Exstatica

This whole post started from the iPhone VS HTC EVO debate.

I’m frankly kind of sick and tired of comparing these phones, there is one huge issue with every comparison.

We’re going to start with types of users.

Heavy User: A user who knows how to abuse their phone, hacks/cracks, or even listens to streaming Pandora all day long, maybe watches youtube for a few hours. They sync with their networks constantly. Usually 6-8 hours on their phone a day.

Power User: A user who syncs with multiple services, has multiple email accounts, social networking, phone usually set to the default of an hour or 2, most email set as items arrive. Has lots of applications installed, and plays about 3-4 hours a day on their phone.

Common User: A user who uses their phone to check facebook, sms, take a few pictures. A pretty common user spends an average 1-2 hours a day on their phone.

Lets compare that per platform.

I’m going to put some very good educated guesses on what this data is. I’ve done some research, and I think its mostly accurate.

First up is Android Users;

So what we have here is a chart showing the breakdown of data for an Android Handset. As you can see Power users are set the highest. The reason is more of a catch 22. Google, and HTC build these phones for Power users. The issue is everyone is becoming a Power user. So when a common user picks up this phone, they are prompted to input all of their logins and networks, and everything. Next thing you know the device is syncing with half the world. That user now becomes a power user by default. I don’t care if you stopped using your phone, you’re phone has now made you a Power User.

How does this effect battery life?  We’ll get to that in just a minute.

Now iOS (iPhone) Users.

Left chart is Pre iOS 4 users.

Right are users who are Post iOS

See the huge difference? iOS users are going to change. Welcome to the club.

The new OS is just like Android. its user friendly, and wants to you connect to all of your happy places. So instead of users becoming common users by default on an Apple Phone, they now automatically upgrade to a Power user. I call this Natural Progression of Technology VS Industry Progression of Technology. People want more, but need it faster.

Technology is a great thing, but there has always been an issue of user demands vs technological development. We have finally reached that point where Technology cannot keep up with our Natural need of information, and connectivity.

So lets talk about importance here. Battery life, its the pinnacle of our downfall in the technology world. This has created a smartphone war.

Lets put aside the app stores, OSes, features, and who has the biggest megapixel. Lets talk about something that effects everyone regardless of platform. Battery life effects us all. iPhone is no exception… well at least not yet. You don’t think the iOS 4 is going to effect battery life? Multitasking brings on a huge amount of change. It changes the behavior of users. It changes how you will use your phone, you will become a power user no matter how hard you try not to.

So just be warned, that while companies are improving battery life, the technology just doesn’t exist yet. No matter how bad you want it.

So complain all you want about my HTC EVO’s battery life, its fine, I get 10+ hours on a charge, but I know what to run and not what to run. Hopefully, Foyo will solve a lot of those issues.

I recently replaced my Palm Pre with a HTC EVO. I couldn’t be happier. I’ve had the entire weekend of non stop playing and have come up with a few things that bug me, and could be improved.

I’m a huge tech guy, and switching from WebOS to Android was a bit of a challenge. I kept wanting to swipe, and view the launcher and switch between applications.

It wasn’t until I really started downloading apps, and playing with all the cool features, that I realized while this Platform is still young it has a ton of potential. I thought that about WebOS and Palm, and I thought Palm was going to come though.

I think things are very different with Google, they want to go to war with Apple, but most of all they want to produce something that the world can change, and be part of it. To me thats a company for people, not to people.

Anyway onto a few of my little issues.

Swiping:

If you have ever used a WebOS device closing applications and switching between them is pretty cool. I can get over not having that feature on a phone, and while holding the Home button on the evo shows applications, I’d much rather see it in a Expose sort of view like the Sense view, but with all my applications. However I would kill for a notification view that shows the current/last 5 applications so I can switch between them that way too.

But the “Card” view isn’t the issue. Its the deleting emails. In WebOS you swipe to the left or the right and it deletes the email. With Android you have to either click menu, or long tap on the item and delete from there.

Contacts:

The Android Contact screen is pretty awesome, but it needs to be changed a little bit. It just seems like there is way to much information to display on a screen. I’d rather have it be dual tabbed. top tabs for a contact show different contact methods. Like Phone, Email, Web, Social Networks.

Service Details:

I’d love to be able to click on the battery or the signal stuff and get better details, I mean really no percent option for battery? Ok I know that the Pre doesn’t have it either but it just seems like a simple option.

Launcher:

I’d love to be able to pin a program to the notification Menu. See the issue I have is, I haven’t figured out how to get to the the launcher without going back to the home. If I’m in the middle of doing something I want to just open the application rather than going home first and then bringing up that panel.

So why Android?

Well Palm is taking a stupid long time to do things. First and foremost why hasn’t Palm made their OS use the GPU yet? I mean seriously, it would give the phone such a huge speed up, and remove a lot of the lag. Maybe they are afraid it will eat the battery to no end. Don’t get me wrong Palm created a pretty cool OS, but their development is horrible. They take way to long to do anything. There should be tons of updates coming in and fixing little bugs, and tweaking the OS to have much better performance than what is currently given with it.

So far I love the Android OS. There are some things that bug me. I love Google though, they have done some amazing stuff and Foyo will not disappoint. At this point they need to look at user experience and give users what they don’t know they need, but will want like no other.

I’ve always been somewhat of a nerd, I know I know hard to believe right? I usually have the latest gadgets, toys, and the occasional useless purchase. I started this cell phone epidemic before it was even one. I had a T68i as my first phone. I once watched that phone slide across a dance floor during a break dance move. Luckly I found it from the blinking bluetooth light. The the geek overdrive took over and a phone that didn’t have a touch screen was a thing of the past. I moved up to an Sony P800. Aww technology.

I’m that sort of guy who pushes things to the edge because well I need speed. I need things to be fast. If its too slow I’ve already moved on. I switched to Sprint about a year and a half ago. I eventually ended up with the phone I have now. The Palm Pre. Don’t get me wrong I love WebOS, but the phone is a piece of crap. I’ve had 4 now, its slow, its painful, and it randomly reboots. But it does a lot of things. One thing it does not do however is 4g.

I work near LAX airport. We’ve got a few cell towers on our roof here and one of them is Verizon, and the other is Sprint. I was on the verge of paying my early term fee, and switching to Verizon because I want android, and there was no end in sight for 4g coming to LA. That was until Some guys in a truck showed up to run fiber. You see I’m the guy who knows where all the fiber comes and goes in this building. First it was Verizon working with Timewarner to get a bunch of fiber. Then Sprint showed up. I had a chance to talk to them, see the inside of their sprint setup, and finally was told… “This is WiMax going in”.

So I hopped on a roof and snapped some photos which you can see here.

My heart jumped, I was so excited that we were getting WiMax here in LA, but when? There are no WiMax devices, I don’t really want an overdrive because well I have a cell phone and Wifi, and well fast internet everywhere except my pocket. Where are the WiMax phones?

Thats when Sprint, and HTC announced at CTIA that they had a new phone.

Meet the HTC Evo. This phone does it all. It runs Android, 4g, HDMI, mobile hotspot. Feature packed, amazing phone that I want now. This is the kind of the device I’ve been waiting for. Full 1ghz processor, plenty of storage, sd card, dual cameras. This phone takes it to the next level… my level.

I’ve been waiting for this kind of device. Something that can keep up with me.

You see as I said previously, I’m a geek. I rely on technology as its my day job, but also my hobby. I sync with multiple exchange accounts, google, yahoo, aim, and a bunch of other personal sites. I’m the Ninja of the internet, I deal with backbone, routers, and switches all day long. Not to mention coding, and forcing things to work the way I want them to work.

Thats how it has been with every phone I’ve ever had. I’ve had to push it to the edge to keep up with me. Hacking kernels, rooting, writing my own plugins. Just to get it to do what I need it to do. I don’t think I’m going to have that problem with the EVO.

I’m ready to switch from Palm to Android. I’ve almost always had an HTC phone, but Winmo sucks, and I’m never going back there.

So heres to you Evo, I hope that your cost is worth it, your OS works, the hardware is solid, and you can run voice and data at the same time. I don’t know when its going to be released, some say june 13th, other say end of May. Either way its not quick enough. If the nexus one was available on Sprint I’d probably have that by now, and then switch again when the Evo came out.

Palm, thank you for the good times. Hate you for the bad times, you’ve been fun to root, hack, and make my phone slave. I’ll miss you, but only in that foster care kind of way.