So Android is now taking a page from Windows Mobile and really pushing the hardware. Is this finally enough to force Apple into raising its own spec game? (TiPb did ask for an iPhone HD last year already). And if so, will next June be soon enough to keep the new generation of competitors at bay?

Or were Tim Cook and Fake Steve (twice) right, that usability and unified platform are the killer iPhone advantages, and on those terms, Apple is still way ahead of the competition?

If the latter, should Windows Mobile (which uses the same split software model and hardware partners), and BlackBerry (which used to have Verizon’s spotlight) be worried?

20 years before there was Verizon’s iPhone iDoesn’t… and Droid does campaign, there was Sega Does and Nintendon’t.

Be interesting to see if it works out better for Droid than it did for Sega…

[via Daring Fireball]

UPDATE: TiPb asked a few non-geek friends and most of them didn’t even realize Verizon was targeting the iPhone in these ads (some thought the commercial was saying whatever device they were talking about didn’t do the things listed). Is that an ad-failure, or was it deliberately targeting geeks?

Secondly, Sacha Seagan over at Gearlog brings up the now apparently dual, and now opposite meaning behind “open application” buzzwords – a device totally controlled by Verizon.

Thirdly, does the push for the Droid explain why Verizon seemingly buried the BlackBerry Storm2 announcement?

Original post after the break!

Verizon has now aired their first new Android 2.0-centric, anti-iPhone (technically “iDon’t iDevice”) attack ad and placed a new website online to go with them. Surprise, surprise — like that leaked BlackBerry Storm2 vs. iPhone 3G(!) chart Verizon put together, the ads contain blatant inaccuracies (even if typeset in Apple’s typical Myriad Pro):

• iDon’t have a real keyboard: Er, it does. Not to get all Spock, but nothing unreal exists, the iPhone’s keyboard exists, therefore it’s real. Sure, it’s soft/virtual (like the Verizon BlackBerry Storm2′s) rather than hard, but it’s certainly not imaginary.
• iDon’t run simultaneous apps: Again, it does. The iPhone can run iPod, Email, Phone, Messages, App Store/iTunes downloads, Quicktime streams, and other functions in the background with full multitasking. Apple restricts two or more 3rd party apps from running at the same time, but that’s obviously too subtle a difference for Verizon. (iPhone on HSPA can also multitask voice and data. Droid on CDMA — no data when you’re on the phone.)
• iDon’t take night shots: Well, we guess they mean the camera’s ISO doesn’t produce good results in low light. Fair point. Arguably nothing short of a really good DSLR sensor does, tiny LED flash included. Though 5 megapixels is still nice.
• iDon’t allow open development. Really, Verizon, with your history, you want to play that card? Android is an about face for you, not a two-face. We’ll wait and see on this one.
• iDon’t customize. Okay, fair point. One out of how many so far? UPDATE: Shawn Roberts points out it remains to be seen how customizable the Droid is. If it’s just re-arranging icons, the iPhone can do that too.
• iDon’t run widgets. What’s a widget? Arguably iPhone Stocks and Weather are widgets not far removed from Mac OS X’s Dashboard counter-parts. We’re guessing they mean little, persistent on-screen information snippets. We’ll give them a second point for that.
• iDon’t have a removable battery. Third point. Apple’s driven away from that entire concept towards longer life, built-in batteries and external charging packs. If that’s something you can’t stand, fair enough.

Wrap all that up in an Adobe Flash-only site for Verizon’s upcoming Android powered Droid phone, and we’re thinking Verizon better hope that the handset ends up a lot better than the marketing thus far. And, that’s the key point here, as Daring Fireball points out:

“Droid” is going to be a Verizon-owned brand. It’s purportedly a Motorola-manufactured phone, but Verizon is the licensee of the “Droid” trademark. (Which name, by the way, strikes me as the perfect name for an Android OS phone — sort of implicitly establishes it as the Android phone.) That’s the big thing. Verizon doesn’t see itself as a mere carrier for other companies’ phones. It sees itself as being bigger than the phones. It’s Verizon-vs.-Apple in this spot, not Verizon-vs.-AT&T.

It’s exactly the opposite approach, with Apple leading the carriers with iPhone (hopefully hastening them into their “dumb-pipe” future), now Verizon wants to turn back the clock by owning an OS like Android. They want to put carriers at the front again. Is that something that tempts you to switch?

[Video via Engadget]