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Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

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Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#31

Post by mahipal »

old-gregg wrote: post #20

Nexus One. I'm surprised you're even asking. Fully Linux-friendly, hackable, powerful and doesn't have any crapware from carriers or hardware manufacturers. Buy it at full price and sign up for a $59/mo month-to-month plan from T-Mobile. Enjoy built-in tethering and guaranteed upgrade to the latest version of Android. I own N1 and iPhone 4 and I believe that N1 is a superior phone. It doesn't need to be plugged to a…

The choice of Java is one of the most mind-boggling things to me. There must be so many developers turned off of the platform because of it.

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

Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#32

Post by pg1 »

Iphone UI is a little bit better. Android is open and google products works very well on these phones. Regarding development it's easier to develop apps for andorid. Only problem is fragmentation. Different screen sizes and os versions can make lot of troubles.

Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#33

Post by jonknee »

mahipal wrote: post #31
old-gregg wrote: post #20

Nexus One. I'm surprised you're even asking. Fully Linux-friendly, hackable, powerful and doesn't have any crapware from carriers or hardware manufacturers. Buy it at full price and sign up for a $59/mo month-to-month plan from T-Mobile. Enjoy built-in tethering and guaranteed upgrade to the latest version of Android. I own N1 and iPhone 4 and I believe that N1 is a superior phone. It doesn't need to be plugged to a…

The choice of Java is one of the most mind-boggling things to me. There must be so many developers turned off of the platform because of it. Luckily, you can now distribute Python scripts as APKs ( http://code.google.com/p/android-scripting/wiki/SharingScrip... ).

What would you have chosen? Java is popular, featureful (have fun allocating memory with objective-c while working on iOS apps!) and fast. I'd bet that it got more people interested than turned off.

Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#34

Post by myth_drannon »

old-gregg wrote: post #20

Nexus One. I'm surprised you're even asking. Fully Linux-friendly, hackable, powerful and doesn't have any crapware from carriers or hardware manufacturers. Buy it at full price and sign up for a $59/mo month-to-month plan from T-Mobile. Enjoy built-in tethering and guaranteed upgrade to the latest version of Android. I own N1 and iPhone 4 and I believe that N1 is a superior phone. It doesn't need to be plugged to a…

Add also Actionscript 3 ,you can run Adobe Air on android Althought it's rather limited in what you can do.

Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#35

Post by rpledge »

dimarco wrote: post #24
rpledge wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If he's running Linux I'd be hesitant to recommend an iPhone 4, but I've never tried. I suspect lack of iTunes would be annoying. Is there a good iTunes substitute on Linux now?

I'm an iPhone user & Linux-only person for the last 2 years and my experience with the iPhone has been great.

What do you use to put music and movies on?

Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#36

Post by jonknee »

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #17

Given that you're satisfied with AT&T, I'd recommend the iPhone 4. However, Linux support is non-existent. You can use iTunes via WINE, but experiences have been varied. 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…

Without iTunes you will have no way to backup or apply system updates. It's not worth it.

Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#38

Post by sandis »

old-gregg wrote: post #20

Nexus One. I'm surprised you're even asking. Fully Linux-friendly, hackable, powerful and doesn't have any crapware from carriers or hardware manufacturers. Buy it at full price and sign up for a $59/mo month-to-month plan from T-Mobile. Enjoy built-in tethering and guaranteed upgrade to the latest version of Android. I own N1 and iPhone 4 and I believe that N1 is a superior phone. It doesn't need to be plugged to a…

> it wouldn't accept MMS or SMS with non-English characters in 2010

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.

Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#39

Post by ben1040 »

old-gregg wrote: post #20

Nexus One. I'm surprised you're even asking. Fully Linux-friendly, hackable, powerful and doesn't have any crapware from carriers or hardware manufacturers. Buy it at full price and sign up for a $59/mo month-to-month plan from T-Mobile. Enjoy built-in tethering and guaranteed upgrade to the latest version of Android. I own N1 and iPhone 4 and I believe that N1 is a superior phone. It doesn't need to be plugged to a…

Another huge thing is Google Voice

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.

Re: Ask HN: What smartphone to get right now?

#40

Post by ratsbane »

old-gregg wrote: post #20

Nexus One. I'm surprised you're even asking. Fully Linux-friendly, hackable, powerful and doesn't have any crapware from carriers or hardware manufacturers. Buy it at full price and sign up for a $59/mo month-to-month plan from T-Mobile. Enjoy built-in tethering and guaranteed upgrade to the latest version of Android. I own N1 and iPhone 4 and I believe that N1 is a superior phone. It doesn't need to be plugged to a…

I have an N1 and T-Mobile also and totally agree. My T-Mobile no-contract unlimited everything (minutes + text + internet, including tethering) is $79, not $59. It's listed on my bill as "FPEvenMorePlusUnlTTW." T-Mobile coverage does have weak spots but in the good areas tethering speed is > 4Mbps.
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