Iphone4 versus NexusS
The TL;DR version is that I'm having an embarrasing non-sensical emotional break down since I'm having to switch back to using a Nexus S after using a Iphone4 secretly for the past few months. My principles are in a mess.
I must confess I started using an Iphone4 whilst on the 2011 Mongol Rally. I had the phone through work, though I didn't have a good reason to use the Iphone until on the trip.
The Iphone4 feature I fell in love with was its camera. It takes excellent videos too, and it was a pure joy to look back on them in the Photos application and the Places feature was a sheer bonus.
I ditched my Canon IXUS 1000 HS months ago because it sucked. The Iphone and NexusS feature I can't live without is Geotagging. I did come across a small Canon camera with a geotagging feature, but the sales person said you need to use special software to enable it. Fuck that! Even if the sales person was wrong, a long GPS acquisition time seems to be the case for camera without a data SIM card. Again the Iphone4 seems really fast, faster than the Android NexusS for geotagging an image. In fact, what I love about the Iphone4 is that it doesn't even show it's geotagging, it just does it (with good results), so it's just one less thing to worry about.
This Tuesday I have to return my work Iphone4 since I am moving to Malaysia and I will have to return to using the Nexus S which has a long list of faults.
The Android Nexus S is incredibly sluggish, like walking through mud when using it. The Android keyboard is almost unusable next to the Iphone4's. :(
The NexusS battery is insanely bad. It's half way when the Iphone4 would be 80% doing more things. The Iphone4 also seems to charge incredibly quickly, unlike the NexusS.
The screen on the Iphone4 feels bigger. Using the NexusS is like using a screen that's half this size... the NexusS feels claustrophobic next to the Iphone4.
Some things about the Iphone4 that sucked are:
- Had to get operator to allow the wifi spot feature which I could never get my laptop connected to
- Apple's Mail client sucks, search seemed broken
- You can't tether on Iphone in Arch (at least I could not figure it out) and that just super sucks. Android tethering is a joy.
- Don't understand notifications on Ios5. For e.g. it tells me I have FB update, but it's sluggish to open FB app and then I have to update again to see the message. w.t.f.? (Still it's better than say tweetdeck falling over all the time on Android)
- Mounting the Iphone4 filesystem from Archlinux broke on the ios5 update which seriously pissed me off. So I had to email off all the pictures I took which is frankly unworkable going forward.
Besides those complaints I will seriously miss the Iphone4. I hate to sound like a complete fan boy, but I don't think I can cope without it. :(
NexusS takes horrible pictures and just the sluggish UI will piss me off no end. Android ICS 4.0 seems even slower and more bloated than the 2.3.6... so this feels seriously like a down grade and I don't see Android rectifying their sucky bloatware trajectory.
I want to keep with a more "open phone" like Android, but tbh I also like to argue I care really about the browser. For me in the mobile Web industry, I feel Safari on Iphone is the browser to target.