Best Smart Phone

[VEX]

I Like the look of the HTC TyTN II with TomTom on it, other than the iPhone what else should I be looking at?

[agent006]

A colleague of mine has a Samsung Blackjack (i think), which he seems impressed with.

[clonmult]

agent006 said:

A colleague of mine has a Samsung Blackjack (i think), which he seems impressed with.

Saw that one of our senior managers here has one of those.

Asked him his opinion.

One word answer - "sucks"

Personally thought Windows mobile wasn't that bad though.

[Civpilot]

Nokia N96 8gb is a pretty handy bit of kit.

You have to remember with the iphone that although the user interface is fantastic, and it has some great intalled applications, the actual phone side of things is very, very out of date. The camera sucks big time and the text messaging features are not the best. And to be honest the call quality isn't that great either.

And no, I'm not an apple hater, I actually thought about the iphone but figured I would rather the ipod touch 16gb, which is now jail broken to do everything the iphone can apart from the call side of things. Which isn't needed because my simply Nokia 6300 is a better "phone" than the iphone.
A mate I work with bought the iphone and is now seriously regretting it due to the fact that the phone side of things is (in his own words) "utterly, utterly pants".

[tigger1]

I have, and like, the nokia 6120 - a small symbian smartphone (possibly the smallest smartphone?)

[page3]

Civpilot said:

You have to remember with the iphone that although the user interface is fantastic, and it has some great intalled applications, the actual phone side of things is very, very out of date.

Totally disagree, but then I do own an iPhone The phone part is excellent. Clear, quick and easy to use. Visual voicemail is fantastic too.

[Noger]

VEX said:

I Like the look of the HTC TyTN II with TomTom on it, other than the iPhone what else should I be looking at?

If you ignore the UI for a minute, the TYTN II is easily the best connected and best spec'ed Smartphone there is at the moment. The camera is a bit of let down compared to some, but zippy processor + double the user RAM of most (128Mb) + HSDPA + GPS + WIFI + Usable Keyboard + Dual Camera + WM6 + SDHC microSD (8Mb currently 16Mb next year) is very hard to beat if you are looking for a powerful business smartphone. There really isn't much it is missing.

Obvious downsides are size and Windows Mobile isn't the friendliest thing (has been very stable for me however) out.

[clonmult]

page3 said:

Civpilot said:

You have to remember with the iphone that although the user interface is fantastic, and it has some great intalled applications, the actual phone side of things is very, very out of date.

Totally disagree, but then I do own an iPhone The phone part is excellent. Clear, quick and easy to use. Visual voicemail is fantastic too.

But you can't say that apart from the UI, its not exactly bleeding edge in any way though.

And at least at the moment, it only counts as a phone, not a "smart phone". The GPS hack looks pretty cool though.

[croxsons]

Noger said:

VEX said:

I Like the look of the HTC TyTN II with TomTom on it, other than the iPhone what else should I be looking at?

If you ignore the UI for a minute, the TYTN II is easily the best connected and best spec'ed Smartphone there is at the moment. The camera is a bit of let down compared to some, but zippy processor + double the user RAM of most (128Mb) + HSDPA + GPS + WIFI + Usable Keyboard + Dual Camera + WM6 + SDHC microSD (8Mb currently 16Mb next year) is very hard to beat if you are looking for a powerful business smartphone. There really isn't much it is missing.

Obvious downsides are size and Windows Mobile isn't the friendliest thing (has been very stable for me however) out.

I concur having just taken delivery of 8 yesterday. Looks fairly good so far, but struggling to get SAP to work on it? I was assured that it would ... but my Passat is refusing to connect to it.

[page3]

clonmult said:

But you can't say that apart from the UI, its not exactly bleeding edge in any way though.

Multi-touch screen. Operating System. Both bleeding edge. I didn't buy it to be bleeding edge though (had enough of UIQ and Windows Mobile phones that just didn't work). Err, sorry about the thread hijack.

[Mr E]

tigger1 said:

I have, and like, the nokia 6120 - a small symbian smartphone (possibly the smallest smartphone?)

I've got a number of 6120's and while they're fine handsets (and very cheap) they don't really class as a smartphone in my eyes.

I also had a very early TyTNII, and it actually broke yesterday and is being returned. Probably a one off....

[Civpilot]

page3 said:

Civpilot said:

You have to remember with the iphone that although the user interface is fantastic, and it has some great intalled applications, the actual phone side of things is very, very out of date.

Totally disagree, but then I do own an iPhone The phone part is excellent. Clear, quick and easy to use. Visual voicemail is fantastic too.

So you disagree because your bias then?

Can you send an MMS message with your iphone?

Can you use video calling?

Can you send a standard SMS message to multiple recipients?

No. you can't with hacking the operating system and adding third party applications (although video caling will never work). So in that respect the phone part of the 'iphone' is very out of date compared to even the most basic pay as you go phones on the market which can all do the tasks listed above.
Although having a top flight camera on a phone is not that important to me (I have a sony a100 DSLR for that) I've lost count of the amount of times I've taken a photo then sent it to a mate there and then via MMS, its a very simple basic task for a phone these days.

And as for not being able to send a standard text message to more than one recipient... WTF were apple thinking when they decided on that little programing gem?

No matter how many times you stick your fingers in your ears and sing "lalalanotlistening" it wont change the facts that the phone application is old hat and pretty basic, despite the utterly stunning UI.

iphone version 2 will no doubt be full 3g and will compare very well to other phones in the areas listed above but at the moment it is seriously flawed and if you want the UI the best bet is to get a good phone of your choice and then buy an ipod touch with double the capacity. You can then very easily opent he touch and install all the iphone applications quite easily to have the PDA side of things with ease with full easy customisation of looks.

Mine looks like this at the moment...

And I've even set it up with multiple main page organised so the games appear on page 2...


Yes you can "jail break" the phone just as easy and start adding appications, but I dont pay £35 a month to use my ipod

Anyone considering an iphone really should consider the flaws in the 'phone' side of things very seriously.

Back on topic I still recommend the N95 8GB. Was playing with one yesterday and I'm seriously impressed with it.

[NS24]

I've an M600 (HTC eten I think) which is fantastic for txts & email, try making or receiving a call & it's extremely -s-l-o-w- to switch to phone mode, to dial, most incoming calls are dropped (as it's regularly in GPRS mode & can only do either GPRS or voice but not both).

[page3]

Civpilot said:

So you disagree because your bias then?

Yes

I focus on what the iPhone does, and how well it does it. Not what it doesn't. So far I'm loving it. At last a phone that isn't hateful to use. My TVR doesn't have ABS, Power Steering, Airbags etc etc, but that doesn't make it worse than a car that does. Its just a difference of opinion on what's important.

Of course there is lots to do to make it even better. I'm sure much will come in time, unlike the sloth-like enhancements made to WM and UIQ (which seems to be going backwards).

Ps. Cool photos. I'm thinking of hacking my iPhone for 3rd party apps but I've not done so yet as I'm waiting to see what the promised SDK offers. I'm extremely happy with the £35/month O2 tariff as it beats many of my past tariffs significantly.

[naetype]

iPAQ Voice Messenger 514 :

Decent phone
Small and easy to carry around even in your shirt pocket
Good battery life (very unusual for a Smartphone)
Bluetooth
Wifi
Camera (1.3mp)
IE Browser
Messenger etc....
and when I can get round to making the changes: Skype
MP3/WMA Player (Windows Media Player)
No touch screen though but I don't miss it.

All for around £100 network free....

[The Dude]

page3 said:

Civpilot said:

So you disagree because your bias then?

Yes

I focus on what the iPhone does, and how well it does it. Not what it doesn't. So far I'm loving it. At last a phone that isn't hateful to use. My TVR doesn't have ABS, Power Steering, Airbags etc etc, but that doesn't make it worse than a car that does. Its just a difference of opinion on what's important.

Of course there is lots to do to make it even better. I'm sure much will come in time, unlike the sloth-like enhancements made to WM and UIQ (which seems to be going backwards).

Ps. Cool photos. I'm thinking of hacking my iPhone for 3rd party apps but I've not done so yet as I'm waiting to see what the promised SDK offers. I'm extremely happy with the £35/month O2 tariff as it beats many of my past tariffs significantly.

I agree with Page3 - it depends on what you deem as critical functions. I can probably count on my fingers the times I've ever sent a text message to multiple recipients in nearly 20 years of having a mobile phone (OT : wow, that's actually quite scary!) so for me, not so important. MMS messaging I'll have to concede, though again I very rarely use it.

For me, the UI is the single most important feature of any of these type of devices. If it's not a pleasure to use, it quickly becomes an irritant. That's not to say I'd sacrafice ALL features just to have a good UI, but iPhone ticks 99% of my boxes and is an utter joy to use.

When the iTouch came out, I dismissed the iPhone and bought one, same thinking as civpilot - better to have a seperate phone and all the cool features of the iTouch seperate. But then you end up carry two things around (I use my iTouch in the car so it comes with me pretty much everywhere). Then after a while I started to think that the iPhone, despite the well documented limitations, at least gives me the ability to make/receive calls/texts (which is all I ever need a phone for anyway) but all in the one device. So I bought one from the US, jailbroke and sim-freed it and now wished I'd never bought the iTouch.

Like the iTouch photos by the way. I'd mucked around with mine to that extent but then I installed the 1.1.2 update and re-cracked it and haven't gotten round to messing about with it again. At least that Customize app works on iTouch now, which makes things a lot easier.

[Noger]

Not selling quite as well in the UK as the USA though is it.

The sheer amount of competition from better specced hardware devices from multiple manufacturers on multiple networks desperate for your business is telling on sales figures.

A 3G + GPS version would get me to sit up and take notice.

It is a revolution though. Phone UIs will never be the same I hope.

[clonmult]

Noger said:

Not selling quite as well in the UK as the USA though is it.

The sheer amount of competition from better specced hardware devices from multiple manufacturers on multiple networks desperate for your business is telling on sales figures.

A 3G + GPS version would get me to sit up and take notice.

It is a revolution though. Phone UIs will never be the same I hope.

Its the kick up the backside for the big phone manufacturers.

Although Apple have only done the good ol' trick of buying in someone elses ideas - would love to know what patents they have for multi-touch, as there's prior art going back a good 20 years?

texting to multiple recipients. I can forgive that for the US market - thats more e-mail oriented than SMS. For europe, its totally unforgiveable. I'm regularly sending texts to 2-15 recipients (thank gods for unlimited text plans!).

But then, whats good for me isn't necessarily good for you and vice versa.

(sorry for the extra thread hijack)

[The Dude]

Noger said:

Not selling quite as well in the UK as the USA though is it.

The sheer amount of competition from better specced hardware devices from multiple manufacturers on multiple networks desperate for your business is telling on sales figures.

A 3G + GPS version would get me to sit up and take notice.

It is a revolution though. Phone UIs will never be the same I hope.

I'd agree with that, especially the last sentence.

It would sell a lot more (in the UK) if it wasn't locked to O2. It's not a strategy I particularly like but I'm sure the deal was pretty good for the two companies.

[Froddan]

croxsons said:

Noger said:

VEX said:

I Like the look of the HTC TyTN II with TomTom on it, other than the iPhone what else should I be looking at?

If you ignore the UI for a minute, the TYTN II is easily the best connected and best spec'ed Smartphone there is at the moment. The camera is a bit of let down compared to some, but zippy processor + double the user RAM of most (128Mb) + HSDPA + GPS + WIFI + Usable Keyboard + Dual Camera + WM6 + SDHC microSD (8Mb currently 16Mb next year) is very hard to beat if you are looking for a powerful business smartphone. There really isn't much it is missing.

Obvious downsides are size and Windows Mobile isn't the friendliest thing (has been very stable for me however) out.

I concur having just taken delivery of 8 yesterday. Looks fairly good so far, but struggling to get SAP to work on it? I was assured that it would ... but my Passat is refusing to connect to it.

Just out of curiosity, who assured you it would work?