Due an upgrade (androids plz!)

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 11:03

Right then, my personal contract is due a replacement in 6 days (obviously I can wait longer if its worthwhile), and already have an iPhone 4 through work.

I've not really got much of a clue when it comes to what the latest smartphones currently are, I know of the Desire and that the Desire HD is on the horizon, but that might not be imminent.

Is there anything else I should be looking at? Is there anything else due to be released soon?

Pretty much narrowed it down to the Nexus One and the HTC Desire, the Nexus is far prettier IMO (and ships with 2.2), but the desire is the slightly better phone?

Confused.

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 11:23

Looking like the Nexus is the one to take.

Is there anything about to be released? Everything I can find always compares the Nexus/Desire to the iPhone 3GS, which to me means that they are a generation behind?

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 11:29

Is it possible to get HTC sense UI onto the Nexus?

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 11:31

k3vst3r said:
Don't think so it's HTC exclusive

But its an HTC phone at the end of the day. Someone must have cooked a ROM that does it?

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 11:37

k3vst3r said:
Nexus one is google made phone with google os?

No, the Nexus One is an HTC made phone with Google branding and a Google OS.

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 13:09

Price isn't a concern as it will be an upgrade from my carrier (vodafone). Yes I know it will either be branded or have a branded ROM, but I don't have to pay for it, so I don't actually care.

All the phones I've mentioned so far are £0.

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 14:21

I'll never entertain the thought of the Samsung. I despise everything samsung have ever made in the mobile devices space, and the fact that its just trying to be an iPhone, well, meh.

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 14:30

Microwave said:
You could get Sense UI on a Nexus with a custom ROM but as has been said....that's just one of the reasons the Desire is a lesser phone, the Sense overlay is a resource hog and makes the phone feel more sluggish.

You'd be shooting yourself in the foot if you put it on a Nexus.

But in the same way - you could put a 'stock' ROM on your Desire to get rid of the Sense overlay.

I'm unsure which you actually think I should get

paradigm · 27 Aug 2010 at 23:39

sarge78 said:
or get a Dell Streak now

I want a mobile phone, not a roof tile.

sarge78 said:
I thought the iPhone 4 was just a Galaxy S in drag?

Not a chance in hell, the Galaxy S feels cheap, the iPhone might me a locked down platform, and have issues, but it "feels" premium.

paradigm · 30 Aug 2010 at 21:59

Tim said:
Hope you don't need Exchange support dude!

That's what my iFail is for, or if I get desperate I've got a Blackberry Storm II sat here :shudder:

paradigm · 2 Sep 2010 at 09:08

Ended up ordering a Nexus One this morning.

Vodafone wanted to charge me for the Desire AND put me on a 24 month contract, AND charge me more than I'm paying now for less minutes/texts.

paradigm · 3 Sep 2010 at 09:48

And so the saga of "This is a joke" begins:

The phone arrived at 08:54 this morning, in a completely unblemished DPD Couriers consignment bag, sealed, everything looks like it's been handled correctly. Unfortunately this is where the good news ends.

I wander up to my desk (I had it delivered to work), make myself comfortable and prepare to open up my first Android handset package, quite excited in that "geeky new toy" kind of way. Carefully removed the DPD bag only to be confronted with a blatently abused and previously opened box:

Ok doesn't look "too" bad, might have just been bumped around a bit in the warehouse...

Ok, now I find that its not sealed at all, and has actually been opened twice (two completely different VOID sticker types have been laid one over the other)

So, I open the box, now not exactly confident in what I might find beneath...

What's this? The phone doesn't fit in the box properly. I lift the phone to find the battery is just sat there under the phone, naked, not in any sealing or bag, just there on its own, looking rather damaged and lifting the phone beyond the confines of its little cubby hole in the box:

Yes, that's two stab wounds and a deep gouge to the battery, on what I was lead to believe was a "brand new, unopened" phone. I'm now very much under the impression that this isn't actually a new phone at all, so start to take a look at the packaging and contents a bit more closely.

So, the box is actually mashed up pretty badly, almost as if someone has stuffed the contents back in not quite knowing how they fit together... Synical? Me? Never!

Yes it's quite hard to see (stupid iPhone camera), but that is the top of the back panel, scuffed, scratched and even misshapen, the button is also scratched to death.

Oh look, missing content. Actually what was missing from the box was quite a lot, starting with the neoprene(?) case that comes with the phone, completely missing. The documentation was also AWOL, nowhere to be seen. The phone contained no memory card (was advised it should have a 4GB card?), and the headphones were absent from the box too.

So, first impressions, not good.

paradigm · 3 Sep 2010 at 10:03

Superewza said:
Return under the DSR, ASAP.

Already underway.

I phoned them the second I realised that it wasn't "quite right". I was then informed that I would be sent a replacement on Monday, obviously I told them that if the earliest I can be sent a replacement is Monday then the earliest I will cancel my contract is in 5 minutes when I ring cancellations.

Funnily enough then that opened up the option of them trying to arrange a same-day delivery, or giving me the option to pick one up from a local Vodafone store (given that the store is 0.9 of a mile away, I chose that option).

At least this way I can see it before I take it away.

paradigm · 3 Sep 2010 at 10:49

Even if it were brand spanking new, completely unblemished, I'm still a bit let down by the quality and the feel of it. I was just expecting something that felt a bit more premium I guess, and I certainly didn't expect to be able to see the pixel pitch quite so obviously.

paradigm · 3 Sep 2010 at 11:33

Superewza said:
Really? To be quite frank you don't get better quality than the Nexus One or the Desire. As for pixel pitch, how close do you want to be holding it exactly?

I can see the pixel pitch from a good 8 inches away, you know, the kind of distance you hold it away from your face.

And no, compared to the iPhone 4, the quality is pretty bad (obviously I wasn't expecting it to be as ridiculous as the iPhone 4's over engineering, but I still expected what was at one point the "flagship" google phone to be pretty much spot on.

paradigm · 3 Sep 2010 at 12:06

Superewza said:
Well judging by how long i've managed to sneak my dad's Desire away and what i've used of the iPhone 4 in the Apple Store i have to say i far prefer the design, materials and build quality of the former. To be honest i have trouble seeing how you'd think otherwise...

Because I'm not anti-apple just for the sake of being "cool". The hardware might not quite be as good in the iPhone 4 (bar the screen, which nothing at all comes close to), but the actual design and build is far better than any HTC phone (and certainly the Samsung Galaxy S).

Robbie G said:
Apart from the price, was there anything about the iPhone 4 that you didn't like that made you plump for a Nexus? Or was it just that you've already got an iPhone 4 though work and faniced something different?

I just didn't see the point in having two of the same phone, not least because it makes it quite hard to distinguish which one I'm answering. It was an opportunity to try something new, so I took it

bhavv said:
Did you get that Nexus from Vodaphone direct????

That is shocking!

Yep, straight from vodafone, shocking is the word!

paradigm · 3 Sep 2010 at 13:54

Just picked up its replacement from the local Vodafone store, and second impressions are: much better