Up until very recently I wanted an iPhone. More specific: I wanted an iPhone 4. I basically needed/wanted a mobile agenda, a navigation system and a mobile Twitter/TwitPic device.
My girlfriend has an iPhone and from the day I saw it I was so fond of it, that I wanted it too. But, since the iPhone 4 was about to come out, I forced myself to wait a bit and get an iPhone 4.
Then the iPhone 4 was released, but the availability was a bit disappointing. I didn’t want to wait any longer and since both my cousin and a good friend recently bought a HTC Desire I impulsively decided to buy a Desire too.
Now, two weeks later, I cannot imagine why I ever wanted an iPhone. The HTC Desire is superior in, well, almost everything compared to the iPhone 3GS (I didn’t have the option to try an iPhone 4 yet, so the rest of this post is about the iPhone 3GS only).
Below are some reasons why I think the HTC Desire beats the iPhone 3GS. Please note that this is not a very objective comparison. It is my personal view on the things I find important on a phone. It might be completely different for you.
Free navigation software from Google
As I said, I needed a navigation system. Both the iPhone and the Desire come with GPS which allow them to run navigation software.
For the iPhone there are several navigation applications available. The most professional one is probably TomTom, which costs around € 80,- in The Netherlands.
The HTC Desire is by default installed with Google Maps Navigation. No extra costs. The software is still in beta phase according to Google, but that’s just Googles way of preventing lawsuits. The software actually works quite good. Besides the price, another benefit is that the software retrieves its map data through the internet. This basically means that you’ll have the most up to date maps available all the time. With TomTom you need to pay to get up to date maps every now and then. Ofcourse there is also a disadvantage to the whole live map thing. It requires an internet connection which basically means you can only use it in your own country as using an internet connection in a different country can be very expensive.
Screens fully customizable with widgets instead of apps only
The iPhone comes with…………. apps. Not much more and not much less. You can organize apps in folders I and apps can have push messages, but that’s it. Ofcourse this doesn’t have to be a bad thing. It’s simple and for a lot of people simple is exactly what they want and need.
Personally I like a bit more flexibility. The Desire runs on Android with HTC Sense. This allows you to not only add apps to your desktop, but also flexible widgets, like a small agenda, a clock, an overview of your message inbox, the current weather information and all sorts of third party widgets free to download through the Android Market.
No need for iTunes
One of the things that really disappointed me with the iPhone is the whole need for iTunes. It wouldn’t be that bad if iTunes was a good program, but I personally think it is far from that. It completely doesn’t match the feeling I have with the iPhone. It is incomprehensible and illogic software. I don’t want to synchronize my music. I don’t want to download an iOS upgrade, make a backup, start upgrading the iPhone, see that the upgrade fails, restore the backup, see that restoring the backup fails, reset to factory defaults, upgrade the iPhone and reconfigure the entire device again every time there is a new iOS upgrade. I simply want to put music on my phone and let the phone upgrade itself when needed. This is exactly what the HTC Desire does. Once connected to your PC, it shows up as a mass storage device to which you can copy music, pictures, movies, etc. Just the way you’re used to when copying stuff from one folder to another folder. If there is a new Android upgrade, the phone itself (not some application on your PC) will notify you on it, automatically make a backup on your SD card and do the upgrade or restore the backup if the upgrade failed for some reason.
I have seen the upgrade of my girlfriends iPhone going wrong several times. Next to that I’ve heard several iPhone owners complaining about the whole upgrade/synchronization with iTunes. This all makes me very happy with the Desires mechanisms for upgrading and putting music on it.
Possible to develop apps for it without having a Mac (and in Java instead of Objective C)
I’m a programmer in my every day life and one of the things I want to do with my new device is (learn to) develop applications for it. With the iPhone you need a Mac to do so. Next to that you need to develop your application in Objective C. When I first learned about this I was kind of disappointed. Not only do I not have a Mac, I also have little experience in Objective C. Of course I am eager to learn a new language, but I find it strange that Apple has chosen for a language that is not that common in the programming community. In the 2008 TIOBE Programming Community Index Objective C was on the 38th position. In the most recent version of that same index Objective C is on the 9th position and still growing, but I have a feeling that this is only because of the extreme popularity of the iPhone and the need for iPhone developers to program applications in that language. This graph proves that.
The Desire runs on Googles Android. Applications for Android are developed in Java using the Android SDK, which is free for download for most common platforms like Windows and Linux. This allows me to develop applications for my Desire on my x86 notebook running Ubuntu in a language that is supported by a very big community and is teached on most information technology educations. Just as a comparison with Objective C: in both the TIOBE Programming Community Index of 2008 and 2010 Java is on the first position. In 2010 17.994% of the programming community used Java while only 3.150% used Objective C.
Fully integrated with Google Contacts and possible to link with Facebook, Twitter and other e-mail accounts
With the iPhone you can synchronize contacts with Outlook. You need iTunes for it and again, this is far from usable. But it is possible.
With Android and thus the HTC Desire you can synchronize your contacts on the fly with your Google contact list. Add a contact on the HTC Desire and it will show up on http://contacts.google.com and the other way around. Next to that, the HTC Desire will automatically prompt you if it finds duplicate contacts or contacts that are also in your Facebook or Twitter list. You can then choose to link these different contacts so the Google contact (and thus your Desire contact) has all the required information in it, including pictures, Facebook profile link, latest Twitter message, etc. Simple, elegant and very useful.
Live feed instead of push messages
When something happens in one of the iPhone apps that is of concern to you, the most a app can do is show you a push message. You then have to click that push message to go to the app and the relevant item. If something other happens, again a new push message, and if something new happens, a new push message on top of that. A bit clumsy.
The Desire uses a life feed. At the top of your desktop is a small bar showing an icon when something interesting happens. If something different happens, an additional icon is shown. You can then click that bar and drag it down to show a description of all the relevant items. From there you can click any of the descriptions to go to the relevant app and item. So no matter the amount of interesting things, they will simply stack up in the life feed and you can choose to click them when time suits you best.
Possibility to extend memory instead of fixed 8/16/32 GB devices
The iPhone comes in a fixed 8, 16 or 32 GB version. Once bought there is no way to increase or decrease the amount of memory on your iPhone. If you need more memory, you will have to buy a different iPhone.
The Desire comes with a microSD memory card slot and a 4 GB microSD card. If the 4 GB is not enough, you can buy a 8 GB, 16 GB or 32 GB microSDHC card for respectively € 20,-, € 30,- or € 100,-.
Open system versus closed system
Personally I do not care much about this, but since a lot of iPhone haters hate the iPhone for its closed system, I couldn’t leave this one out.
The iPhone has a closed system. This basically means that with the legal iPhone software you cannot install/download apps outside of the iTunes store. Of course this is not necessarily a bad thing. This way Apple prevents bad/malicious apps from being installed which increases the general feel good attitude people have towards the iPhone. And of course this way Apple prevents user from installing free software that should actually be paid for.
But…. the phone is yours right? So why should someone decide on what you can or cannot install? If you want to take the risk of messing up your phone then that’s your choice. And if you want to take the risk of installing illegal software, no matter if it’s morally wrong or right, then that’s still your choice.
The HTC Desire by default also only allows you to install apps through the Android Market. But, if you really want to, you can explicitly tell your Desire to also allow apps to be installed outside of the market.
Note that there are (illegal) ways to hack your iPhone so you can install non-market software on it too, but the fact that you need to hack your iPhone for it, doesn’t feel right.
Home, Menu, Back and Search button vs Home button
The iPhone only has a Home button with which you can always get back to the home screen. Other actions are app dependent. In the beginning I was very charmed by the Home button only concept of the iPhone, but after a while I was frustrated by the fact that different app developers implement some basic other actions in different ways. The search button in Safari, for instance, is located in a different place and looks different than the search button in Echofon (Twitter app for the iPhone).
The HTC Desire has some more buttons for a few actions every app supports, namely Menu, Back and Search. Not only does this increase the size of the screen that can be used for the actual contents of the applications instead of widgets needed for actions, it also works very intuitive. You know that if you want to search something in a app, you don’t have to look for a search icon. You simply press the search button on your telephone. You know that if you want to go to the previous page in some app, you don’t have to click some back icon on your screen. You simply press the button you press in every app when wanting to go back.
Conclusion
So as said in the beginning, personally I think the complete HTC Desire package is far superior compared to, at least, the Apple iPhone 3GS. Don’t get me wrong. I like the iPhone very much for its simplicity and elegant design, but I like the Desire even more.
In two years I will have the option to get a new phone and I have a strong feeling that it will be a HTC device running on Android again.
