Archive for the ‘iPhone’ Category
Quick Review of Samsung Charge and Moto Bionic
Since we write mobile software and need to test on a variety of hardware we buy a lot of phones. And I often carry two phones around, an Android device and my iPhone. Sometimes I forward my main number, which is associated with my Verizon iPhone, to my Android device. Alas, I can’t forward the texts.
I am a Verizon customer and typically only carry Verizon phones. I used ATT for three or so years when that was the only way to get an iPhone in the US, but returned to Verizon when I could. Verizon is not perfect and it’s expensive, but they offer by far the best service in the US. Being on Verizon limits me to their Android handsets.
Friends and family who are verizon customers often ask me what phone they should get to replace their aging handset. Short answer today: none. Wait. There are better options coming.
I carried the Samsung Droid Charge for about six weeks before passing it on to someone else at the company. The LTE network was fast, but the phone itself was dog slow. It was slow enough that I had to train myself to pause after taking actions or I would take the same action twice.
Speed was the number one problem on the Charge. People look at me funny when I say that because it’s an LTE phone and we all know that LTE is fast. Yes, LTE is fast, and if you enjoy running speedtest.net on the phone all day to confirm the speed of your local 4G network, then this phone is for you. But if you are hoping to do more than that, say, maybe, read email or browse the web, then you will be disappointed.
Battery life is the second issue on the Charge. It won’t last a day on medium usage. It’s a 3pm phone. That’s a non-starter when I am traveling.
People also rave about the contrast, saturation and viewing angle of the OLED display on the Charge. Yes, those things are all there, but what they forget to mention is the terrible color accuracy and overblown reds that detract from looking at photos on the device.
The weight of the Charge is manageable. Officially it’s 5.0 oz. By contrast, the iPhone 4.8 oz. The size of the phone is significantly larger than the iPhone and not completely comfortable in the hand. It’s hard to reach for some of the bottom buttons. But overall, the Charge has pretty good ergonomics.
Other nice features: you can take a screenshot with the Charge (samsung addition); there is a pretty nice dock that turns the phone into a bedside alarm clock and charges a second battery (which you will need). Samsung puts controls for wifi and bluetooth in the notification bar.
I downloaded and paid for a clean copy of the Android 2.3 keyboard because the 2.2 keyboard that Samsung ships is not great and the phone has not yet been updated to 2.3.
The Droid Bionic I have only had for a few days. It’s heavier than the Charge, coming in at 5.6 oz. The screen has better color rendition, although you can see some pixelation. Viewing angle is inferior.
But the big news with the Bionic is that the phone itself is fast, more than fast enough that I don’t think about the speed.
Moto’s customization of the Android UI is not attractive to me and the phones ships with lot’s of crapware. You can’t remove the crapware unless you root the phone, which I have not done. I downloaded Go Launcher to change the home screen. That made me marginally happier. Battery life is still under review by me but my guess is that it will be a 5pm phone.
The phone feels less plasticy in the hand than the Charge, but the ergonomics are no better and possibly worse with a power button that is on the top left.
Neither of these phones are anywhere near as polished as the iPhone 4 in terms of the physical hardware. We also are running iOS 5 on our iPhones (we are developers) and although we can’t review or talk about any specific features until Apple releases that, Apple is working through the list of shortcomings of the iPhone versus Android that I outlined about one year go.
So as a Verizon customer right now, my recommendation would be to wait. If you love iOS and the iPhone, then the rumors say the iPhone 5 is imminent. If you are a lover of the Robot then wait for the rumored Nexus Prime. I don’t think LTE is worth the sacrifice in battery life, weight and size that it requires today. The rumor is that Apple is not putting LTE into the iPhone 5 and given the battery life, size and weight of the first generation of LTE phones, I think that was a smart decision on their part.
Finally, some will be asking Android vs iOS? What’s better? My feeling is that Apple has the better product. The main deficiency today is the lack of turn by turn navigation, which you can solve by buying a third party GPS app for the iPhone (I bought the TomTom app, which works adequately if not brilliantly;traffic is an added yearly subscription; TomTom customer support, if you have the misfortune to contact them, is HORRIBLE).
Android is also very strong if you are a Google Apps user. The integration with Google Apps makes it an attractive option for those users. If you are a Google apps user on the iPhone, make sure you configure your account as an Exchange account against m.google.com versus setting your account up as a Gmail account. You will get contact synchronization that way.
iPhone 4 Impressions
I have had an iPhone 4 since launch day. I upgraded from a 3GS. Overall, it’s nice upgrade over the previous version of the phone. The single best feature is the new 300 DPI Retina display. You interact with that display all the time and you never stop noticing how beautiful and sharp it is.
Overall fit and finish are a step above the previous phone. The lack of plastic means that it is more durable. It feels thinner in my pocket. It’s the size that I feel a phone should be.
The new antenna is both better and worse. If you touch the phone in its sensitive weak spot, where the GSM and Wifi antennas meet, you may drop a call and you will certainly see greatly reduced data rates.
But, if you take care to not put your finger over that weak spot, the reception is actually a bit better than the previous phone in my my opinion. The new phone is capable of significantly faster upload rates due to its implementation of HSUPA, good for Phanfare because our iPhone app uploads full size images from the phone.
This points out the maddening compromise that Apple made with the new design. The phone is capable of better reception and suffers from worse reception when held in certain ways. But there is no way I would consider returning the phone over this issue. I like it too much over the old phone.
I took the iPhone 4 and an iPad 3G on a recent European cruise and often found the iPhone could get a cell signal where the iPad got none.
On land when I was using the iPhone, I sometimes dropped from 3G to Edge and then realized my finger was over the weak spot. This was an interesting environment to test the devices both because GSM coverage is thought to be better in Europe and the devices were roaming across multiple cell carriers, looking for the best one.
Overall, the iPhone 4 is a pleasure to use. It’s fast and feels even faster because of the fast app switching in iOS 4. The only feature I miss from the 3GS/iOS 3 is that double clicking the home button used to bring up phone favorites for me. Now, under iOS 4, it brings up the task manager (I know Steve hates that term but let’s call a spade a spade).
I still miss the reliability of my old Verizon Blackberry as a phone. I had the Blackberry World Phone (CDMA + GSM). I could make a call on that phone and hold the call while driving from Princeton to NYC (at least an hour). With the iPhone on ATT, I would be lucky to get five minutes. I don’t know whether that’s ATT or Apple’s fault. I suspect a little of both.
But the iPhone is really a pocket computer at its heart. I use it more on WiFi than any other way. As a pocket computer it shines above all other devices on the market. The whole package: hardware, software, UI, and apps are unbeatable from my standpoint.
I think Apple is enjoying success with the iPhone platform, despite it being a so-so phone, because they properly predicted the transition from voice to data. I use far fewer minutes than I did 10 years ago. I nearly never leave anybody voice mail and often don’t listen to my voice mail. I just call the person back.
I used the camera quite a bit on my recent trip. It’s not a digital SLR, but in easy lighting situations, it takes a gorgeous photo.
You might notice I did not mention facetime. The only facetime calls I made are test calls to marvel over the technology. This is partially because I just don’t use the device as a phone all that often and when I do its a business call via bluetooth.
I would recommend the iPhone 4. It’s small, light, has superior battery life, a beautiful display and an improved camera. It is still unreliable in the US as a phone. If you need a phone that will always ring when you call it, and that can hold calls for more than 10 minutes, you should probably stick with a Verizon device. Not sure whether Android phones hold calls. The blackberry devices certainly do the last time I checked.
The End of Unlimited Data at ATT is Mostly a Good Thing
ATT today announced the end of unlimited data plans for wireless customers. Why did they do it? It was not about revenue. They sat around the table at ATT and asked: What’s the number one issue with customer satisfaction today? And the universal answer is network performance. How do they fix it?
Well, they could add more capacity but that takes a long time and is very expensive. Instead, they decided to ration the scarce resource of the data network by offering tiered plans. When people pay for what they eat, they eat less and more efficiently. I remember my freshman year at Dartmouth we used to have all-you-can-eat-dining at “Full Fare.” In that dining hall, the trays would go to the dish room with food sculptures and uneaten desserts. Meanwhile, in the “A la Carte” dining room next door, where students paid for each item, trays would show up at the dish room with an empty plate and a fork. Really. It’s just human nature.
With tiered pricing, ATT’s network performance is going to improve in high congestion areas. 98% of their customers will see reduced costs and the top 2%, if they want to pay for extra data above 2GB, will get good download speeds on their additional usage. Plus, top 2% customers are no longer the enemy of ATT. They pay a fair rate and can do whatever they want.
It’s also good for consumers because you can now get a cheaper entry level data plan for $15/month, great for kids.
Alas, ATT could not help but throw in a few items that are not customer friendly or rational. I hope they rethink them:
- If you go over the 200MB in the entry level plan, they charge you an additional $15 for the next 200MB, effectively charging you $30 for 400MB when you could have purchased 2GB for $25 if you had planned better. This harkens back to the very consumer unfriendly practice of making consumers guess at their voice usage minutes per month and hitting them with unreasonable overage charges when they guess wrong.
- Tethering will cost $20 per month extra. This is a mistake. If I buy a 2GB package, they should be comfortable with my using that any way I see fit for personal use. After all, I am not likely going to be using my laptop simultaneously with my iPhone. This is ATT being greedy. They just want a per device charge, but a per-person charge is actually more rational and customer friendly. Tethering has enough shortcomings in battery life and convenience to be its own punishment relative to buying a separate data connection for a device.
Even with this nasty fine print, the move to tiered pricing is good for ATT customers. Sure, in a perfect world there would be enough capacity that everyone could just use as much as they want, but the reality is that wireless data is a scarce resource today for ATT, and by charging people for what they consume, they will better allocate their resources among their customers.
How does this affect photography? Cameras are used sporadically. Allowing consumers to pay for the data they use will allow cameras to get cellular data connections that don’t need to cost anything when you don’t use the camera. Today, some devices are already sold this way, like the Kindle. Of course, ATT is not selling iPhone data like that today. It’s use it or lose it, but maybe someday they will. This is what is needed to put cellular connections on every device on earth.
I love my new Verizon iPhone
I am traveling down Interstate 91 South in New Hampshire, returning from my 20th Dartmouth Reunion, enjoying pretty decent data access on my iPhone 3G, even though there is zero ATT service on this stretch of the road. I am getting a few hundred kilobits/second.
Ok, there is one small detail I a left out. I am using a MiFi 2200 Wi-Fi hotspot in the car. This little device, smaller than a deck of cards, connects to the Verizon data network, establishes and EvDO connection, and puts up Wi-Fi cloud around itself.
Using the MiFi, my iPhone is essentially a Verizon iPhone. I use data more than voice, so this really does bring the better Verizon coverage to my iPhone. The device is battery operated, although you can plug it in or attach it via USB to a charging source, such as the 12-volt adapter in the car.
No doubt, this is an expensive solution. The Verizon EvDO card is over $60/month. But, truth-be-told, I have had EvDO service for over 4 years now since I find it useful when traveling. The sad truth is that while the ATT 3G network is faster than the Verizon data network when it is available, it is often not available.
When we hike out west I like having the security of a cell phone when we are on the trail. This is the first summer in 11 years where I don’t own a Verizon cell phone, and it will be nice to have the security of the Verizon network while using my iPhone.
The Mi-Fi is not perfect. I found that after being idle for several hours, it turns off the Wi-Fi network and hence essentially needs to be rebooted before you can use connected devices again. But given that it is close at hand, this is not too much of an inconvenience.
As an added bonus, the Mi-Fi supports up to 5 devices (a limitation probably imposed by Verizon) and so my laptop and my old iPhone, which is now the family iPod Touch, can also be on the network.
Carrying your own personal Wi-Fi cloud has never been easier. You could do it using a variety of devices for the past few years, but they were big and clunky and required multiple pieces of hardware. The Mi-Fi gives you a very convenient form-factor and built in battery that makes the concept significantly more useful. And by letting you share the expensive EvDo connection, it also makes Verizon’s EvDo service more economical.
Google releases sync, makes it possible for us to move to Google Apps, ditch Windows
Google announced wireless syncing support for the iPhone through ActiveSync, which makes googles calendar, email and address book look like an exchange server from the standpoint of the iPhone. This is significant and here is why.
We use iPhones and we want wireless sync. Until now, there were two solutions for this: MobileMe and Microsoft Exchange. We use Exchange today, but Microsoft Outlook is has been driving me a bit batty lately. It slows down, rebuilds its database far too frequently, and recently the search functionality inside Outlook got an order of magnitude slower (something broke in vista and I don’t know what). What’s more, we need to back it up and use a separate spam service (postini, owned by google) to make email usable.
We would love to move to a cloud-based service for email, contacts and calendar and simultaneously ditch Outlook. But to move Phanfare to google apps, we need wireless sync of our email, address book and calenda to our mobile devices. MobileMe does wireless sync, but they won’t host phanfare.com, so that is a non-starter. Also, Google’s web-based tools are better.
Now with the Google’s sync services, if they work, we could move off Exchange. And if we can move off Exchange, we can move the desktops off Microsoft Windows.
So while this may seem like a minor geeky announcement, it is not. This is a major step forward in allowing businesses to ditch Windows. And Microsoft enabled this by expanding the licensing of ActiveSync.
I applaud Microsoft’s willingness to do this. Google’s new sync service also works with windows mobile devices. It is this type of relentless cannibilization of your own business that is the hallmark of companies that come through disruptive transitions alive. Microsoft sees the writing on the wall with Windows and even with Exchange and they are opening up the ecosystem and competing with their core products.
Phanfare iPhone app now wirelessly synchronizes all your stuff
We are thrilled to announce a new version of the Phanfare iPhone app that improves upon the viewing experience by wirelessly synchronizing and caching your recent albums right on the phone. The viewing experience is buttery smooth, includes videos, and works (for photos) even when the iPhone is in airplane mode.
New photos you take on your iPhone are integrated directly into your collection. With this new version your iPhone is transformed into a managed wireless digital camera. Your whole collection appears on the camera and new content is automatically uploaded to your account in the background.
This new version of the Phanfare iPhone app is available for the iPod Touch as well. While the touch lacks a camera, you can still view your photo and video collection via the app.
For many shooters, the iPhone is only one of the many devices they use in their photographic life. Phanfare brings all the content together, viewable from the web and on the iPhone. We also support TV viewing via our media server software combined with the PS III and Xbox 360. We would love to be in TVs directly (if you manufacturer TVs, contact us – we would be happy to provide API keys).
iPhone vs. Blackberry, Part II
Just about a year go, I wrote about whether my first generation iPhone could replace my Blackberry. My conclusion at the time was no. Now one year later, I have taken the plunge and moved my 11-year Verizon number to my new 3G iPhone. I did it because I love photography and the new Phanfare app for the iPhone allows me to finally build a wireless camera i can live with.
In the year since I wrote the last article, Apple also fixed a lot about what was broken with the first generation iPhone. They added 3G, they added GPS, they included Exchange integration and they allow you to search your contacts. I have been using the new 3G iPhone in Exchange mode for 3 days. here are the pros and cons relative to a Verizon Blackberry.
The good:
- I can delete and file email messages in folders much more efficiently with the iPhone than the Blackberry.
- The UI on the iPhone is light years ahead of the Blackberry.
- The Apple Remote program that lets you control iTunes is a dream when combined with an Airport express and and amp. Finally, whole house sound that makes sense for parties and won’t break the bank. Thank you Apple!
- iPhone does push email in the background, not quite as well as a Blackberry, but competently.
- You can respond to email on your iPhone when there is no network present. It queues for later delivery like a Blackberry.
- Third party apps are awesome. My personal favorites are the Phanfare app (of course) and the light saber app.
- GPS is fast and reliable.
The bad:
- You can’t delete or file email when there is no network coverage.
- The Blackberry is faster to go from “holster or pocket” to reading email. Blackberry loads faster (but with no animations)
- The keyboard for me is still much slower and less accurate than a Blackberry. When I touch type, I look at the display, not the keys. With an iPhone, I must look at the keys because there is no tactile way to feel the keys.
- If you respond to email on the iPhone, it does not show as replied within Outlook.
- App’s can’t run in the background, so for example, the Phanfare app can’t push photos when you are doing other stuff.
- GSM phones cause other electronics to buzz (speakers, for example). Now I have the classic GSM phone buzz coming from my computer speakers when sitting at my desk. CDMA phones don’t have this problem.
- No wireless synch of exchange Notes or Tasks. Not a huge thing, but I do use these features.
The ugly:
- The iPhone battery life is a total disaster. If you keep 3G on, even if you don’t use a lot of 3G and are out and about, send some email, read a few web pages and make a 10 min phone call, your battery will be dead, dead, dead by 4pm.
- The ATT network is horribly under built compared to Verizon in the tri-state area. There are many places where you get no service or a 1 bar, which contributes to battery life problems.
- Even in a major metro area like NYC, if you explore a bit (We took i80 out to the Delaware water gap today), you will quickly find that 3G basically only exists up the Turnpike.
Conclusion
So what is the verdict? I am sticking with my iPhone, but it simply can’t by my only phone. No way I can travel into the city and only bring my iPhone. I wound deplete the battery and be very frustrated.
When traveling I find myself stuffing my old Verizon Blackberry into my bag. It has a phone number that nobody knows, but it also has my email, and email is super reliable on the Blackberry.
I used to travel on airplanes with 2 Verizon phones; the Blackberry is horrible in a noisy place. I had a cheapo family share phone I used for those situations. Now I will simply take my Blackberry and my iPhone, but that is a very expensive solution.
The iPhone battery life and the lousy ATT network are the two biggest things holding back the iPhone, especially for serious business use. Remember, the battery on the iPhone can’t be removed. Originally, I thought “big deal.” I never carry a second battery for my Blackberry. But you see, my Verizon Blackberry can easily go 30 hours on a charge, meaning I can get through the day with it.
Cell phones use more power when cell reception is weak, so the bad ATT network certainly contributes to the poor battery life on the iPhone. But i am guessing that if there was a CDMA version of the iPhone running on the Verizon network, it would still be challenged to last a full work day.
A Verizon Blackberry remains the gold standard for reliable wireless email in the United States.
Nevertheless, the iPhone is nothing less than revolutionary. At the exact moment when SW developers have pretty much given up creating downloadable software for Macs and PCs, those same developers are clamoring to write downloadable apps for the iPhone. This is no accident. The iPhone is a new consumer computing platform, one that will enormously successful up and down the food chain.
Import from Shutterfly, Snapfish, Kodak and Picasa Web Albums
We just released a new version of Phanfare that enables more inputs and outputs so you can access your media any way you want on any device you want.
- Import from Shutterfly, Snapfish, Kodak, and Picasa web albums directly into your Phanfare account.
- Export from iPhoto to the Phanfare service using our new iPhoto plugin.
- Improved iPhone viewing experience. Just browse to Phanfare using Safari on the iPhone.
- RSS feeds to follow your Phanfare messages using iGoogle, MyYahoo, Google Reader and similar services.
- Media RSS feeds to show your albums on digital photo frames.
- Album viewing pages now have links to album editing pages if you are the owner of the album.
- Numerous bug fixes and small optimizations including support for Firefox 3.
As always, let us know at support @ phanfare.com or bugs @ phanfare.com if you have trouble using the service or want to report a bug.
Phanfare for the iPhone
We are happy to announce that we have developed a camera application for the new iPhone store that allows users to share iPhone photos on the web with a single click. The photos are moved wirelessly to the internet where they are immediately visible to friends and family and archivally stored.
We have also released a new mobile viewing experience that targets the Safari web browser built into the iPhone.
Here is a demo of the new Phanfare iPhone application and the mobile viewing experience.
http://albums.phanfare.com/video/4;1003289;2080668;28510947;1309f95956457154c514d89a2c1b4cdd
The Phanfare camera application turns the iPhone into a connected digital camera that takes the PC out of the loop for uploading and sharing. Users enjoy the convenience and portability of the iPhone with all the benefits of cloud-based storage and sharing. After you take a picture, you can instantly add a caption, add the photo to an existing album or create a new album without ever leaving the application. Here is a demonstration of the new iPhone app.
For consumers, digital photography was a huge step forward over film, but uploading digital photos to a computer is just too complicated. The Phanfare iPhone app gets the computer out of the uploading loop and makes digital photography significantly more convenient.
Good Consumer Apps Don't Expose the Filesystem
Consumer apps are moving to the cloud. No news there, we all know it. One unifying characteristic of well designed cloud-based applications is that they don’t expose the file system to the user. Do you think about the file system on Gmail? What about when you are using Google Docs?
The computer filesystem is an engineering concept, designed by the geeks who created computers. It has nearly no useful purpose in mainstream computing.
Apps that expose the filesystem are uniformly focused on the wrong level of the problem if they are being pitched at consumers. The best example would be the consumer backup services out there like box.net and Mozy. These are fine services for small businesses. But as a consumer, forget about it. Use a hosted service in the cloud that solves the underlying problem.
Don’t backup your email, use Gmail. Don’t Backup your photos and videos. Use Phanfare to manage them. What if you want to create a spreadsheet? Use google docs. What about backing up your tax forms form TurboTax? Just use the web version! Any service that promises to sync your hard drive to the cloud is a waste of time. But wait you say. How do I backup all my personal files that I create with MS office? You have lots of files you create with MS Office? You are not mainstream. You probably look more like a small business, in which case, soak in the file system.
Consumer devices can be divided along similar lines. The Blackberry and iPhone are both great consumer devices and neither one shows you the file system. The Nintendo Wii and Sony Playstation both have available web browsers, but no user-visible file system to corrupt. On the other hand, the standard Windows PC shows you the file system and PCs are notoriously difficult for consumers to keep running and manage. Macs are really only slightly better.
We will eventually see a great consumer appliance that allows you to access the internet, run a web browser and do everything you want to do while providing no access to the underlying file system. This embedded device will probably run some form of Unix under the covers but that will be transparent to the consumer. A good bet is that the first such device will be a multi-touch tablet computer from Apple.
An Engineer 