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Executive Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 1,471
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As far as what I would like on IOS from Android, it's only one thing, and it's the windowshade for notifications. Honestly, that's the best feature of Android and you don't realize how good it is until you deal with the modal and mostly useless notifications that stack up on IOS. I have a feeling that'll change in the future (they hired a UX guy for notifications; I expect things to get better).
Most of the other stuff, though? Meh.
Removable storage? Sorry; having half my music library on one card and half on another is a pain in the ass. Not big on carrying a card in a box, and when you spend as much time on the subway as I do, having them "in the cloud" is meaningless.
Keyboards? Meh. I usually install Better Keyboard because it's the most IOS like. I prefer it to pretty much every other Android keyboard. Swipe is neat, but I can't imagine banging out too much text with it. I find it gets in the way a lot. Other keyboards? Not too bad either, but none of them sell me on the system.
Custom launchers? Meh. I find most of the Android launchers, because of widget overload, are just cluttered messes. They work, and if you like 3000 widgets plus 4 pages of apps on a home screen, plus a secondary press to bring up "all" of your apps, that's fine, but for me, I find that system sub optimal. I have my apps organized by pages on my iPhone, and have folders within the pages. If you ask me where my stuff is, I can tell you without my phone even being in my hand what screen it's on. It works for me. your mileage may vary.
Widgets? Clutter. Do not like.
Removable battery? If I were getting the battery life of the Android devices I used on my iPhone, this would matter, but I take my phone off the charger at 7am, use it all day long at work, listen to music on the train in both directions on my hour commute, come home, use the phone more, watch videos when I get in bed, then charge it all on one charge. I rarely if ever have the need for more juice than I get. That's not to say I've never wished for an external battery, but having one wouldn't sell me on a system at all. Every Android device I've tried (the N1, the Vibrant, the MyTouch 4g, the original MyTouch, the Vibrant 4g, the G2, and the LG G2x) have less battery stamina than my iPhone 4 with the same usage patterns.
Custom Roms? Yeah that's cool, and I love Cyanogen, but I'm not up for wacking my phone with some off-the-internet stuff mainly because my phone is my lifeline at work. Without it, I'm toast. I can't rely on a custom ROM for my job. Cyanogen is awesome, and stable, but there will be a release where it isn't, and if my phone goes, my life goes. I'd rather have the QA of the manufacturer for something I consider mission critical.
Flash? Tried it on multiple handsets and have never seen a need for it. It's a neat "wow, look at this" feature, but I can live without it. I just don't feel the critical need for it that I used to.
App Integration? Killer feature. When it works well, it's awesome. That is, until something gets its hooks into your OS and you troubleshoot the damn thing forever until you figure out some dumb running service or hook broke your phone. It's a chance you take, and I'd take it with caution, but yes, this is an awesome feature, but in my experience, it isn't always awesome.
The one thing they didn't mention? Sideloading of apps and alternate app stores. That's the true beauty of Android above everything else and every other feature. Not being held back by the whims of a carrier or manufacturer is something that actually has me ready to move to Android even though I would rather have an iPhone. I'm really surprised that isn't in the list, or even at #1.
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Current Apple Stuff: 24" iMac, iPhone 4, AppleTV (original), 4gb Shuffle, 64gb iPad 2.
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