Everything has negatives.
Android: might have to deal with crapware. Apple: oh, you can't do that on an iPhone.
Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
51–60 of 211 posts
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's still a problem with US carriers. (Other countries have far better carriers and ecosystems than the US) It still absolutely amazes me that you guys usually pay for incoming SMS messages. I mean come on. W T F? If the carriers started charging each time you charge your battery the US public would just bend over and take it.
> It still absolutely amazes me that you guys usually pay for incoming SMS messages. What? I've never seen a carrier charge for incoming SMS.
Last time I checked (a few months ago), every large carrier in Canada charges 15 cents for each incoming SMS. That's Bell, Rogers, Telus...maybe some others.
Many people have a plan addon that includes receiving some SMS for free, but the basic stock plans do not.
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#53I guess the article was written by Steve Jobs.
Yes. Anyone who has a less than adoring reaction to Android is either a pro-Apple shill or a brainwashed idiot.
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's still a problem with US carriers. (Other countries have far better carriers and ecosystems than the US) It still absolutely amazes me that you guys usually pay for incoming SMS messages. I mean come on. W T F? If the carriers started charging each time you charge your battery the US public would just bend over and take it.
> It still absolutely amazes me that you guys usually pay for incoming SMS messages. What? I've never seen a carrier charge for incoming SMS.
Really?
Verizon: "20¢ per text sent (per recipient) or received (including Canada, Mexico, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands)"
AT&T: "All AT&T customers with Text Messaging-capable phones are pre-activated to send and receive messages at $0.20 per message with no monthly charge."
Straight from their websites.
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's still a problem with US carriers. (Other countries have far better carriers and ecosystems than the US) It still absolutely amazes me that you guys usually pay for incoming SMS messages. I mean come on. W T F? If the carriers started charging each time you charge your battery the US public would just bend over and take it.
> It still absolutely amazes me that you guys usually pay for incoming SMS messages. What? I've never seen a carrier charge for incoming SMS.
[deleted]
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's still a problem with US carriers. (Other countries have far better carriers and ecosystems than the US) It still absolutely amazes me that you guys usually pay for incoming SMS messages. I mean come on. W T F? If the carriers started charging each time you charge your battery the US public would just bend over and take it.
> It still absolutely amazes me that you guys usually pay for incoming SMS messages. What? I've never seen a carrier charge for incoming SMS.
Have you been in a coma for the last decade? Americans get bent over the barrel on SMS pricing.
https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=incoming+text+message+...
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#57"Why not certify and approve a few of the best components and then place some sort of “premium Android experience” certification label on phones that pass tests and use components approved by Google?"
This is a great idea.
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm glad the author's mom found a smartphone she likes, but this isn't an Android problem. I'll be downvoted, but here goes: This shows the Linux heritage. All of Linux's problems on the desktop aren't really problems with Linux. It turns out that Android's problems aren't Android's either. Solved!
All of Linux's problems on the desktop aren't really problems with Linux. Errr, what?
What he's saying is that all of Linux's problems are with the kernel and surrounding low level code (which is quite stable, performs well, etc.), but with the integration, support and design of the distributions laid on top of them.
For example Ubuntu has made great strides in this regard, but some would say the continual, sometimes drastic changes in the shipped apps and modifications of the interface make it hard for users.
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#59To all those people saying that it isn't Android fault but the carrier's: it is Android fault.
Android wants to be open, and with openness comes crapware, just like your gigabytes of crapware installed on your "some-how-open" Windows machine. The solution? Make sure that carriers won't install crapware anymore, but then how would that be open anymore?
Re: Why my Mom Bought an Android, Returned It, and Got an iPhone
#60The real issue here is not the hardware and not Android, but what device manufacturers and network providers cram down the throats of their customers. Custom UI enhancements/replacements, useless bundled apps that can't be removed, and the removal of standard, OS-delivered features. None of this should have been new or a surprise to the writer's mom, who was coming to Android from a feature phone. Feature phones have…
The battery life and "scorching hot" temperature sound like hardware issues, but I doubt they're representative of all Android phones - just this model.
I owned 3 different Android phones over the past 3 years. My wife owned 2 models different from mine over the same span. My experience is based on using 5 different Android models from different manufacturers. Although I'm focusing now on the things I did not like, the fact that I stayed with Android for so long should suggest that there was plenty I did like.
Battery life was terrible on every Android phone I used. I could not get through an 8-9 hour work day with moderate use (an hour or two of streaming, maybe a few web pages, some texting and a brief call or two). I can absolutely confirm the weird battery issues this user experienced. On multiple phones. At times, the phone would get warm (not scorching hot in my case) and the battery would go from close to a full charge to nearly dead in the span of an hour or so. I kept spare chargers everywhere. Five freakin' phones.
I finally gave in and switched to an iPhone. Now I'm kicking myself for not doing it sooner. Maybe this is a little dramatic, but after using iOS for several weeks I have come to the realization that Android is flat out trash in comparison. I like having an "end call" button that is actually responsive and, you know... ends a call. On Android I would press it several times before the call would end. Just about every time. On too many occasions I had to pull the battery off.
The unresponsive button thing isn't isolated either. Push a button. Wait. Wait. Push it a couple more times. The whole thing is agonizingly slow. Try to unlock the screen. Crap. I have to push the button 3 or 4 times. Arrgghhh!
Don't even get me started on typing. The keyboard would lag on a regular basis, to the point where it was just not practical to use it for texting. I would start to type, the keyboard froze up and then a bunch of special accented characters would show up. Turning off basically every feature of the keyboard like haptic feedback and auto-correction would help, but the typing experience was still the worst of any phone I have used since T9 predictive text has been available.
Apps crashed left and right. I'm not even talking about random stuff from the Android market. I'm talking about the built in ones. I had a task killer installed. It was my most frequently used app. Let that sink in. My task killer was my most frequently used app. I was constantly killing things that were slowing down the phone or eating up battery for no good reason. Search the Android market for task killers. There are tons of them. Some of them run in the background and automatically kill stuff in an attempt to improve performance.
I could go on, but I'd rather not. I'm just glad I don't have to use those Android phones anymore. It will be a very long time before I would consider buying one again.