Monthly Archives: July 2010

I am going to write a quick series of articles looking at the good and bad of each of the main smartphone platforms and how they each rate compared to the competition. It’s not all about the devices themselves, as you will see, but ultimately having a phone that does what you need well is what is most important.

APPLE

The Good

There is little doubt that the iPhone is a stunning piece of kit. From the materials used to the way the OS interacts with the owner, there is nothing quite like it on the market today. It is a little bit of luxury for the ordinary person and Apple should be commended for bringing this level of design completeness to everyone. Some argue that the price is high, and indeed it is for a phone, but in comparison to the competition and for the level of build quality it isn’t at all when you really think about it.

The number of apps available is crazy and when we hear numbers in the region of 100,000’s it is an irrelevance. What is not irrelevant, however, is the quality of the apps and the rate at which they are being released. Yes, there is a lot of rubbish on the app store, but that does not hide the fact that almost every mobile app and game from the past few years is now available on the iPhone platform. The big developers are on board and the rate of development and innovation does not look like it will slow anytime soon.

Apple’s control over the software, hardware and distribution creates an environment that works seamlessly (almost) and this leads to much better software reliability than is seen on some other platforms.

The Bad

We are starting to see some small chinks appear in the iPhone eco system and this is demonstrated by the way that iOS 4 works on the iPhone 3G and to a lesser degree the iPhone 3GS. Let’s be honest and realise that the 3G should have been classed as incompatible with the new OS because it has a huge impact on performance. iOS 4, even on the iPhone 4, has some problems; the well documented proximity sensor issue is just one, but some users are also experiencing small slowdowns and freezes when running multiple apps. The experience is still better than most others, but the flawless OS feel is not there in the way that it was before.

The control over the entire eco system has lead to some strange pricing decisions, of which iBooks is the best example. Many books are priced very high to the point that it is likely to strangely sales and some films and TV programmes are also priced at a point where it is much cheaper to buy a physical DVD. Music is not immune to this with the likes of Amazon generally being cheaper so hopefully Apple will realise that they also need to compete.

The final downside is something that you will either not understand or fully agree with. The way Apple markets its products is in many ways remarkably good and is largely responsible for the upturn in fortunes it has experiences over the past decade. For many people, however, it is annoying.

Those videos showing Ive and the gang explaining how the new product is beautiful and how it will change your life just beg to be spoofed. The queues of people lining up to buy a new iPhone or iPad (sometimes for days) and then receiving applause and cheers for having spent $100’s with a company worth billions just seem weird to me. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but the extreme marketing tactics Apple uses put me off rather than make me feel that I am a part of something special. I am British, and admittedly more cynical and reserved than most, but it is perfect for the American market and the trend seems to be spreading to other countries as each new product is released.

Conclusion

Unusually the bad points I raise about Apple do not centre on the hardware which is why I use an iPhone 4 every day. The outside areas such as company perception and media pricing are an annoyance rather than something that is inherently wrong with the products and this bodes well for the future of the platform. Apple has done almost everything right since the first iPhone release, but now needs to ensure that the small cracks do not open any wider and that it can get back to where it was 3 years ago. I have to say though that, in my opinion, the iPhone platform is currently some way ahead of the rest.

Tomorrow, the good and bad of BlackBerry smartphones.