Smart phone decisions..

[thatguy]

My wife and I are upgrading to smartphones in February when we are eligible for our Verizon upgrade.

I am consider the following phones and wanted to get input from anyone about the pro's and con's of each

1) Motorola Razr Maxx (same as the razr but with a bigger battery)

2) Samsung Galaxy S3

3) Iphone 5


I am really leaning toward the Razr Maxx due to the longer battery life - but still open.. We are Mac/Apple users, but there is an app for Android phones that allow you to load your iTunes onto the droid phone.

Thoughts. Suggestions

Brian

 

[murphy1244]

Motorola makes the best portable communications devices

 

[k0ua]

Some say the Razr, might be a bit better phone ( I have one and the phone works well and way better as a phone than the blackberry I had.) but others will say the apple has more and better apps, but well there are thousands of apps for the droid too..so... Here is something else a friend told me and you should consider it. He said he has always been able to sell previous versions of the Apple phones on e-bay for a significant portion of what he paid for them.. It is something to consider, and I had not considered that. Overall the Razr is cool and the Iphone is cool.. you pays your money and ya takes your choice.

 

[OKnewguy]

The S3 is the best selling android smartphone yet. I really do not think you can't go wrong with any of them (although I prefer android). I like the removable batteries and extra storage capacity of many androids. The s3 runs samsung's touch wiz and the razr is motorolla's skin on android. From what I hear the razr's/motorolla's skin of android is very minimal and does not mess with the OS much at all. I am a guy that mods my phones so it really does not make much difference to me what the manufacturer puts on them to start. Android phones allow for incredible customizing, Iphones are more locked down. Some people (like me) will tweak on the phone so the android makes sense. The iphones are great phones too, especially if you are a person who never messes with things or tweaks them.
P.S. The funny thing about motorolla is they were purchased by google, but google has kept them seperated out of its android development. Google used LG for the NEXUS 4.
Dave

 

[JDgreen227]

I am a very careful shopper no matter what I buy and I chose the Droid Razr Maxx as ny new device about 3 months ago. The screen size is ideal and battery life is far superior to what I had expected. My nephew recently got a Galaxy S3 and he raves about it. Wife had an Iphone 4 that I tried out, but I didn't care for it as it didn't feel right in my hand. About apps, I read recently there are over 700,000 apps for Android devices . Agree with what OKnewguy says, you cannot go wrong with any of those choices.

For what it's worth I have only one gripe about my Droid...while the 8mp camera takes fantastic pictures and while the next shot can be taken almost immediately, the shutter lag is really bad. There may be an app to remedy that but I have only installed one on mine (Facebook). If you do get a Droid, check to see if it already has the upgrade to Android 4.0.4, mine had to have the upgrade installed.

 

[farmall 55a case]

Droid RAZR maxx HD here n I love it!

 

[riptides]

I started with a Moto Q. ran through two iPhones, and have bricked a Samsung S3. The S3, Android based, is the better of the tweaking devices if your into that, and in MY area with Verizon, unmatched in LTE (4g) coverage. It fits very nice into the phone, tablet, computer architecture for the house and business needs. For technology playing, Android based devices, and for MY personal use - the Galaxy series from Samsung, cutting edge, way cool features, great ease of use and form factors.

 

[Tomtint]

The iPhone 5 has not had great reviews. I have a iPhone 4S that has been trouble free. I will never own anything that is Microsoft based ever again. That eliminates many other phones. jMO

 

[jinman]

Oh man! It's gotta be a duck phone.

 

[kiotiken]

Either Android phone over an iPhone! I love my Motorola Atrix HD. Motorola phones have a better battery life and get better reception. My wife has a Galaxy Ace II-x (probably a Canadian variant of the Ace line) and drops calls all the time. We're in a marginal area for coverage and my Atrix is a super star.

 

[thatguy]

Thanks for all the thoughts and reasoning behind them..

Brian

 

[thatguy]

The S3 is the best selling android smartphone yet. I really do not think you can't go wrong with any of them (although I prefer android). I like the removable batteries and extra storage capacity of many androids. The s3 runs samsung's touch wiz and the razr is motorolla's skin on android. From what I hear the razr's/motorolla's skin of android is very minimal and does not mess with the OS much at all. I am a guy that mods my phones so it really does not make much difference to me what the manufacturer puts on them to start. Android phones allow for incredible customizing, Iphones are more locked down. Some people (like me) will tweak on the phone so the android makes sense. The iphones are great phones too, especially if you are a person who never messes with things or tweaks them.
P.S. The funny thing about motorolla is they were purchased by google, but google has kept them seperated out of its android development. Google used LG for the NEXUS 4.
Dave

im sort of a geek, but not a very technical geek - can someone 'splain what this mean that Dave posted

"The s3 runs samsung's touch wiz and the razr is motorolla's skin on android. "

thanks

brian

 

[kiotiken]

im sort of a geek, but not a very technical geek - can someone 'splain what this mean that Dave posted

"The s3 runs samsung's touch wiz and the razr is motorolla's skin on android. "

thanks

brian

Each manufacture adds their own skin and apps to the base Android OS. When you see a NEXUS phone or tablet, that's pure Android, with nothing added.

 

[JDgreen227]

Each manufacture adds their own skin and apps to the base Android OS. When you see a NEXUS phone or tablet, that's pure Android, with nothing added.

I formerly subscribed to LAPTOP magazine, which covered mobile devices of all types, and when the first Android phones came out they stated something like: "Do consumers really need a new OS for mobile devices....?"

 

[kiotiken]

I formerly subscribed to LAPTOP magazine, which covered mobile devices of all types, and when the first Android phones came out they stated something like: "Do consumers really need a new OS for mobile devices....?"

Now you know, we did!

 

[edlegault]

Last year I moved from a Blackberry to an Android. I like the Android, but I REALLY miss having a real keyboard, like my Blackberry. Any Androids out there with a real keyboard? You gotta figure out what you will use it for, then get a phone that matches your needs. For me, the Android gives me instant, easy access to my google calendar, which I need for business and personal use.

 

[riptides]

Last year I moved from a Blackberry to an Android. I like the Android, but I REALLY miss having a real keyboard, like my Blackberry. Any Androids out there with a real keyboard? You gotta figure out what you will use it for, then get a phone that matches your needs. For me, the Android gives me instant, easy access to my google calendar, which I need for business and personal use.

This is humor.. you can connect a full USB keyboard and other USB devices directly to your Android based phone.

There are a slew of droid devices, "Incredible" comes to mind with those keyboards you had on the BlackBerry.

 

[JDgreen227]

This is humor.. you can connect a full USB keyboard and other USB devices directly to your Android based phone.

There are a slew of droid devices, "Incredible" comes to mind with those keyboards you had on the BlackBerry.

I have a friend who was formerly a Blackberry Curve user (as I was) and when she changed to an Android she got one with the slide out keyboard. I tried hers and it was really nice to have a full keyboard but it made the device really heavy and bulky. After 2 months of using the onscreen keyboard on my Droid I am beginning to prefer it to the Blackberry keyboard with one exception: When you turn the device to horizontal position and use the keyboard to compose an email, you can only see about half the text the much smaller Blackberry screen would display.

 

[hchxoom]

I'm biased towards android because I like the way it works better, but if you're apple/mac folk you will likely prefer the iphone. Everyone else in my family (wife and older kids) have iphones and love them. I will say they always work and they love them. They're also all mac users, so the similarities suit them. I have a LITTLE programming in my background and am a "tinkerer" by nature (I gues most TBNrs probably are), so apple product have annoyed me for years... I just can't get under the hood, and if I don't like the way an apple product works, well tough. With android, I can get dirty and see what's happening and, if I choose, make tweaks. It functionally seems more pc-like (it has, for example, a file explorer ao I can look around the phone "storage" as if it were a pc hard drive to see what I'm storing and add, transfwr, or delete files... I think newer iphones have some of this ability now, its just less intuitive). Among the greatest advantages of many (not all) android phones is their ability to use an sd card (actually a mini or micro sd), so you have expandable storage that can also be moved from phone to phone to tablet to pc to camera, if you wish. The downside is that android may be a bit less stable due to more options and flexibility.

I had the Samsung S2, now have the Samsung Note2. The Note is, by far, the best phone I've ever had... love the huge screen (great for my aging eyes... this is my other beef with iphones, screens are too small), best battery life and smoothest operating smartphone (all facets - calls, email, internet, dropbox, music, etc.). The Note2 is essentially the same as the s3, just larger. The S2 was the s3 predecessor, and also a great phone- I only replaced it for size. I think Samsung makes the best phones on the market today, bar none incl. Apple.

If you decide on an android phone, don't just drop an itunes clone on it... I left itunes behind with my first android phone and have never been happier. I now have music that is much more easily transportable phone to phone, computer to computer, or streaming from the cloud. Amazon is a great source if you buy music online, and you're never limited by apple's atupid device restrictions.

 

[unbidden]

Buy the Galaxy S3. Great phone as are the others but for me the deal breaker on iPhone is the battery. The S3 batteries are a "soft battery". On the iphone you have to charge the phone, the S3 just pick up an extra battery and wall charger that charges the battery without needing the phone; swap out the battery when needed. Depending on which RAZR, I believe the same issue applies.