- Drop a Samsung, smash the screen, scuff the PLASTICwork, shout at the floor, then go into your local Samsung store and they laugh at you.
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iPhone 5 Launch Props Up Apple's Share of Smartphone Market as Samsung Keeps Rolling
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- Drop a Samsung, smash the screen, scuff the PLASTICwork, shout at the floor, then go into your local Samsung store and they laugh at you.
For me it's Touchdown email. It has full (Outlook-like) email functionality that is not available on iOS. I like being able to reply with attachments, read/reply/delete emails while I'm on a plane and have it automatically sync when I land, and reply to calendaring requests with detail.
Not everyone does this but people who use email for work do this all the time. I see so many people who have iPhones/iPads pull out their laptop at the airport when they have to do anything complicated.
A smartphone is probably the most "personal" electronic device anyone can own. Since most people with cell phones keep them within arm's reach 24/7, it's by far the device most of us interact with the most.
Apple has chosen to go one direction with respect to hardware and OS and Samsung has chosen to go another. Can't we all just accept that what works for me might not work the best for you and leave it at that?
I don't understand the bickering back and forth that ensues anytime one of these market share type articles is posted. You like your phone and I like mine. In two years or less, we'll probably both have different phones than we have right now anyway.
For those of you saying Apple is dated. . .clearly they're not hurting because they haven't completely overhauled iOS. RIM, on the other hand, is trying to reinvent its OS for the umpteenth time and they're still losing market share like crazy. I, for one, like the fact that there are certain fundamentals of iOS that I can count on regardless of new hardware.
Those fundamentals are largely absent on Android handsets. If you switch handset manufacturers, you're likely going to have to re-learn certain things because even though the OS could be the same down to the version, each handset manufacturer usually puts a different "gloss" on top of Android.
Being able to personalize and customize your phone to the max is nice; but at the end of the day, I personally don't care about that. If the technology we have now had been around 10 or 15 years ago, I would've been all about "oooh. . .look how I've modded my phone!"
However, now I really just have six requirements for a phone:
- Make/receive phone calls
- Send/receive text messages
- Have a good camera
- Don't reboot during phone calls
- Don't freeze
- Have an app ecosystem that's mature and diverse
On all counts, the iPhone wins for me. Like I said at the beginning, though, that's me. You probably have a different criteria for how a phone fits into your lifestyle and that's fine. Let's all go out into the marketplace and enjoy the fact that we have choices and can pick the phone that works best for us as individuals.
Apple has chosen to go one direction with respect to hardware and OS and Samsung has chosen to go another. Can't we all just accept that what works for me might not work the best for you and leave it at that?
I don't understand the bickering back and forth that ensues anytime one of these market share type articles is posted. You like your phone and I like mine. In two years or less, we'll probably both have different phones than we have right now anyway.
For those of you saying Apple is dated. . .clearly they're not hurting because they haven't completely overhauled iOS. RIM, on the other hand, is trying to reinvent its OS for the umpteenth time and they're still losing market share like crazy. I, for one, like the fact that there are certain fundamentals of iOS that I can count on regardless of new hardware.
Those fundamentals are largely absent on Android handsets. If you switch handset manufacturers, you're likely going to have to re-learn certain things because even though the OS could be the same down to the version, each handset manufacturer usually puts a different "gloss" on top of Android.
Being able to personalize and customize your phone to the max is nice; but at the end of the day, I personally don't care about that. If the technology we have now had been around 10 or 15 years ago, I would've been all about "oooh. . .look how I've modded my phone!"
However, now I really just have six requirements for a phone:
- Make/receive phone calls
- Send/receive text messages
- Have a good camera
- Don't reboot during phone calls
- Don't freeze
- Have an app ecosystem that's mature and diverse
On all counts, the iPhone wins for me. Like I said at the beginning, though, that's me. You probably have a different criteria for how a phone fits into your lifestyle and that's fine. Let's all go out into the marketplace and enjoy the fact that we have choices and can pick the phone that works best for us as individuals.
You make a lot of good valid points, however in regards to the diversification of android phones from different OEMs and how that affects re-learning I will have to disagree.
Going from different manufactures the "gloss" is merely skinning. The menu options are the same, the App drwaer, the home screens, the menus in settings... everything is the same layout but themed differently. The only thing you would possibly have to learn is the custom apps that they put on their phones. For instance Motorola has its own social app that converges alot of popular social networks and Samsung has a whole suite of apps that add additional functionality to android android. However unlocking, navigation and the use of the phones are essentially the same.
You are confusing "being talked about" with "selling a lot". Samsung sells lots and lots of cheap phones that nobody mentions here, and that nobody cares about. Nothing wrong with that, plenty of people want a phone that is cheap, but it increases the numbers. Fact is that Apple's percentage of revenue in the smartphone market has been growing all the time, because the average price of a smartphone has been going down.
From the day 1 they were making fun of the iPhone not having copy/paste as any regular dumb phone.
Sorry, but if you release a "smartphone" with no Copy/Paste, no multitasking, no resolution independent UI, no notifications, no voice command, no folders,
then it's half-baked "smartphone".
Despite Android devices having the greater marketshare, iOS has more of the browsing marketshare.
Does this mean iOS devices are used more and are more useful?
Or, does it mean that browsing on an Android device isn't as good as iOS?
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It also didn't have any apps, MMS and exchange support. Some people seem to forget that. What it was - was a lot of fun to play with - just not all that good if you wanted to be productive.
Actually, it is a fair comparison and exactly my point. Android phones, rarely, if ever get upgraded. Sure you can root it and do it yourself, but a vast majority of people can't or won't do that.
I don't know. You know for a fact that Apple's code isn't making use of hardware?
I do know that Apple talks about the new microphones built into their newer devices and how they make it easier to pick up your voice in loud crowded areas - Siri.
The A5 also has an ISP, which could be used to analyze images to stitch them together to create a panoramic photograph.
And there's not anything in the newer GPU's that allow rendering of 3D images on the fly that Apple might be using during the turn-by-turn?
Sorry, but unless you're privy to Apple's internal development, don't try to pass off "others did it" as an excuse as to why Apple doesn't.
Just because 3rd party apps do it, or jailbreaking your phone can make it happen, that doesn't mean it's up to Apple's performance standards. Could some of the features just be product differentiation? Yes, but so what. There's nothing wrong with that.
But if Apple was just interested in selling new hardware to everyone, they'd be playing the Android/OEM/carrier game of withholding updates from users or they would charge money to update.
Last time I checked, neither of those were the case.
Or does it mean that people do more on their Android phones than just use data?
This never seems to be addressed. Why does "usage" automatically equate to web traffic?
I use my iPad all the time without using data. Same thing with my Skyrocket phone. Do a lot of apps use data? absolutely. But one doesn't equate to the other.
Nope. And I don't need it. Keep in mind, I'm not saying Swype isn't interesting, but one input feature isn't not a selling point for me.
Sadly, you're missing the point. When you want to make a software product, you always target the lowest common denominator. Even on iOS, even on OS X.
There is no point in restricting your app to only work on iOS 6 unless you app needs something that iOS 6 provides.
It's just the same on any multi-versioned platform (iOS, Android, Windows, OSX, numerous Linuxes, etc) out there.
But that's not accurate. Google updates their core apps all the time - they just don't require a new OS to do so. It's not a fair comparison because over the last year, many people have received greater functionality from their core Apps without a full update.
Instant new financial priorities and wanted to get myself an excuse to buy the 5S. . I miss the Retina when reading the web but it's not that terrible.
Sure I won't play FIFA 13 anymore but I've got iMessage, Notification Center, Do Not Disturb and a bunch of other apps available.
Ironically this 3GS seems to have significally better battery life on iOS6 then my old 4S on 5.1.1
.Basically I use it as a "very pleasent and reliable dumb phone".
It's a myth. You've never owned Android? Both of my Sprint Androids: HTC EVO and Galaxy S2 received next OS version upgrades, as well as a half a dozen of security patches. And even back in 2009 it was a wireless update, not tied to a stupid iTunes.
And if you really care about instant Android updates, you can always get Nexus phone. With Android you always have a choice.
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Ever tried using iBooks and iCloud to accomplish this instead of Dropbox to manage PDFs?
You can email PDFs out of iBooks.
So we have iPhone 4 and Galaxy SII, which I believe came out around the same time
iPhone 4 got iOS6, missing Siri & Turn by Turn that I know of
When my SII gets JB next month what parts of JB will not work on it?
not sure why rooting comes into it, I have never rooted mine and am still getting the latest
I wasn't making a comparison between the two OSs.
I was making the comparision between iOS4, which my phone came with and the new features in iOS 6 which it has now;
and Gingerbread which most Android phones had last year, if they were lucky aaannnnddddd....Gingerbread which they still have because the OEMs (minus maybe Samsung, occasionaly) refuse to upgrade their old phones. Sure, YOU can root it (if you know what you're doing, which most people don't) and upgrade (and lose any of the skinned features) or you can buy yet another phone (which will never be upgraded to the latest feature set).
American company, American profits.
Samsungs are also made in China. Enjoy your plastic Korean knockoff.
A jailbroken iPhone will do everything an Android phone will do, minus the crappy Android app store.
Sure everybody uses their device for more than just data.
But browsing marketshare should equate to device marketshare unless another variable is at play.
iOS has a great app repository so it isn't because of the quality of apps available impeding alternate methods to use the device.
The variable must be that browsing on an Android device isn't as good an experience in comparison to iOS.
No it's not. Getting stuck with an old OS version is a known fact in much of the Android world. Consider yourself lucky you ended up with the magical device/carrier combination that allowed you to update your device.