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Wait for iPhone5 or get GS3?

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farscapesg1

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Still using an iPhone 3GS but the battery has become a major issue. The battery status will say I still have 48% and it will suddently shut down. Restarting it will open for a couple minutes and then shut down again.. until I plug it in to charge.

I had planned on waiting for the release of the new iPhone, but not sure if I can postpone a purchase until that time now. My wife's phone (ATT Fuze) has also just died, while I'm out of town of course. She had to run into Best Buy and pick up a Go Phone and transferred the SIM card so that she has a phone until I get back in town.

Our contract with ATT has been up for almost a year and I'm pretty sure we will be moving to Verizon for better coverage, even with their new plans. I get a coporate discount through both ATT and Verizon (though not any of the "prepaid" carriers). Not to mention I don't see us paying the high price to get off-contract phones. Yes, I know in the long run it can be cheaper if the prepaid plan is low enough, but I also recieve $75/month allowance off my phone bill for work, as long as it is an "accepted" carrier, which does not include any of the "prepaid" carriers.

My wife's phone currently has a data block on it, but when we upgrade she has already said she wants a smartphone with data access, so the new plans may not be horrible for us (I'm hoping), versus just adding data to our existing plan and upgrading our phones through ATT.

Now for the issues where I'm having issues deciding between the two :)

1) Stock phone. My iPhone is not jailbroken. My wife doesn't want a modified ROM on her phone. Basically, I want to buy a phone and have it work as is without having to root/jailbreak/etc. This is both for myself and my wife... especially for the wife so I don't have to tinker with it.

2) Voice dialing. I've read some reports that the GS3 doesn't do voice diaing. This is a huge item for me as I have a 1 hour to 1.5 hour commute each way to work. I have to be able to use a bluetooth headset to make and recieve phone calls. My 3GS does this without any issues, so I'm assuming the new iPhone will. Of course I'm having a hard time believing that the GS3 would not be able to...

3) Voice and data at the same time. This may be a carrier issue, and I could work without it, but I do take a lot of conference calls on my phone where I would also need to check email/Internet while on the call. Especially with more WebEx meetings, where the users still feel the need to have a dial-in number instead of voice and video over the conference itself.

4) Tethering. I think this one is pretty much a wash nowadays, but with my travels I need my phone to work as a hotspot when my hotel Internet/business WiFi sucks.

App store doesn't really matter becuase the main apps I use are available on both platforms.

The one last note I have is that my corporate office really pushes iPhones through a lack of Android support. Getting corporate email on Android requires us to purchase Touchdown out of our own pocket. Some of our web apps aren't supported on Android, but are supported on iPhone. VPN access isn't supported via Android, though phones are really too small to do remote desktop work on IMO, so this really just affects tablet support.

Advice?
 
A few points:

- The Galaxy S3 is probably the best "stock" experience I've seen from a phone yet. The only reason I rooted mine was to install a program to back up and restore all my apps, though I eventually started testing new roms. This was the first Android device where I felt I could stay on the stock rom and be happy. The worst annoyance were the touch-tone sounds when you dial, so that tells you how minor the problem was.

- S-Voice works better than Siri on almost every level, and you can absolutely voice dial. You can compose texts, have them read back to you, etc.

- I'm 90% certain you can do voice & data with Verizon, but I can't guarantee it. It's definitely possible on their LTE, but I'm not sure about CDMA. Some of the newer phones let you do it, but no clue if the GS3 is one of them. Willing to bet it is.

- Tethering is included on Verizon's share plans, but other than that they're going to bend you over on every other aspect of the plan.

Look, I'm REALLY anti-Verizon. I recognize they have better coverage in some backwoods areas in the US, but their corporate policies and attitude turn me off more than any other carrier, possibly more than any other company.

That being said, you know how the iphone will function, because you have one already. Nothing is going to be new or amazing when you upgrade. Honestly, I think the GS3 blows the doors off the 4s, and I'm not impressed with the features of iOS 6 at all.

As for rooting, there's literally no downside to it. If you don't want to mess with it, that's understandable, but it's not like it's a major ordeal or bother.
 
GSIII all the way. It's amazing stock, and infinitely better than any Iphone. Unless you just really want a phone designed for toddlers, then there's no reason to own an Iphone anymore.
 
Just a note for VPN on Android devices OP, The VPN hooks were put back into the OS's code with the release of ICS. Any ICS Android phone can do VPN just fine. We got SG3's for my coworkers so I could put them on VPN for any sort of emergency. I rooted my Droid X and got VPN to work on that so I'm waiting for my phone to die before getting an SG3
 
Thanks for all the input.

Still not sure about moving to Verizon. I just got really fed up with ATT on our trip from Houston TX to Orlando FL. All along I-10 we kept loosing ATT signal, while my Verizon Hotspot from work stayed steady with 4 bars. That is completely unacceptable for a major carrier not to have a steady, reliable signal along a major interstate! ATT's coverage in the Houston area seems to be going downhill also, at least where I drive. There are several places I used to have good coverage and now get poor signal. For example, on top of the Marriotte parking garage in the Woodlands for the 4th of July I could only get EDGE coverage. My house used to be a full 4 bars and now I'm lucky to get 2, while the hotspot gets 4-5 on a consistant basis.

Other than that, I've been happy with ATT, it just seems like they are almost giving up in the area.

As for VPN... the company uses Juniper :( From my understanding, it isn't Andoid's fault it doesn't work. The company refuses to implement the required technology on their side to support Android devices and Junos Pulse. Like I said, the company seems to be really pushing for iDevices and blaming it on "security reasons" when I know that is bullshit.

Good to hear the information I had about voice dialing is wrong and that the stock OS is actually pretty good on the GS3.
 
May want to wait for some more details on the iPhone before you make a decision. Honestly I've been pretty underwhelmed with Apple's iPhone updates as of late.

I just bought a S3, I love the thing. Large screen, which translates to lots of keyboard room for my sausage fingers. Fast, bright, decent battery life, and very, very thin.

Have used an iPhone and well, I dunno, Android is my choice, especially since they've really started to polish it up a bit.

You'll probably be happy with either choice. Good luck.
 
farscapesg1 said:
Thanks for all the input.

Still not sure about moving to Verizon. I just got really fed up with ATT on our trip from Houston TX to Orlando FL. All along I-10 we kept loosing ATT signal, while my Verizon Hotspot from work stayed steady with 4 bars. That is completely unacceptable for a major carrier not to have a steady, reliable signal along a major interstate! ATT's coverage in the Houston area seems to be going downhill also, at least where I drive. There are several places I used to have good coverage and now get poor signal. For example, on top of the Marriotte parking garage in the Woodlands for the 4th of July I could only get EDGE coverage. My house used to be a full 4 bars and now I'm lucky to get 2, while the hotspot gets 4-5 on a consistant basis.

Other than that, I've been happy with ATT, it just seems like they are almost giving up in the area.

As for VPN... the company uses Juniper :( From my understanding, it isn't Andoid's fault it doesn't work. The company refuses to implement the required technology on their side to support Android devices and Junos Pulse. Like I said, the company seems to be really pushing for iDevices and blaming it on "security reasons" when I know that is bullshit.

Good to hear the information I had about voice dialing is wrong and that the stock OS is actually pretty good on the GS3.
Click to expand...

Honestly I don't think I've ever heard an ATT customer that hasnt had the same coverage issues you describe. My wife had an iPhone forever with ATT and even my crap Droid on Verizon..well....I always, ALWAYS have at least 1x voice in the backwoods of Maine, when she's lucky if she can hit a roaming carrier. Verizon, while expensive, has the best coverage and best speeds in my experience. LTE is still a crapshoot on ANY carrier, but one can't complain about rock-solid 3g in 95% of wherever we go.
 
Coverage issues are completely dependant on the lease agreements across multiple carriers in your area. Many cell companies "Lease" tower space from each other which furthers their cell strength. This is why coverage can go down and uphill, if contracts go up and are not renewed. IF you call at&t they have a utility that can look into cell towers in the area.
 
ZrRock said:
Coverage issues are completely dependant on the lease agreements across multiple carriers in your area. Many cell companies "Lease" tower space from each other which furthers their cell strength. This is why coverage can go down and uphill, if contracts go up and are not renewed. IF you call at&t they have a utility that can look into cell towers in the area.
Click to expand...

Not entirely true. Lots of things can affect perceived signal strength in an area, foliage growth, building and new construction, power lines, network congestion and many, many other factors.
 
Considering we don't actually know anything about the iphone 5 it's hard to speculate, this thread title may as well be ios or android.

I'd go GS3 personally but I'm a fan of android.
 
Yeah, I know. I just refuse to purchase a 4S now with the new version so close to release. When I get back home I'll find out just how long my wife can live with the temporary go phone. Considering she texts quite a lot and was used to a full keyboard, I have a feeling it won't be until the release of the new iPhone, so I'll probably end up with a GS3 anyways :)
 
I've been pretty fed up with Verizon's practices over the past year in their nickel and diming of customers.

That said, I was at Monticello in Central Virginia yesterday, and I was at best 250 yards from any electrical source (so I know it didn't grab onto a wifi connection silently as it sometimes seems to do), and I had all 5 bars lit up on my GS3. I decided to joke around and run a speed test to a server in DC... and I got just at 4MB/s download and 1MB/s upload. I don't really understand it, but its what I got. Rural hill in central Virginia and I hit better speeds than my cable internet at home. One time I got about 3.2MB/s at home, but I always figured it had somehow silently connected to my router. Is this even feasible?
 
Dethred said:
I've been pretty fed up with Verizon's practices over the past year in their nickel and diming of customers.

That said, I was at Monticello in Central Virginia yesterday, and I was at best 250 yards from any electrical source (so I know it didn't grab onto a wifi connection silently as it sometimes seems to do), and I had all 5 bars lit up on my GS3. I decided to joke around and run a speed test to a server in DC... and I got just at 4MB/s download and 1MB/s upload. I don't really understand it, but its what I got. Rural hill in central Virginia and I hit better speeds than my cable internet at home. One time I got about 3.2MB/s at home, but I always figured it had somehow silently connected to my router. Is this even feasible?
Click to expand...

Yes. Verizon LTE pwns. Pretty much the only reason I'm still with them. Coverage is excellent around Los Angeles, speeds are far faster than any public wifi and most people's home connections, and I'm on grandfathered unlimited data with corporate discount.
 
I would still try to wait out that next iPhone... if you've spent much of your time on the iPhone, switching to Android just because you don't want to wait a few weeks is a bit much. You don't move to the opposite side of a city to an "it'll do" house just because your ideal new house will be late -- you find a temporary place to stay and put your stuff in storage.

The GS3 is a fine phone, but I have to call shenanigans on this "S Voice is better than Siri" claim. It's not. It's just not. I've used both myself, I've seen extensive side-by-side tests, and S Voice botches more results and is less likely to have custom-formatted data. For example, ask S Voice "what's the weather like in Ottawa," while you're located in Ottawa, Canada, and will give you results for an Ottawa in the US. Siri checks your location and assumes you mean the Ottawa closest to you. Siri can also answer follow-up questions based on recent context ("how about Montreal?") where S Voice just scratches its head.

Remember, all S Voice happens to be is a slightly tweaked version of Vlingo from mid-2011. If you want something closer to Siri on Android, you look for Google Now... which itself is a bit early (I have a Galaxy Nexus with Jelly Bean).
 
Switched from 4S 64gb to SG3 16gb w/ 32gb SD card. Much happier with SG3. I doubt the new iPhone will be anywhere close to 4.8" of screen.
 
Oh, it's not switching to Android just because I don't want to wait. Been using an HP Touchpad with ICS for almost a year. Love the Android interface on a tablet. Just stopped by an ATT store to kill some time today and played with the GS3 and I really like the feel and interface. Of course, playing with it in the store for a few minutes is completely different than using it on a daily basis.

Definitely not tied to Apple. I hate ITunes. I hate the hoops I have to go through to drop audiobooks and MP3s on the damn device. It's south easier adding media to my Touchpad.
 
If you can wait it out in the next 2 months there will be the iPhone 5, Galaxy Note 2, Galaxy S3 64gb model + possibly the 5inch htc galaxy note rival + razr HD +any other nexus device that might launch.
 
farscapesg1 said:
Oh, it's not switching to Android just because I don't want to wait. Been using an HP Touchpad with ICS for almost a year. Love the Android interface on a tablet. Just stopped by an ATT store to kill some time today and played with the GS3 and I really like the feel and interface. Of course, playing with it in the store for a few minutes is completely different than using it on a daily basis.

Definitely not tied to Apple. I hate ITunes. I hate the hoops I have to go through to drop audiobooks and MP3s on the damn device. It's south easier adding media to my Touchpad.
Click to expand...
so here's a good comparison: you know how if you leave the touchpad ICS "sleeping" on your desk for day and a half is totally dead? but if you leave it on webOS it'll just chill for 4-5 days and you can pick it up and browse with it?

at least that was my experience with my 32gb touchpad running cm9 vs. webOS.

the way webOS handled cards was gorgeous compared to android...cm9 was a lot better than cm7 (which is what us early webOS touchpad users had to suffer through while ICS was being developed) but it doesn't hold a candle to webOS.

The gestures are smooth. You know you can swipe all up and down and over on the bezel? There's nothing like that on android. android is great, it's geeky it's tweaky, it's hours and hours of relaxation (or work depending on your view of the situation) getting everything dialed in before the next nightly is downloading in the background.

using the two side by side demonstrates some of the glaring issues that still persist with android.

addressing some of your peeves with iOS:
if you don't want to jailbreak then use media monkey instead of iTunes and send to kindle instead of importing your pdf's

The major differences that separate the two for me are:
the main problem with the SGSIII is that the battery life will approximate what your 3gs is giving you now--what is it about 5 hours of uptime if you watch it like a hawk?

the main problem with an iPhone is that it doesn't have swype or anything like it. the stuff I alluded to above annoy me but aren't enough to get me to switch back to iOS unless there's some swype type of keyboard.


your wife shouldn't really be much of the equation because she needs a phone now and her needs/desires won't be met by either device. she needs something like a mytouch4g if she's used to full keyboards.

when I was on AT&T a couple years ago they were capable of upgrading one line at a time. So it's not like she has to wait as long as you to get a new device (unless you're switching). You could just buy a phone and return it before the grace period is up. If you have any ethical qualms about that explain what you're doing to the rep and they should be glad to help you out. At least when my (ex) wife broke her phones they used to have spares in the drawer that they would lend out...that was like 6-7 years ago. After that they just told us to buy one and bring it back when hers came back from repair or replacement. So there should be some kind of mechanism for them to help you in this situation if she can't live with a gophone for the next month.

I'd wait if I were you. Have you held an SGSIII? It's fairly large and I didn't like it. Not as bad as the Note (which upon hearing me say that maybe I'd get a Note my gf emphatically stated, "oh hell no") but something that requires some serious finger time before dropping that much coin on the latest android that will be old news in a matter of months.
 
mope54 said:
The major differences that separate the two for me are:
the main problem with the SGSIII is that the battery life will approximate what your 3gs is giving you now--what is it about 5 hours of uptime if you watch it like a hawk?
Click to expand...

Actually S3 battery life is excellent. The S4 is a great power efficient processor. Not sure where you got the poor battery life idea from.:confused:
 
The SGS3 is a great phone, but it's quite large. I still think iOS has the best and most seamless user experience as well. And no, I am not an Apple fanboy!
 
DirtyB said:
Actually S3 battery life is excellent. The S4 is a great power efficient processor. Not sure where you got the poor battery life idea from.:confused:
Click to expand...
while true that the sgsIII is better relative to the android phones preceding it, here you see some tests with it coming in at about 8 hours which isn't too far off from what I suspect his aging iphone 3gs is getting (~5 hours of heavy use)

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6022/samsung-galaxy-s-iii-review-att-and-tmobile-usa-variants/3

and it's still behind by a couple hours to the 4s, which will be either matched or bested by the iphone 5. The larger point I made regarding this issue still stands: android's battery life is just now catching up to the more established and optimized OSs.

For someone who needs data and 4g on the road it's an issue that bears ticking off the list when considering phones and platforms.
 
Have you considered a Windows Phone? Don't knock one until you try it. I've used all the major OS' (Android, iOS, WebOs, and WP) and of all them, WP is the most enjoyable, seamless, and best looking OS out there followed closely by WebOs.

WP8 will be out in a couple of months. I'd say wait until then to see what's released and make your decision. WP7 is great and is currently what I'm using, but the specs are lackluster compared to today's latest and greatest thanks to MS' requirements of single core processors on WP7. With WP8, that won't be an issue as it supports up to 64 cores.

IMO, WP takes the ease of use of iOS and blends it with the power of Android. It's not as powerful as Android and not quite (just barely IMO) as easy to use as iOS, but sits somewhere right in the middle and is a great compromise for a lot of people if they were willing to give it a chance.
 
WP should get great battery life, too. I forgot to include that when I was discussing webOS because the TouchPad was a good example since we both owned one. But I also had an HD2 and when I used it with WP7 the battery would last for days on standby and android (any version) could barely last a day even so-called sleeping.
 
I didn't have time to fully read your long post but in short.

Screw the iphone and get the GSIII. My wife and I both had iphone 3GSs as well. Apple has more stability imo than android but android is soo open to customize how you want it's unreal.

Try this. Hold your breath for as long as you can and when you can't take it any more and take in that huge satisfying breath of air. That feeling right there is what it's like on our new phones lol.

Now, if you phone is in good condition you can trade it in to amazon for a giftcard. Both our phones were in like-new condition with the boxes/cables/manuals/etc and we got $300ish for the pair of them. Not bad considering they were like 3+ years old and we only paid $400 for the pair under contract.
 
I'll look into the Windows phones.. but after my wife has dealt with an ATT Fuze and I had a Samsung Blackjack before that, I'm having a hard time trusing MS ;) Yeah, I know they have made huge changes, but I can honestly say working in the IT field I have yet to hear anyone praise Windows phones.

The size of the GS3 isn't a concern for me. I like larger phones (though not the size of the Note!! ) and having looked at it and held it in the store, the size is good IMO. It does feel "plasticy" though, coming from an iPhone.

Battery life isn't as much of a concern for me since I have a travel charger in my car that charges my phone on my commute to and from work each day. 1 to 1.5 hours of driving gives them plenty of time to charge up :( Phone gets charged every night while I sleep.

Of course, anything would be better than my iPhone at the moment. I can listen to Pandora while not charging, for about 2 hours before it dies. If not left on a charger over night, it will be dead by the morning from just sitting idle.
 
Do both.

Wait for iPhone 5, then buy GS3 at lower price :p

...or at the very least have an opportunity to compare what is on the market at that point.

Personally, I need a phone ASAP, so I don't have the luxury of waiting. I'll be picking up a GS3 in a few days.
 
entropism said:
Look, I'm REALLY anti-Verizon. I recognize they have better coverage in some backwoods areas in the US, but their corporate policies and attitude turn me off more than any other carrier, possibly more than any other company.
Click to expand...

There really only are two valid competitors service wise in the U.S. Verizon and AT&T. All the smaller carriers have complete and utter crap for coverage.

Verizon totally destroys AT&T, and its not just in backwoods areas.

I currently have AT&T. In my building at work, 5 minutes from downtown Boston, I have 0 service. At my house, 15 minutes from down town Boston I have very poor service, to the point where people have a tough time understanding me.

I like streaming Spotify as a music source in my car. During my 20 minute drive home from work, I lose signal at 5 different spots, interrupting my music.

In New York it's even worse. You could be walking down a block in Manhattan, dropping calls left and right. The joke about the iPhone when it was first launched was that ti's cool and all, but whats the point if it's barely useful as a phone due to AT&T's network?

So Verizon's business practices and customer care sucks, but they are really the only useable option in the U.S. IMHO, and even at that, their network sucks compared to networks in other similarly industrialized nations across the world. (Europe, Japan, etc.)

I'm dropping my AT&T account for Verizon in a few days time, and I guess I will just have to put up with them. I don't feel like I have a real choice.
 
wait till September 9th then apple will release the specs for the iPhone 5 and go from there ?
 
Yup, wait and see unless for some reason you absolutely, positively, and your life depended on getting a phone right now, get the SGS3.
 
farscapesg1 said:
Still using an iPhone 3GS but the battery has become a major issue. The battery status will say I still have 48% and it will suddently shut down. Restarting it will open for a couple minutes and then shut down again.. until I plug it in to charge.

I had planned on waiting for the release of the new iPhone, but not sure if I can postpone a purchase until that time now. My wife's phone (ATT Fuze) has also just died, while I'm out of town of course. She had to run into Best Buy and pick up a Go Phone and transferred the SIM card so that she has a phone until I get back in town.

Our contract with ATT has been up for almost a year and I'm pretty sure we will be moving to Verizon for better coverage, even with their new plans. I get a coporate discount through both ATT and Verizon (though not any of the "prepaid" carriers). Not to mention I don't see us paying the high price to get off-contract phones. Yes, I know in the long run it can be cheaper if the prepaid plan is low enough, but I also recieve $75/month allowance off my phone bill for work, as long as it is an "accepted" carrier, which does not include any of the "prepaid" carriers.

My wife's phone currently has a data block on it, but when we upgrade she has already said she wants a smartphone with data access, so the new plans may not be horrible for us (I'm hoping), versus just adding data to our existing plan and upgrading our phones through ATT.

Now for the issues where I'm having issues deciding between the two :)

1) Stock phone. My iPhone is not jailbroken. My wife doesn't want a modified ROM on her phone. Basically, I want to buy a phone and have it work as is without having to root/jailbreak/etc. This is both for myself and my wife... especially for the wife so I don't have to tinker with it.

2) Voice dialing. I've read some reports that the GS3 doesn't do voice diaing. This is a huge item for me as I have a 1 hour to 1.5 hour commute each way to work. I have to be able to use a bluetooth headset to make and recieve phone calls. My 3GS does this without any issues, so I'm assuming the new iPhone will. Of course I'm having a hard time believing that the GS3 would not be able to...

3) Voice and data at the same time. This may be a carrier issue, and I could work without it, but I do take a lot of conference calls on my phone where I would also need to check email/Internet while on the call. Especially with more WebEx meetings, where the users still feel the need to have a dial-in number instead of voice and video over the conference itself.

4) Tethering. I think this one is pretty much a wash nowadays, but with my travels I need my phone to work as a hotspot when my hotel Internet/business WiFi sucks.

App store doesn't really matter becuase the main apps I use are available on both platforms.

The one last note I have is that my corporate office really pushes iPhones through a lack of Android support. Getting corporate email on Android requires us to purchase Touchdown out of our own pocket. Some of our web apps aren't supported on Android, but are supported on iPhone. VPN access isn't supported via Android, though phones are really too small to do remote desktop work on IMO, so this really just affects tablet support.

Advice?
Click to expand...

The galaxy siii will do simultaneous voice and data on both GSM (AT&T) and CDMA networks (verizon, sprint) on both 3g (it has svdo capabilities) and 4g can do simultaneous voice and data. The iphone on cdma will not do it simultaneously. The iphone 4s generally has poorer battery than the s3 as well especially the cdma varients.
 
mope54 said:
while true that the sgsIII is better relative to the android phones preceding it, here you see some tests with it coming in at about 8 hours which isn't too far off from what I suspect his aging iphone 3gs is getting (~5 hours of heavy use)

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6022/samsung-galaxy-s-iii-review-att-and-tmobile-usa-variants/3

and it's still behind by a couple hours to the 4s, which will be either matched or bested by the iphone 5. The larger point I made regarding this issue still stands: android's battery life is just now catching up to the more established and optimized OSs.

For someone who needs data and 4g on the road it's an issue that bears ticking off the list when considering phones and platforms.
Click to expand...

The 4s has terrible battery life especially the cdma version. It was a big step down from the 4 in battery performance. The a5 is very power hungry.

Theres something wrong with that article. I have never seen anyone browser for 10 hours over the cell network on a 4s and not have the battery die. Most of my friends with 4s's get about 3-4 hours screen on time before its completely dead.

None of those phones get anywhere close to those kind of numbers battery wise. My nexus uses pretty nothing at idle but It only has about 5 hours max of browsing time and thats if your doing anything crazy.

Edit:
Just read the article. It just autorefreshes the same page over and over. Obviously its not really a realistic test. It includes nothing of scrolling or loading different pages which are much more taxing on the cpu/gpu. Once the 4s's gpu revs up to perform scrolling the battery life decreases much faster. Most likely faster than the 28nm snapdragon s4 the s3 uses. Loading a cached page over and over is not really an accurate test at all. The iphone may be more aggressive with caching as well during refreshes. Android may use less of the cache to make sure the page is fully refreshed. Either way none of these phones make it this long in more realistic use.
 
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Zarathustra[H];1039015559 said:
In New York it's even worse. You could be walking down a block in Manhattan, dropping calls left and right. The joke about the iPhone when it was first launched was that ti's cool and all, but whats the point if it's barely useful as a phone due to AT&T's network?
Click to expand...

4 years ago maybe, but if you're dropping calls "left & right" in NYC, something is VERY wrong. I can't attest to Boston, but I've had no problems in Worcester or Shrewsbury. I think you're SEVERELY discrediting AT&T's network on this one.


When the original iPhone launched, AT&T dropped the ball and was horrendous. This is common knowledge. Hell, even when the 3GS launched, I had to return it because service in NY and NJ was damn near unusable. Now? My only complaint is with the bill and the employees, the service has been excellent.

Also, to say there's only 2 valid competitors in the US, well... Again, I think you're completely wrong. For those who live and stay in major metropolitan areas, Sprint & T-Mobile are not only valid, but excellent alternatives. For those travelling into rural areas, you're right, it's not a good idea. On the other hand, prepaid carriers like Straight Talk are also excellent.

"The only usable option" indeed...
 
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entropism said:
4 years ago maybe, but if you're dropping calls "left & right" in NYC, something is VERY wrong. I can't attest to Boston, but I've had no problems in Worcester or Shrewsbury. I think you're SEVERELY discrediting AT&T's network on this one.


When the original iPhone launched, AT&T dropped the ball and was horrendous. This is common knowledge. Hell, even when the 3GS launched, I had to return it because service in NY and NJ was damn near unusable. Now? My only complaint is with the bill and the employees, the service has been excellent.

Also, to say there's only 2 valid competitors in the US, well... Again, I think you're completely wrong. For those who live and stay in major metropolitan areas, Sprint & T-Mobile are not only valid, but excellent alternatives. For those travelling into rural areas, you're right, it's not a good idea. On the other hand, prepaid carriers like Straight Talk are also excellent.

"The only usable option" indeed...
Click to expand...

Well, I haven't been to New York in a while, so I am open to things having changed, but based on my history with AT&T it's not something I would have expected.

I work in Everett and live right on the Woburn/Winchester border. Both places have horrible reception. It's particularly weird in Everett. The phone indicates I have a strong signal, but the transfer speeds are horrendous, to the point of unusable. (been waiting 5-10 minutes for this damned web page to load, and now it timed out and I have to refresh it, type stuff)

To me this suggests that the towers provide sufficient wireless reception, but that the land lines providing the towers with data are overwhelmed.

In my house in Winchester, wireless reception is just low. Text messages are rarely received indoors and the low signal strength makes call quality poor to the point of it being difficult to understand.

Between my home and work, there are several places with spotty reception, but there is one complete dead zone for about a half a mile to a mile on South Border Road along the Winchester/Medford border where calls are always dropped and data completely stalls.

These are not particularly rural areas. I would call them dense suburban in most places, with some bordering on Urban areas. After all, it's all within rt 128.

Where I used to live, in Cambridge, MA my apartment was also a dead zone. Frequently dropped phone calls were the norm, to the point where my mom was pissed at me as she thought I was faking dropped calls to avoid talking to her.

Come to think of it, the only place I've lived in the last ~10 years since graduating college (old, now discontinued Cingular CDMA was surprisingly good in Western Mass near Umass, Amherst) where signal reception wasn't a problem was when I was staying at my parents place in West Hartford, CT. Even when I lived in downtown Providence, RI, my service would drop calls all the time.

I also haven't been on the T in a long time, but a few years ago when I lived in Cambridge, and took the T semi regularly, AT&T had no service at all on the trains, while other people (presumably on Verizon) were talking away...

This also has not been a phone issue, unless my last 7 phones have all been bad)

Some old silver samsung flip-phone -> Motorola V180 -> 1st gen Motorola Razer -> iPhone -> iPhone 3G -> iPhone 4 + Blackberry Curve issued by work also on AT&T)

Some colleagues I work with have Sprint, and they constantly complain about dropped calls, and a good friend of mine has T-Mobile and gets no reception at all in his house in Jamaica Plain.

The only people I don't hear complaining about their service, their dropped calls and their network speeds are people on Verizon. I've never once heard a complaint from my friends with Verizon service.
 
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my friend switched from the 3g to the sony xprevia or whatever and lost his unlimited data plan, can anyone confirm for OP if this might be true if he switches as well
 
I've been in the NY area for the past 10+ years using AT&T, and while I have always read of other people experiencing dropped calls left and right, somehow it's never effected me! Sure, no phone service is perfect, and I have the periodic dropped call, but nowhere at the rate that people are exclaiming it to be. I personally have not had enough reason to leave AT&T, especially with LTE rolled out to NYC.

My current phone is the GS2, but my brother just bought the GS3 (he also lives in NYC) and I've been playing with it for him.

To address size issues, I use the quote, "Once you go big, you can't go back." I remember when I bought the GS2 (which is 4.3 inches, opposed to 4.5 on the GS3) I thought I wouldn't like it because it's too big. Now, I can't stand anything smaller! You get use to having more real estate, bigger screens to read your email, bigger screen to type your reply, to browse the web, to watch netflix/youtube/whatever. Not to mention, I still strongly prefer the AMOLED display of the GSx over the iPhone's display.

As for battery life, my GS2 definitely does suffer battery issues when I'm actively around the city. I have NOT YET TESTED the GS3 in a normal day's use. If I'm at work with the phone in my pocket, I can easily last a day and not break under 40% battery. It's the days that I'm actively moving around, ducking in and out of subways (which always drains battery because it constantly looks for signal), looking up google maps to see if I'm on the right street, using other apps to find where to meet my friend for dinner, and general email/txting to actually coordinate with my friends... THAT'S when I tend to run out of battery by ~8 pm. My solution? I bought another official battery for $20 off amazon that I carry in my pocket. Around 8 pm, I duck into a Starbucks and take 30 secs to swap the batteries, and I'm back at 100% for the rest of the night!

For my friends with a car, their day seems to involve enough of "going back to the car to drive to next destination" that they quickly plug into a car charger in that small time.

Now, to actually address your points:
1) I love the stock GS2 and GS3 that I've played with. And, if you don't like the console/interface of ICS, there's an app you can download that acts as a very customizable skin letting you modify the interface all kinds of ways, WITHOUT having to root. I don't remember what this app is called right now because I don't use it, but I can ask my friend later...

There's always the slight annoyance that Android versions aren't rolled out as smoothly and frequently as iOS versions. I personally am not bothered by this because I find ICS to work well enough, but I remember just reading something today about Google rolling out PKD(??) to make this upgrade faster in the future.

Also I'm a heavy google user. So I love the sync with my Google Contacts. I use Chrome for Android and I like how it syncs with my chrome for desktop. Youtube channels all matched too. etc. Only thing I don't use really is Google's cloud storage.. Dropbox for me there (which works great on Android).

2) I can't actually answer this right now because I don't have a bluetooth device. But... I can't imagine it not working right? I'll update later if I try it out w/ friend's bluetooth.

3) This is a carrier difference of CDMA vs GSM/HSPA+ during the 2g & 3-3.5g era, which is what the iPhone4GS is on. Verizon (CDMA) technology does not allow voice and data at the same time, while AT&T (GSM/HSPA+) does. I do NOT KNOW if LTE allows both at the same time. A "true" 4G should, but the die-hard 4g'ers will say LTE does not qualify. Google could probably answer this question quickly.

I'll answer that on the GS2 and GS3 on AT&T, I call and data at the same time ALL THE TIME. Speakerphone the call while surfing during those boring conference calls, lol.

4) I believe both iPhone & GS3 support tethering. I believe this has more or less become a common feature. The difference has been how it's implemented and whether or not you pay a lot for it. I'll say that I tether with my GS2 via an app and have not rooted my device.

Chipotle doesn't have an Android app! That makes me sad :(
 
Kuo said:
3) This is a carrier difference of CDMA vs GSM/HSPA+ during the 2g & 3-3.5g era, which is what the iPhone4GS is on. Verizon (CDMA) technology does not allow voice and data at the same time, while AT&T (GSM/HSPA+) does. I do NOT KNOW if LTE allows both at the same time. A "true" 4G should, but the die-hard 4g'ers will say LTE does not qualify. Google could probably answer this question quickly.
Click to expand...

Not anymore. Newer Sprint and Verizon phones allow data and voice simultaneously on CDMA.
 
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