Help me find a phone that's awesome like my iPhone 3G. I just moved to an area where AT&T coverage is not good in my home. I bought a microcell, but the voice quality and lag are a bit annoying. My AT&T contract ends near Christmas time, but ideally, I won't buy a new phone until February. Verizon has good coverage where I live, and my company gives me a 18% discount, so I'll likely get Verizon service.
Help me choose a phone which best meets the below features and is as close to iphone-like as possible. Obviously most phones won't have all the features, but hopefully one has many of the features.
Here's what features are most important:
1) Size, feel, and build quality: I want something about the size of an iphone, not a huge 4 or 5 inch screen, something close to 3.5 inches is fine.
2) Good on-screen keyboard. The phone can also have a slider in addition, but I like on-screen better. The keyboard should be able to rotate to portrait for the web browser, email, and sms. I don't care if it does landscape, so long as landscape is not the only option for the critical built-in apps.
3) A great web browser: one that is as compatible or close to Safari
4) Downloadable ESPN podcasts either through the browser or a music app/store
5) Email support for pop3, imap, gmail, and basic exchange (email only for exchange is fine).
6) Good gmail experience in the web browser
7) Contact syncing with windows contacts or outlook. This can be a one-time sync.
8) If it has multitasking, it shouldn't require a paid app for task managing
9) For the camera, I don't care as long as it's better than the iphone 3G's ancient camera
10) I don't want cloud sync for contacts, email, etc. Those should all be local for privacy reasons.
11) I don't care about games at all
Apps that are absolutely required:
1) Google maps
2) Text Plus ( I know android has this, but not sure which phones it's compatible with
3) Facebook, but not integrated into contacts or home screen, something that's a separate app like the iphone app.
4) ESPN scorecenter or similar score alert app
5) AIM/MSN/Google IM with push notifications
Apps that I would like:
1) Opera Mini
2) Skype with 3G and wifi support, ideally not using my minutes (I can use my iphone in airplane mode if necessary)
3) A good weather app like weatherbug
4) YouTube with the full video collection (not a crippled version)
So the phones that look best for me are
1) Motorola Droid 2 (Verizon): Has most of what I want and a slide out keyboard, not too thick, decent build quality, but not sure how intuitive Android is. Also it's expensive at $230 for a 1-year contract. I can spend the money if it's justified.
2) Palm Pre Plus (Verizon): Has some of the features I want, not sure about the apps. It also comes with free tethering up to 5 GB. Has good/easy multitasking, but no on screen keyboard and it's quite old. It's the cheapest of the smartphones at $70 for a 1 year contract. Is an updated version coming out anytime soon?
3) HTC Droid Incredible (Verizon): Probably the fastest and sleakest phone, but the screen is not good outdoors, sorta cheap feel with the plastic, and not sure how intuitive android is. The optical joystick is interesting. The price is expensive at $270 for a 1-year contract.
4) Verizon iPhone, doubt this is coming out, but maybe it's worth it to wait until after x-mas at least.
5) Anything else coming out soon?
Thanks in advance
Help me choose a phone which best meets the below features and is as close to iphone-like as possible. Obviously most phones won't have all the features, but hopefully one has many of the features.
Here's what features are most important:
1) Size, feel, and build quality: I want something about the size of an iphone, not a huge 4 or 5 inch screen, something close to 3.5 inches is fine.
2) Good on-screen keyboard. The phone can also have a slider in addition, but I like on-screen better. The keyboard should be able to rotate to portrait for the web browser, email, and sms. I don't care if it does landscape, so long as landscape is not the only option for the critical built-in apps.
3) A great web browser: one that is as compatible or close to Safari
4) Downloadable ESPN podcasts either through the browser or a music app/store
5) Email support for pop3, imap, gmail, and basic exchange (email only for exchange is fine).
6) Good gmail experience in the web browser
7) Contact syncing with windows contacts or outlook. This can be a one-time sync.
8) If it has multitasking, it shouldn't require a paid app for task managing
9) For the camera, I don't care as long as it's better than the iphone 3G's ancient camera
10) I don't want cloud sync for contacts, email, etc. Those should all be local for privacy reasons.
11) I don't care about games at all
Apps that are absolutely required:
1) Google maps
2) Text Plus ( I know android has this, but not sure which phones it's compatible with
3) Facebook, but not integrated into contacts or home screen, something that's a separate app like the iphone app.
4) ESPN scorecenter or similar score alert app
5) AIM/MSN/Google IM with push notifications
Apps that I would like:
1) Opera Mini
2) Skype with 3G and wifi support, ideally not using my minutes (I can use my iphone in airplane mode if necessary)
3) A good weather app like weatherbug
4) YouTube with the full video collection (not a crippled version)
So the phones that look best for me are
1) Motorola Droid 2 (Verizon): Has most of what I want and a slide out keyboard, not too thick, decent build quality, but not sure how intuitive Android is. Also it's expensive at $230 for a 1-year contract. I can spend the money if it's justified.
2) Palm Pre Plus (Verizon): Has some of the features I want, not sure about the apps. It also comes with free tethering up to 5 GB. Has good/easy multitasking, but no on screen keyboard and it's quite old. It's the cheapest of the smartphones at $70 for a 1 year contract. Is an updated version coming out anytime soon?
3) HTC Droid Incredible (Verizon): Probably the fastest and sleakest phone, but the screen is not good outdoors, sorta cheap feel with the plastic, and not sure how intuitive android is. The optical joystick is interesting. The price is expensive at $270 for a 1-year contract.
4) Verizon iPhone, doubt this is coming out, but maybe it's worth it to wait until after x-mas at least.
5) Anything else coming out soon?
Thanks in advance
