From Android to iPhone
A longtime Android fanboy’s perspective
I have done a dirty thing… I bought an iPhone 5 the other day, and I (not so) secretly love it.
I have been a die hard Android fan for the past 5 years and anyone that knows me can attest to this (this is why everyone laughs when I told them I got an iPhone, the irony is hilarious). I have dismissed iPhones for a long time, citing many reasons (many which are still true), but recently I came to a realization. I need something that just works.
For the past 5 years, I have been tweaking, hacking, and playing around with all the versions of the Android OS. I love how feature packed the OS is and how much you can customize it. This was one of my biggest arguments against the iPhone. I now realize that all these features and customization are not free - there is a cost - and that is complexity and slowness. My priorities have changed, and I no longer want to pay the price for all this cool stuff.
The iPhone lacks a lot of the customization that I have been used to, and it is quite frustrating at times. Why is it so hard to customize notifications? Why can’t I control what app opens on specific actions (Chrome for all web links, instead of Safari sometimes, etc..) This is something that iOS needs to work on. But, even with these restrictions, I am still happy using it. I hit the restriction, and I’m like, “ok, I guess I can’t do that and move on”.
Another strong arguing point of mine for Android was the menu and home-screen. I think Android’s is superior. On Android home-screens, I only have the apps that I want easy access to, thus reducing the clutter. Yes, you can have folders in iOS, but it can make it quite annoying finding apps when you have many installed (yes, you can search, but what if you are more visual, or don’t want to type). On Android, when I want to find an app that I rarely use, I am presented with a nice alphabetically organized list. And who can not love the home-screen widgets that Android offers? I love widgets and they are super useful! By simply unlocking your device you can see all the information you need. Very cool!
And now onto hardware… There is something special to be said about the hardware that Apple makes. It feels so good. Somehow I feel special when I am using the iPhone. It feels solid, simple, and very high end. I have not found an Android phone that matches this feel. One argument I had was, well having a replaceable battery is important and that requires a sacrifice to design. That is totally irrelevant now with all these portable USB battery packs.
There are many more differences that I can compare, but it boils down to two things. Performance and Usability. I found myself using my Android and being super frustrated at how much it lagged and how difficult it was to use because of the slowness and sometimes unnecessary layers of complexity. Yes, you can say that my hardware sucked (Samsung Motorola Droid and Samsung Galaxy Nexus), but I don’t think that was the problem.
The problem with Android is that the focus is on features. I love how full-featured the OS is, it’s great! However, something gets lost in this, and that is the overall usability and performance. The more stuff you add, the more you upgrade, the worse it gets. There is a reason why iOS just works, and it is because iOS lacks many of the features that can provide inconsistent performance. Apple’s success lies in the ability to resist adding a feature until it’s 100% necessary and reliable and its direct control over limited versions of hardware.
It pains me to say this, but I love my iPhone.
