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iPhone 4 to ATrix is a mixed bag for me

Z

zeze22

Lurker
I've been trying to ditch the iPhone for Android for months now, and have tried the Droid X, the Evo, the G2, the MyTouch 4G and the Inspire. (Yes, I have opened and closed that many accounts on Verizon, Sprint and TMo).

I can say that the Atrix is my favorite Android device, and the high res. screen has alot to do with that.

My primary uses are music, internet radio, news and browsing apps and work (I'm a lawyer - calendar apps are big).\

As a music fan, HTC is out- audio quality with their sound processor and headphone jack is very, very poor. Both these phones are very good in that arena.

SO here are my observations on these two phones, which I still own:

1. Sex and prettiness has to go to iPhone, both in terms of the UI and OS as well as the physical unit itself. Plastic versus metal; solidity versus creakiness. Iphone wins this hands down, although the flipside is the iPhone OS is dated and can feel a bit too trendy as well.

1(a). Screen responsiveness is the iPhone hands down over any device I have ever used. Typing accuracy, drawing apps, games. This is a overhwlming strength on the iPhone.

2. Features and power go to Atrix- voice commands, Google Nav, integration of all of the apps so that one thing iinks to the other, integration of social networking. This is an Atrix win in a big way.

However, you still have great features with the iPhone, you just have to work a little harder sometimes.

3. Battery life: draw for me. Both are state of the art for battery life as of now. I do not understand the criticisms of Atrix. I am at 1/2 power at the end of a busy day with both devices.

4. I have seen better DATA (but not voice) signal strength on the iPhone here in Boston. Seems internet radio and bars last longer and stronger on the iPhone. I have seen better voice (no dropped calls) on the Atrix.


So, my decision. When all is said and done, iPhone just feels easier and better, and I may be willing to trade some power and features for that intangible comfort factor.
 
I left my iPhone 4 for the Atrix and lapdock. I feel the iOS is geared toward those looking for comfort while Android is about creating your own comfort. ADW.launcher EX is excellent for use with the Atrix. Google calender sync is great. First Android device I've used and my only gripe is the pentile LCD, qHD helps though.
 
Scholar said:
I feel the iOS is geared toward those looking for comfort while Android is about creating your own comfort.
Click to expand...

i wholeheartedly agree with the above quote.

new forum member and first time android user here. just purchased my motorola atrix a couple of days ago and i am definitely enjoying it.

i was an iphone user for a long, long time. but i started growing tired of it. of apple, in general.

i don't like how they're so proprietary over their products. you had to jailbreak to get the customizable aspect to open up for you. and i especially don't like apple's "this is what we're giving you, take it" attitude. and the funny part of that is people actually do take it. and steve jobs' narcissistic attitude is a factor for my departure, as well.

i just can't see why i should support a company, a group of people such as those.

as far as the quote... i'm all for buying a product and making it my own however i'd like without someone telling me what i am or am not able to do. basically, an open OS like Android compared to a completely walled-in iOS.

granted, Android might not be as "pretty" nor as "comfortable" as iOS... but i'm the type of guy who works on his own car rather than have it done by a mechanic, cuts his own grass, mixes his own cement.

the end.
 
i dont mix my own cement or work on my car. but when it comes down to it, i dont understand why i had to drill down 3 menus to turn wifi off or bluetooth. i dont understand why the lock screen went to waste. because of jailbreaking we all know what can really be done with the iphone. most of which, android lets you do. so, i left my iphone 4 to my wife and got an inspire. im going back to trade it in for and atrix. why? battery, external speaker, gps... none of which are good.
 
zeze22 said:
I've been trying to ditch the iPhone for Android for months now, and have tried the Droid X, the Evo, the G2, the MyTouch 4G and the Inspire. (Yes, I have opened and closed that many accounts on Verizon, Sprint and TMo).

I can say that the Atrix is my favorite Android device, and the high res. screen has alot to do with that.

My primary uses are music, internet radio, news and browsing apps and work (I'm a lawyer - calendar apps are big).\

As a music fan, HTC is out- audio quality with their sound processor and headphone jack is very, very poor. Both these phones are very good in that arena.

SO here are my observations on these two phones, which I still own:

1. Sex and prettiness has to go to iPhone, both in terms of the UI and OS as well as the physical unit itself. Plastic versus metal; solidity versus creakiness. Iphone wins this hands down, although the flipside is the iPhone OS is dated and can feel a bit too trendy as well.

1(a). Screen responsiveness is the iPhone hands down over any device I have ever used. Typing accuracy, drawing apps, games. This is a overhwlming strength on the iPhone.

2. Features and power go to Atrix- voice commands, Google Nav, integration of all of the apps so that one thing iinks to the other, integration of social networking. This is an Atrix win in a big way.

However, you still have great features with the iPhone, you just have to work a little harder sometimes.

3. Battery life: draw for me. Both are state of the art for battery life as of now. I do not understand the criticisms of Atrix. I am at 1/2 power at the end of a busy day with both devices.

4. I have seen better DATA (but not voice) signal strength on the iPhone here in Boston. Seems internet radio and bars last longer and stronger on the iPhone. I have seen better voice (no dropped calls) on the Atrix.


So, my decision. When all is said and done, iPhone just feels easier and better, and I may be willing to trade some power and features for that intangible comfort factor.
Click to expand...


the more i read on these tech forums, the more i realize how sick some of you people are. lol.
 
velvetelvis said:
i dont mix my own cement or work on my car. but when it comes down to it, i dont understand why i had to drill down 3 menus to turn wifi off or bluetooth. i dont understand why the lock screen went to waste. because of jailbreaking we all know what can really be done with the iphone. most of which, android lets you do. so, i left my iphone 4 to my wife and got an inspire. im going back to trade it in for and atrix. why? battery, external speaker, gps... none of which are good.
Click to expand...
I did the same thing ..Atrix 4G ftw, great phone ! I use GO Launcher
 
To the OP:

How do you feel about iTunes? I mean not just the app, but how it fits into the whole management model[?]

I really prefer the open filesystem model on Android. I can copy files via USB, WiFi (FTP, HTTP, SMB), Bluetooth, I can build my own directory structures and they're totally preserved. I can sample pics to my own preferences, copy movies over in a number of formats, etc.

That's one of my biggest gripes with iOS devices, the way it +has+ to managed with iTunes. I will say that the iTunes/iPhone experience is better on a Mac.

We were out one day shooting with our DSLR, and I was using a MicroSD in a SD adapter, and was able to pull it out, install it in my [at the time] Captivate and upload/edit.

Android OS feels more like a traditional "desktop" OS, vs. iOS which feels like a phone OS.

The hardware on the iPhone is outstanding. That's SOP for Apple, just take a look at the level of detail in a Macbook Pro.

Since we have an iPhone 4, also having an Android device is fun, since it mixes things up a bit, covers both app markets, etc. Having to make a decision on a single device would be a little tougher, but my background makes me take more of an interest in Android.
 
freedom. it comes down to having the freedom to make your device work the way you need. If the iphone already works the way you need it to and you can stand itunes (i *hate* itunes), then yer set. If, however, you are like me, and the iphone needs some 'fixing', then android is the answer. case-in-point: after 6mos with the IP4, I still hadn't gotten used to the auto-correct feature in the keyboard and struggled with it daily. The stock android keyboard is ok, but I upgraded to swiftkey, and after 5mins I had gotten used to it and was very happy with the performance of that keyboard.
 
zeze22 said:
3. Battery life: draw for me. Both are state of the art for battery life as of now. I do not understand the criticisms of Atrix. I am at 1/2 power at the end of a busy day with both devices.

4. I have seen better DATA (but not voice) signal strength on the iPhone here in Boston. Seems internet radio and bars last longer and stronger on the iPhone. I have seen better voice (no dropped calls) on the Atrix.


So, my decision. When all is said and done, iPhone just feels easier and better, and I may be willing to trade some power and features for that intangible comfort factor.
Click to expand...

I just returned my Atrix and went back to the iPhone 4. For what I was using, the battery life was terrible on the Atrix. To get the same battery life out of the Atrix, I had to turn off Wifi, Bluetooth, and notifications. These are things I never had to do on the iPhone 4. BTW, I did cycle the battery properly. I had the phone for about a week.

As for DATA, the iPhone 4 had much better wifi signal. Say what you want about the external antenna (death grip!) but it definitely helps. I found on the Atrix that if I held the phone the same way I did as the iPhone, I would lose the wifi signal and then it would take like 30 seconds for it to come back.

The main issue for me was video and the built-in cameras. No support for ffc except for Qik and even then it was only Android to Android. Taking videos and trying to share them (via email or mms) always resulted in "too large. please resize" messages. What is the point of a 5MP camera if I have to use the lowest resolution before I can send? Yeah, mms needs to be resized but at least the OS or UI should do that for you.

No support for Mac. In trying to get my data (mostly the pictures and videos I took) off the Atrix to return the phone, I had to find a Windows machine to save them. I didn't have a SD card installed so all the data was on internal storage.

I did like the integration of Android and being able to replace things like the keyboard and the SMS app but the out of the box experience of the Atrix was terrible. Maybe HTC or Samsung have a better out of box experience.
 
I came on board with AT&T due to the any mobile calling addition. Coming from Sprint I wanted to try the iPhone and see what I thought I was missing. 5 days later it went back and I got the ATRIX.

The iPhone4 is a nice device but I want nothing to do with Apples dictatorship.

Sprint made me a good offer to come back but the ATRIX is better than anything they have to offer IMO.
 
Another reason I chose it over the iPhone was the Gorilla Glass used for the screen. I had it on my Nextel i1 and it looks like the day I got the phone without any screen protector installed. Too many people I know have broken the display on the iPhone and I'm a little tough on a phone.
 
I just traded my iphone 3gs for an atrix and love having an android phone again! I took the iphone 4 on trial and that is a great phone, but the ios system is so locked down. Very fun, but not sophisticated, in my opinion.

The atrix is super fast and my battery life has been great so far. I am still re-learning android and learning about the atrix, but so far I love the phone.
 
billm261 said:
Another reason I chose it over the iPhone was the Gorilla Glass used for the screen. I had it on my Nextel i1 and it looks like the day I got the phone without any screen protector installed. Too many people I know have broken the display on the iPhone and I'm a little tough on a phone.
Click to expand...

I read the atrix has Gorilla Glass but was not really sure what that meant - thanks for the input!

So I can assume the screen is more durable than my old iphone? Should I still use a screen protector?
 
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