I won't miss you either I'm happy to report. I recently ditched my iPhone for the newest android based phone on the market, Verizon's DROID Incredible. Yes, I even left AT&T. I left for several reasons, Apple being Apple was probably the number one reason and I chose to put my money where my mouth is. I had an iPhone 3G (not the 3GS). My wife has the 3GS. I'm painfully aware of how much faster the 3GS is compared to the 3G is, so speed comparison between the iPhone and Incredible is not going to be mentioned in this post at all.

So, unboxing it was fun. Apple has the upper hand as unboxing almost feels like a religious experience. Taking a picture of the Droid Incredible was basically my photo with the iPhone. Unboxing the Incredible showed me that it was professionally done, nothing more / nothing less. I plugged in and turned on the Incredible. Keep in mind that I hadn't canceled my AT&T account yet. I was greeted with a message to setup my phone. I dialed and waited. After a few minutes, I watched the 3G symbol drop from my iphone and suddenly my Incredible prompted to reboot. After the reboot, it was fully operational. Basically my phone number got transferred and my AT&T account was canceled without talking to a single person. I even attempted to log onto my AT&T account to verify and my account is in 'limited' access as all I can do is pay my last bill due to the cancellation.

Before I go any further, understand that I'm pretty integrated with Google from the get go. I have 2 google app mail domains, a gmail account, gtalk account, etc. Once I setup account info in the Incredible, it just feels like I'm walking around with a mini-Google assistant. Even gtalk is seamlessly integrated. Gmail program on the Incredible is much more superior than the mail client on the iPhone.

Plenty of eyecandy on the Incredible. There are some flashy widgets I got rid of immediately. The 7 "home screens" are easy enough to navigate around. Adding icons and moving them around on the homescreens is a little different than the iPhone, but it didn't bother me. Having active widgets on the screen is somewhat similar to the desktop versions of the google widgets / windows sidebar and such, so... it's cool / different. Regarding the social, turning on the Facebook / Twitter profile on the phone was like magic, it just worked and immediately your phone pulled down the latest. I'll come back to the Facebook experience in a second after I briefly talk about the contact manager.

I have to admit I prefer the contact manager on the iPhone. The overall design / interface / navigation of the iPhone contact manager is much easier to manage / deal with. I accidentally synched my facebook contacts with my phone contacts. I immediately saw way too many contacts on my phone and thought my phone book was all screwed up, but it only kept the ones that were recognizable there in my phone book anyway. From there, I just linked my name / phone numbers with the actual facebook profile and... voila... my phone book of contact now also shows an updated photo and status message. o_O I can honestly say that I wasn't expecting it and if you're a social geek like I am, it's a welcome change.

The keyboard is virtual, takes a little typing to get used to - can be done in both portrait or landscape mode. Incredible has it automatically set by default that when you're typing, the phone provides tactical feedback via phone vibration. Not bad, but I can see it being annoying and I'm curious about the battery life leaving it on. Right now, the phone is not fully charged and I can't really comment on the battery life.

Another reason why I'm leaving the iPhone behind is because of iTunes. I hate / detest iTunes with a passion. I'm a PC guy and that stuff is nothing but bloat for me.  Now, with the rumors that the next OSX update will have available desktop applications through the iTunes it has become clear that I no longer want involved as I don't own a single mac desktop and don't get me started with the possible political agenda that Apple may require your desktop apps to be signed and sold through iTunes before you can use them.

There's still much more to talk about and I don't know, I feel like I'm rambling at this point. I will acknowledge that I don't regret switching and I don't feel like I'm going to miss out on the iPhone experience. I guess I'll make another blog post later regarding anything else I've noticed or like / enjoy / miss.

Rest assured, there's life after Apple. :)

Seth Bienek wrote on 04/28/10 9:46 PM

Nice! Will be joining you hopefully in the coming months.

Actually, to be honest, I am kind of hoping AT&T comes out with a decent Android phone that isn't locked down and bastardized beyond usefulness. Don't hold my breath, I know.

leef wrote on 04/29/10 3:31 AM

Nice! I did the same a few weeks ago and barely remember my iphone. The wife became jealous and is now waiting for her NexusOne in the mail, lol

Chris wrote on 04/29/10 3:53 AM

Yep...I've come to this conclusion a LOOOONG time ago.
Apple has become the new MS. Their closed ecosystem will be their undoing. iTunes was always the achilles heel for me when deciding to get rid of my iPod. overbloated crapware. Let's not forget Apple's stringent development program. Here's a good read for ya: http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/programming-and-development/?p=2486&tag=content;col1

matt wrote on 04/29/10 5:12 AM

top stuff, I plan to make my next phone a "anything but apple" phone.
most likely android based.
itunes becomes a bigger and bigger pile of crap with each version.
greatest thing I done for my mp3's was to go back to winamp, the program hasn't changed in complexity in 12 years!

TomasF wrote on 04/29/10 7:21 AM

Congrats. I've had my HTC Desire for a couple of weeks now, and while I never had an iPhone (because of iTunes), I knew the i-platform well. My impression is the platform and build quality of the Desire, and probably Incredible, is now really solid. It just gives instant confidence.
The one weakness compared to iPhone I'll concede is that many 3rd party apps are still 1st or 2nd generation, while on iPhone the big ones are 3rd or 4th, and thus more polished and feature rich. From what I can tell, that gap is fast closing. New versions of long time iPhone favourites are coming out for Android every day. In addition to all those that never got passed Apples wall of rejection.

About the keyboard, it only took me a few days to get fully comfortable with the HTC keyboard, but on a whim I tried SlideIT, a Swype-style keyboard, and I'm loving that too. Fantastic input method, but a bit hard to switch language in (I communicate about 50/50 in English and my native Norwegian)

Rob Wilkerson wrote on 04/29/10 7:34 AM

2 days into my Android experience and I'm still digging it. I never got any Facebook pollution of my contacts so maybe I did something right on accident. I can't imagine how I'll fill 7 (!) home screens, but when you throw in Sense UI's "scenes", my mind is blown. Are there really people who can segregate and populate that much space?

My only annoyance so far is that, like you, I have multiple Google apps accounts, but I can only see a calendar for the one that I linked the phone to without doing some sharing and permissions checking. I hope they fix that soon.

RobG wrote on 04/29/10 4:40 PM

I'm not the Apple-haters it appears many of you are; heck I just switched to a Mac in January because of Windows' instability (even Win7). My phone is a Blackberry and I HATE it. I've been tempted to get an iPhone, but the new Droid Incredible looks very interesting. I'm not ready to jump yet (though as the primary on the account, I could), so I'll wait and see how things go. I'm actually thinking of going back to a regular flip-phone.

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