I would wait until November/December until some Android 3.0 phones come out with better UI, next generation dual core CPU's, better graphics, higher resolution, 1 GB RAM, etc

In the case of the Behold II, Samsung promised an update to Android 2.0 when it became available. After it did, Samsung claimed that it wasn't compatible with the device. Third-party developers succeeded in running 2.1 on it, but, lacking drivers, many hardware features did not work.

I had one of their slides for a very short while and almost every operation that involved putting data on the phone or taking it off required a Windows only program to communicate with the phone.

I'm with Verizon and their version, Samsung Fascinate is expected sooon, likely after the launch of the Droid 2

Since you're already on AT&T and don't mind staying I wonder if you could buy one phone and try it out for a couple weeks and then take it back and try another. That's the only way to really find out about each (Android vs. iOS) since most discussion on the internet about them has reached emacs vs. vi level.

I'm not sure how it would be if I couldn't as every so often i do sync some music or movies. But cloud services are making iTunes and the USB cable more and more irrelevant.

It's a shame Apple is so bad at cloud services itself.

Software upgrades require iTunes, but I guess as long as you have access to an iTunes equipped box sometimes. As you point out, if you're dependant on adding Music and Movies frequently it would become a pain in the ass.

I know you can use Rhythmbox to sync music and videos to the device. Not sure about apps, but you can definitely just download apps on the device itself. Also, I hear iTunes runs fine in Wine, so that's also an option.

It just a lightweight phone which easy to use as a phone (dial, read/write text messages).

Let us face it. Anywhere I am (home or office) I have at least 4 different ways to connect to the web and waste my time over there [;-)].

Let us face it. Anywhere I am (home or office) I have at least 4 different ways to connect to the web and waste my time over there [;-)].

Actually, it was for this reason that I moved on to a blackberry, I was constantly spending time checking my email. Naturally, by the time you open your browser you go on to check other things etc etc. Now I write (personal) emails almost exclusively from my blackberry and it has made me much more productive.

I would have gotten and Android if there had been a model with physical keyboard which I could have gotten, but alas it was not the case.

http://mobiputing.com/tag/jackeey-wallpaper/

Update 2: Google temporarily banned the developer’s apps, but has since decided that they’re safe. You can now download them from the Android Market again. But the bigger point is that you should look closely at the permissions required by some apps to determine whether you’re comfortable with the type of information they’re collecting.

http://www.androidtapp.com/android-wallpaper-apps-falsely-ac...

The worse part about all of this is no one, I mean no one fact checked accurately. VentureBeat, The Wall Street Journal, CNET, Fast Company, Fortune, PC World, Computerworld, Gizmodo, AppleInsider, etc. the list goes on and on and everybody jumped the gun in reporting the issue. No one asked the developer about it nor really looked into the methods Lookout used in building it’s report called the App Genome Project.

That's because you're stunningly ignorant, not only about Android's security model, but also about Apple's inability to catch anything but the superficial.

Your claim that they are lies is humorous, however. Ignorance casts a wide shadow.

You just gave two examples.

Luckily, you don't really need iTunes all that much. You only really need iTunes for activation, and that can be done for you at the Apple Store. Media and app purchases can all be done on the phone itself. As for synchronization of data: I recommend Google's services, which integrate nicely with the iPhone --- Apple's MobileMe works best on Mac and Windows.

If you decide to go for Android, I'd recommend the Samsung Galaxy S, which on AT&T is called Samsung Captivate. It's the closest thing out there to an iPhone 4.

http://www.measy.com/quiz/category/smartphones

I own N1 and iPhone 4 and I believe that N1 is a superior phone. It doesn't need to be plugged to a computer for everything and as a phone it works much better on TMobile than iPhone does on AT&T: the reception is worse on the iPhone, it wouldn't accept MMS or SMS with non-English characters in 2010. WTF. The software (Android) is totally in a different league too: integration with Google calendars, maps and contacts is truly amazing, and you quickly get used to your phone automatically recognizing phone numbers and addresses in arbitrary text.

Another huge thing is Google Voice: you can dial any number straight from your address book without even worrying which country you're calling to, that's mind blowing to me (and I use it daily).

I bought both because we're doing software development for both, but I'm not proficient enough to comment on their APIs and programming environments. I do prefer Objective-C to Java though

Luckily, you can now distribute Python scripts as APKs (http://code.google.com/p/android-scripting/wiki/SharingScrip...).

More importantly, it's the most popular VM to target for new language implementations. You can use Rhino, Python, Lua, Scala, Scheme, Clojure, Fantom, Frink, and others on it.

Thanks for the Python APK link, last time I checked you couldn't deploy standalone Python apps but now I can play with it.

http://riddell.us/ClojureAndAndroidWithEmacsOnUbuntu.html

... although the impression I get from the stuff I've been reading is that there's a 3-4 second delay when starting up an app written in Clojure. There were hopes that Froyo will help in this regard, but I haven't been able to find any reports on that yet. My Nexus One should be arriving this week, so I guess I'll be finding out soon :)

I've learned many languages in my years, while neither Java nor Objective-C is my favorite language right now (erlang is, though I haven't used it for awhile) they both were at different points in my life.

I hated Objective-C for the first week or two, then came to understand it, and saw how it was so much better than Java.

Of course, Java means both the language syntax and the frameworks, and half of what makes Objective-C so great is the frameworks.

Don't let syntax hang you up... you have to get over the syntax hassle to really understand a language. If you want "bad" syntax, look at erlang. That was tough, I had to force myself to learn it, but once I did, the syntax became a non-issue.

Objective-C has every advantage Java does, but the converse is not the case.

I've used ObjC for many years and released several Cocoa apps. The syntax isn't the problem; I actually rather like the brackets.

Objective-C has every advantage Java does, but the converse is not the case.

No garbage collection (on iOS at least), inherently unsafe, primitive types requiring silly [NSNumber numberWithInt:x] contortions, header files, no namespaces...

Cause if you think those are a list of problems, you don't know how to write software.

Java was a good choice in my opinion. I've done enough development for Android to love it, hate it, then love it all over again.

That's odd. I used receive and send text messages in Latvian and Russian all the time and so do all of my friends. You should try to reinstall the iOS.

Back to the flamewar: I recently got myself an Android phone and I'm not really happy with the Market application quality and the operating system itself. At this point it just isn't quite as polished as iOS is.

I don't use Google Voice for outbound calls, but I absolutely love the voicemail features from Google Voice. I thought that visual voicemail on the iPhone was nice, but after switching to Android I realized the combination of the web interface and the onboard voicemail app on the phone is a huge winner.

Also, to address the OP's concern about staying on AT&T, my AT&T band N1 seems to work like a champ. If you're not afraid of eBay, then I wouldn't think twice about getting one that would work on AT&T's 3G bands.

The "Family Talk + Text + Web" with unlimited minutes and no contract is $139.99: http://www.t-mobile.com/shop/plans/Cell-Phone-Plans.aspx?cat...

At least, that's what I'm paying and that's what T-Mobile's site shows. If they're showing different prices in your part of the country please let me know and I'll reopen negotiations with them.

With taxes and fees I pay $89.66/month. There's only one phone (the N1) on this account.

[Edit] I did start thinking about this so I just called T-Mobile. The "FP" in the plan name stands for "Flex Pay," which in T-Mobile's world means you don't have a contract.

I'll touch on the things I don't like about it, though, for the sake of comparison.

- Not much internal memory. 512mb gets eaten up quickly by the OS and apps. That's alleviated somewhat by 2.2 allowing apps to be partially installed to SD card, but it's optional to the developer. It's not a huge complaint, but it is a complaint.

- Weak GPU. This isn't a gaming phone. Hardware like the Galaxy S is a lot better in this regard - if you're wanting to play non-puzzle games, look elsewhere. The N1's Snapdragon apparently doesn't perform as well as the Hummingbird found in some other newer phones as well, despite having the same clock speed. That said, it's no slouch, and CPU speed is not generally something I can complain about.

- The AMOLED screen washes out badly in sunlight. With 2.2's auto-adjust, it's usable in direct sunlight, but compared against SAMOLED or LCD screens, it comes up pretty short.

- It's not as big as some other phones. This is personal preference - I'm a big guy and would like a larger phone, so depending on your preference, another form factor might be preferable. The EVO and Droid X are both very large phones (4.3" screen), and the Galaxy S is moderately large (4" screen), while the Nexus One is "only" 3.7". (The iPhone trails the pack at 3.5").

That said, those are the only things I don't like about the phone, and they are extremely easy to live with in general.

From Homerun Battle to Backbreaker football to that cool racing game I can't quite remember the name of - all run smooth.

Quake 3 runs fine at the highest settings on my Nexus One, and is very playable. The GPU is fine.

Here's how it works: when you put your finger down on the screen it could be either a tap or the start of a scroll. The phone doesn't know at that instant which. It has to wait to make the call until there's been some amount of motion, about 1 or 2 cm, and until that time, the screen can't move (you don't want the screen bouncing around when you tap on things). So, when you start a scroll, when the phone actually knows it's a scroll, your finger has moved a couple cm but the screen hasn't. Android, for some damn reason, takes that instant to "catch up" to your finger, so that every time you scroll, the screen jerks up a line or two. No animation or anything. One frame it's down there, and the next it's up here. Try keeping your place when that happens, it's really annoying.

There is another way to do it too. The iPhone just doesn't bother to catch up. It works great and seems like no more difficult to implement.

I love my iPhone 4. Nothing out there is nearly as good, especially when you're looking at the screen on this thing!

Droid 2 on verizon (out in about a month I believe) if you have philosophical objections to Apple or want freedom from syncing with your laptop. The original droid is still a great phone and was pretty well designed. Droid 2 will have better hardware and battery life than the original while keeping the same design.

...or if you want a professionally functional notification system, or widgets, or strong universal voice support, or...

Seriously, whenever someone starts in with "philosophical objection" they're propping up a garbage strawman. I choose Android because, in a hundred and one ways, it provides me a more usable, more powerful, more useful device.

A lot of people I associate with who own Android phones agree with me yet they tell me they refuse support Apple's policies and are voting with their dollar. And I completely understand their view point. Do you?

And, having used both devices in real life and for development, the Nexus One is the best device on the market (if the Galaxy S Pro had 2.2, I'd easily choose it as the market leader). In fact after using an Android device for a while, and trying to go back to an iPhone 4 for a while, the completely gimped notification system (which, to me, is the #1 requirement of a smartphone), and the lack of widgets, made it feel absolutely crippled.

So where does that leave us? Sounds like a couple of people with opinions.

Saying that the iPhone is the best and people who choose otherwise do so for philosophical reasons is absolute garbage, and you're just messaging your own ego and choices, betraying a fundamental insecurity. I choose Android because it's, "far and away", the best platform in my opinion.

No, I didn't. I called them out for stereotyping why someone would choose something other than the iPhone.

It's akin to saying "The Nexus One is the best device, but I can understand that if you're gay, a follower, or strongly susceptible to marketing pressure, the iPhone might be a better device for you". (You know, instead of finding it to be the right device for them)

The outrage is about the strawman.

I now understand that he meant to say that among the people he knows, they consider the iPhone the better choice objectively, but some choose Android for ethical reasons. I don't see why you don't see that as well.

Let's share our opinions and keep it constructive.

But really, Uncle Steve needs to give us the ability to use an iPhone without an iTunes computer.

It's being replaced with an Android phone as soon as it comes out of contract. There's nothing wrong with it as a phone, but it's at its best only when it's integrated with iTunes on the desktop.

first of all it seems like every month two new "iphone killers" are released. they all have the same functionality, they are all the same size, and they all require you purchase the same one of five service choices. until that changes, what's the point of upgrading.

in the recent past, the netbooks, then the kindle and then the ipad appeared and it made people realize that their smartphone was not everything they wanted out of their devices. so now there's a slew of new features entering smartphones and will be for the next 6-12 months.

but what i want is simple. it's not some way to turn a phone into a tablet and it's not some way to turn a laptop into a tablet and it's certainly not some way to turn a laptop into a phone. i want 3 devices that all sync:

(1) a laptop for development, storage, and other processing power needs (i have this one)

(2) a tablet that's smaller than the ipad but bigger than the iphone (dell streak?) it needs to fit in my pocket (barely) but not have to load the mobile version of many webpages

(3) a watch phone with very limited apps (phone, text, stopwatch, notes, etc) because i don't want my smartphone at the beach, on a hike, on a bikeride etc, but i DO want a phone.

I liked how the N900 has an XTerm right on it by default, quite awesome!

I would stick with android though, and something that can have froyo on it. I would go with the Legend or Desire, or Motorolla Droid if I wanted a keyboard.

I currently have the LG Eve GW620 and its impressive for how cheap of a phone it is.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/2553828,CST-NWS-iphone01....

I stuck with it though, and the Nexus One eventually grew on me. What I started to realize was that it was a phone that wasn't built to be pretty or cute but rather useful. For example, all alerts that came in I would know about via the trackball lighting up a particular color (I had red=text or missed call, green=email, blue=twitter @reply). The status bar also made it very easy to see what was happening on my phone without ever having to actually unlock it. Finally I didn't constantly have to unlock my phone, go to app X and see what just came in. Because the marketplace is so lenient, I found everything I could ever want in regards to apps. Wifi Hotspot creator, LED Flashlight app, NES emulator, eBook readers, etc. It's all there and the majority are free. I never paid for one app on my Nexus One and it did so much more than any iPhone I ever owned. Sure, the apps are never quite as polished but you get over it and start appreciating the functionality. On top of that, being allowed to put whatever I want on my phone by simply mounting the SD card is amazing. Not having to deal with iTunes BS was so liberating.

Unfortunately, Jobs did an amazing job of hyping the iPhone4 and I switched back over. I've never been more disappointed in my life. I dropped maybe 2 calls the entire time I had the Nexus One. Literally the first call I made on my new iPhone4 was dropped within a minute. The antenna problem was real, and it almost ended my current relationship. My girlfriend stopped talking to me on the phone and resorted to texts only. Thanks Steve! After being spoiled by the usefulness of Android the iPhone feels like such a toy. You can only see one push notification at a time, if another notification comes in the last one is erased, I feel like they force me to be using the phone at all times or else I'm going to miss something. I can't even switch back because I sold my Nexus One to my roommate, who rubs it in every chance he gets.

At least my free bumper came in yesterday. Oh did I mention with the new bumper I can't use any standard 1/8" headphone jack other than Apple's ear buds? So every time I want to listen to music I have to take the bumper off...awesome.

Swype is cool too, I now can't live without it -- in fact, I stopped using my native tongue in SMS form because it's THAT much easier to type in English.

Oh, now I also have an SFTP client, an SSH client, turn-by-turn navigation, WiFi analyzer -- all for free. Pretty soon, I will get tethering. The only downside to my particular phone is the AT&T crapware you can't get rid of, and it infuriates me that I have to root the phone to delete it. But even that is better than having to deal with iTunes.

1. The Galaxy S is going to be a big device on many carriers. 2. Reviews said the battery life is the best around for android. 3. I wanted background apps.

The display isnt quite as sharp as the iPhone for text but it is a joy to use. Im not so thrilled with the apps I cant uninstall but Ill probably root the device to take care of that. Oh and the touch mechanism is really good. Ive never written something as long as this post before and Ive only had 4 mistaps.

I cant compare it to other experiences but Im very happy with it.

I use email a huge amount so that's a large factor for me, but I've actually not had any complaints in other areas. Browser isn't exactly amazing, but is easily good enough for what I need it for... I use twitter a fair bit and have a great app for that... I don't want to play games / watch films / read books on it... and all round it's just a really nice phone.

Recently, the Google Maps Navigation has been activated here in Italy (with voice search, which I thought was available exclusively on the Nexus One).

Last week HTC released an OTA update with android 2.2, which also added an app for tethering over wifi (tethering via USB was already available) and 720p video recording.

for me the problem is rather with soft buttons being inadvertently activated when using the device in landscape mode, not the feedback.

Android is still very much on my radar but for purely professional reasons. The fact of the matter is that having used Linux since '95 there is nothing in that environment that even closely resembles a Linux environment, despite it using the Linux kernel (i.e. the user-space has nothing to do with a classic Linux user-space.) In addition, while their platform is "open", their development process isn't. IOW, you get code-drops every so often with no possibility of participating and/or looking into the bleeding edge. Meego, on the other hand, has been engineered with that in mind.

If my father called, and asked me what smartphone to get, I'd suggest an Android device.

If an old friend called, who happened to be familiar with Linux, I'd advise the N900 with no reservations. The N900 is more open than Android in that it uses the traditional APIs used on the Linux desktop. You can install pidgin, irssi, otr, asterisk, and just about everything else that is popular with Linux. It even comes with an xterm app by default.

The N900 also has incredible integration with Skype, including video. It also supports adding SIP accounts. Both Skype and SIP work very well over 3G on T-Mobile US.

Interesting, where? I have an N900 on T-Mobile in Boston and it's been very disappointing. I had visions of a "data only" relationship with the phone, but neither Skype nor SIP over 3G are of acceptable quality. Over wifi, works pretty well, though.

How have you set yours up? I tried Google Voice -> Gizmo5, buying a skype number, and some other things and nothing worked. For instance, the phone can't seem to handle an incoming SIP call and phone call at the same time -- so I couldn't forward my Google Voice number to both my actual cell number and SIP, and answer with either depending on the situation.

Then, I have general issues with the phone -- no good maps solution (the Nokia program is terrible, and can't use Google Maps), email is painfully slow to open and inconsistent about polling every 5 minutes like I want it to, I've hung up on incoming calls several times because the "Answer" button gets replaced by the "Hang up and send a text message" button when I'm taking it out of my pocket, etc.

All in all, I've been somewhat disappointed with the phone.

With respect to maps and email, you have a point. The N900 is not up to speed there.

It's a good geek phone, but not something I'd recommend to my parents.

I have been running Linux exclusively since the late 90's and considered a Maemo phone, but decided to go with Android because I thought that it would have much more momentum and my phone using life would be easier.

Firstly its quite large (not an issue for me) and doesn't work in portrait mode very well. Its not really a phone per say its more of a tablet that can make phone calls. The screen while fine is not as sharp or nice looking as either a HTC Desire or iPhone 4. Lastly its resistive which can be a plus or minus depending on your point of view.

Now that said, it plays fine with Linux since it just mounts as another drive. You don't really need to connect it to anything since you can sync podcasts and the like over wifi or your data connection. You can run almost any software you want on it. Development using Python is a breeze. You can ssh in and use it as a mobile workstation. The browser is a real browser and websites display as would on your desktop pc.

I think the real test for the N900 will be if MeeGo works out to be any good for it. I have high hopes though :)

I ended up getting an iPhone, because it's what people have now, and there's probably a bigger market for contract work on it right now. I also have a Mac, though. Longer-term, I'm betting on Android to overtake the other platforms (mostly as a matter of cost), but it's still in the stage where startups and early-adopter types are the main users, as opposed to the very mainstream iPhone.

The screen is HUGE, to the point that it almost becomes a tablet - yet it is still a phone. The screen makes the phone a little big, but given that the screen goes practically up to the edge of the phone on all sides, it's efficiently proportioned. And I find I can get v productive on it - writing longer emails, reading ebooks, etc.

I get all the benefit of Android (see elsewhere in this thread), Sprint (which is actually v good coverage in SF and other metros), 4G coming soon and unlimited plans for $59. Wifi tethering is free if you r00t the phone.

You won't have any problems with running linux with it (for a start you don't really have to connect it to a computer for anything unlike the iPhone) whereas it's practically impossible to run iPhone + linux effectively (via Wine basically, urghh)

Like you I had delayed, but in the end I went with Android because of the rapid iteration model of the platform as opposed to the curated nature of the Apple Product/Service. Not to mention the hackability of the Android platform. YMMV

The UI/UX is not quite as good as i4 and the market is not yet comparable to the AppStore but I cannot really complain too much about either fact. Froyo update should arrive sometime in the next month or two though the 2.1 is usually snappy enough already.

Someone also mentioned the U.S. (rebranded?) version does not have a front camera - my phone does. I am not sure if this is the case, but might pay special attention to that if it is important.

Now the most impressive part was Swype keyboard. First time using it after seeing it 2 years ago at Techcrunch 50. Basically, once you use that keyboard pattern its tough to go back. I think you should be able to install that on any Android device.

I use iPhone 4 day to day. Pretty happy with it, apart from the service.

If you can wait a few months it may be worth seeing which phones are going to get Android 3.0. The N1 probably will but all bets are off with HTC and Samsung. I'd say most of their phones sold today will get it eventually but who knows when. Both HTC and Samsung totally dropped the ball on the 1.x->2.x transition. Motorola hasn't experienced a major OS update yet so it's not clear if they will be better prepared. The gimping of 2.2 features for the original Droid is not an encouraging sign. I would suggest a Super AMOLED screen if you want to use your phone outdoors. Maybe wait for the next device Google adopts as a developer reference platform?

1. I wanted a phone that is not Completely closed

2. I don't care about the eye candy

3. I run Linux - Anything that is not 100% compatible is out of the question

4. I Wanted a real keyboard - i just can't get used to those on-screen keyboards

5. I wanted Skype support out of the box

6. REAL multitasking

So I obviously ruled the IPhone out first. Other than eye-candy and hype i couldn't find any good reason to actually want to own one. I have to say - it is a beautiful phone, but I'm the kinda guy that want something practical.

My two real contenders were the N1 (the best android phone at the time) and the N900. The N900 won eventually since:

1. the keyboard is one of the best i had used.

2. It is a Nokia which in my opinion means a better build than HTC.

3. It's almost a Full Linux box - I could take almost any application i have on my box and recompile it with minimal effort for the N900 (it can use either GTK or QT)

4. For some odd reason i really like resistive screens (once you get used to pushing a little ,it feels a lot more accurate than capacitives)

With all that said, for anyone thats not a total Linux geek like me - an android phone will be the phone i recommend to anyone who asks. its obviously the place to go now.

The community behind android is growing rapidly, which means it will progress faster and become more polished with every release.

It really is the ultimate geek phone.

Also runs on android so you are safe from Steve craziness and Steve tax (unlocked costs half of iPhone 4 16GB).

Most powerful GPU. Runs Quake 3 like a charm: http://www.tgdaily.com/mobility-features/50507-galaxy-s-thra...

I have had both (+ win mobile) and prefer android by a long shot.

Verizon LTE is supposedly launching in a few months and then you'll want an Android phone that works w/ LTE. Of course, we don't know where you live, so LTE may not be available in your area.