Tuesday, September 06, 2011

In The Market For A Smartphone

Image representing Android as depicted in Crun...Image via CrunchBaseI am in the market for a smartphone. (My First Smartphone: What's It Going To Be?)

I googled up my query, not surprisingly.

CNet: Best Android phones
PC Magazine: The Best Android Phones
Matt Cutts: Finding the best cell phone carrier
Phandroid: HTC Evo 4G Was the Best Selling Android Phone in Q2
Tech Radar: Top 160 best Android apps 2011
XDA Developers: Which is the best Android phone?
The Android Authority: Best Dual Core Android Phones from US Carriers: Some time soon, you might find the single core processing power of your smartphone won’t be enough to support all the mobile features you want to try out....... Verizon: Droid Bionic .... Verizon: Samsung 19100 Galaxy S II ...... Sprint: Motorola Photon 4G ...... T-Mobile: HTC Sensation 4G
Tested: The Best Android Phone for Your Network (August 2011)

The most helpful article was this one by the Business Insider. Maybe because it confirmed my prejudices. The two top phones the article has listed are the two phones I was already thinking were the two top phones even before I did the googling.

Business Insider: The Top 10 Android Phones You Can Buy This Month: first Ice Cream Sandwich phone, the Droid Prime, on Verizon...... The Nexus S is still our favorite Android phone since it offers the purest Android experience available. With the Nexus S you're guaranteed to get the latest updates straight from Google without waiting for your carrier or manufacturer to catch up......... Price: Free with two-year contract from Sprint (4G)

I want my smartphone to enable me to become a video blogger. That is my number one reason to want to get a smartphone. And I like the idea of being able to upload pictures just as they are taken.

My phone should help me create multi-media content. That is the number one thing.

And once I buy it, I want to keep the phone for two years.

Nexus S is still tugging at my heart. There is a new Nexus phone round the corner. If that were not the case, I'd not even be looking at any of the non Nexus phones.

I have a feeling I might go buy the Samsung Galaxy S II and then regret it when Nexus Prime shows up.

My laptop before the one I have now was a Toshiba. Samsung does have that Asian pride factor. But then by now all phones are made in Asia. The iPhone is an Asian product. Asian sweat labor.

Business Insider: : The Best Android Phone You Still Can't Have [REVIEW]
As far as speed goes, I definitely noticed an improvement in performance over my Nexus S. The Galaxy S II's 1.2 GHz dual-core processor makes apps, video, and web pages load lickety-split and can even handle some of the more intense 3D games like N.O.V.A. without choking...... Assuming you still use your phone to make calls, you won't be disappointed either. Quality was clear as a bell ..... An 8 MP camera is pretty standard on top-tier smartphones now, but the Galaxy S II is one of the few to offer full 1080p HD video recording. Photos and video look great, noticeably better than what I can do with my iPhone 4..... The best way I can describe TouchWiz is a less attractive version of iOS. (In fact, TouchWiz is part of the reason Apple is suing Samsung.) ..... a pretty standard Android experience: Google apps, Google sync, Android Market...they're all here. .... once the Galaxy S II does launch in the U.S., it will easily be the new gold standard for Android phones, just like the original Galaxy S was.
So obviously this thing is better than the Nexus S and the iPhone 4. But the iPhone 5 and the Nexus Prime might have things to say.

Nexus S
Nexus S can function as a Wi-Fi hotspot for up to six portable devices such as laptops or tablets. Once connected, these devices will have access to the Internet
If the Nexus S is free on Sprint with a two year contract, will they also give you the Nexus Prime for free when it shows up?

The Android Authority: Nexus 3: Dual Core, Ice Cream Sandwich, Super AMOLED Plus, and More
the official announcement of the upcoming version of Android at Google IO 2011, Ice Cream Sandwich, which is, essentially, a combination of Android 2.3 Gingerbread and Android 3.0+ Honeycomb into a “cohesive whole”, the whole industry is abuzz with speculation, rumors,and increased excitement around the third Nexus device that is set to be formally announced sometime at the end of Q3/ early Q4. ....... the next Nexus will be the phone to beat, and will be the first to receive the Android Ice Cream update. Stay tuned for more Nexus 3 rumors!
The Android Authority: 4G is a Lie – Here’s Why
Even most iPhone users think their iPhone 4′s are 4G, most likely because of the “4″. Well, we hate to break it to you, but we are a long way from true 4G. Real 4G would mean you could download a 700MB video in 9 seconds. .... While no carrier in the world has yet to reach true 4G speeds – a company in Japan called DoComo has just made available a 75Mbps mobile data connection, which is roughly 4 time faster than even the fastest speeds available in the USA, and is said to be the fastest cellphone network in the world. ..... True 4G speeds are shockingly fast – like 100mbs fast. ..... Root Metrics was able to determine that Verizon’s LTE 4G network is the fastest – and by a substantial margin. Verizon’s network (at least in their location of testing in metro Seattle) consistently destroyed anything the competition could muster. Not only were Verizon’s download speeds amazingly fast, so too were their upload speeds, and all with near 100% success to boot. So, in a nutshell, Verizon’s LTE network is simply thus best at providing very fast downloading and uploading, consistently. ...... Verizon’s 4G network achieved download speeds nearly 400% that of even the closest competition


The Nexus Prime on Verizon is what I really want. But it is not here. Not yet. Samsung Galaxy S II is not here yet either. But it will be here on September 16. It is between those two phones for me, I think.
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