[Eee Pad Transformer Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Spd2Last:
**Sorry for getting really long. There's a TL;DR at bottom

This has been a question I myself have pondered. Unfortunately, there will always be hardcore fanboys on both sides of the field that may make fun of you or talk you down because of some superiority they may think they have for being on the "correct" side. A couple of years back, I was looking to purchase a PMP and read lots of forums about different products like Archos 5, Zune, iPod Touch, and others. I was part of an Archos forum because I was excited about the Archos 5 (it seemed like a great device with good specs at the time). I asked about experiences and compared to the other devices I was considering and was shot down because of the iPod. Most people talked a lot of crap about it and some were just plain rude assholes to me for it. In the end, I ended up with the iPod and the Archos turned out to be a disappointment. Couldn't have been happier with my decision because of all the apps and jailbreak support it was getting.

Now back to the present... All I really want are somewhat unbiased (there will always be some bias) opinions with a friendly open mind.

I currently use an iPhone 4 and love the damn thing. I jailbroke it as soon as I could and the functionality it provides plus ALL of the user support for it is great. I also have a Fascinate that I've been messing around with for a while to get accustomed to Android and see its ups and downs as compared to my experiences with the iPhone.

There's no denying that iOS has a larger selection of apps AND a larger selection of tablet specific apps than Android. Yes that gap is closing over time, but it's still wide open in terms of both quantity and quality though I'm not denying that Android has some good apps going for it. In a way, it is easier and more efficient to develop iOS apps because of the fragmentation with Android, but also because iOS users are more willing to spend money on apps than Android users:

On a positive note, all of these new Honeycomb tablets are coming out with nearly identical specs (mainly Tegra2 and 1280x800 screens) which will help with the fragmentation issue for this generation of devices. Regardless, iOS still has lots of tablet apps because the iPad was a surprisingly successful device and has been out for over a year now. Yes both iPad and HC tablets can run apps not optimized for tablets: iPad can either run the apps in their native resolution (centered on screen with black borders) or scaled to fit on the screen (basically zoom to fit), HC tablets has the elements scaled to fit. iPad's non-optimized apps will either look small and sharp or blown and maybe blurry. HC non-optimized apps "may" look fine but lots of wasted space will be evident as like here:

http:/*delete me*/r.phonedog.com/shared/images/2011/3/150472-a-Honeycomb-TwitterForAndroid.png

There's a difference between apps that will run "fine" and tablet-optimized apps where they make use of all the screen real estate. Again yes, Android is growing, but it's not near to what the iPad has achieved.

Next on the list is battery life. Finally we get to see Android devices on the same level when it comes to battery life with iOS devices. From personal experience, the Fascinate is out of battery much faster than is my iPhone. My brother has a Captivate as does my friend, and another friend has an HTC. All phones are running Froyo. I'm not stating it as a general fact, but from what I've observed, all the Android devices constantly require charging. I will play games, stream videos, read a lot of forums/blogs, and do other things and I never manage to run out of battery; in fact, I still haven't ever run out of battery since I got the phone unlike my brother with his Captivate.

This is getting long :( I hope I still have your attention...

So I've been wanting to purchase a tablet and immediately considered Android because while I believe iOS works great for a phone, it's a different story for tablets. I believe it to be idiotic NOT to use the iPad's extra screen estate to display more information besides a grid of icons. The widgets just make sense on a screen of that size. Android's widget support AND flash support (which I didn't miss on my phone, but I believe to be a necessary thing to have on a screen this size) makes this a VERY worthwhile alternative. The main thing holding me back, besides the abundant choices of tablets, is that HC doesn't feel quite there yet. I've been reading conflicting reports, but it seems like those that overly praise HC are the fanboys that see no faults. On the other hand, although the iPad displays only a grid (it CAN be changed with Cydia apps, but widgets and layout are much more natural in Android), it has an OS where things just work.

I played with the Xoom is Best Buy. I liked it, but it had its flaws. It couldn't play HD Youtube videos smoothly and the UI was a bit jerky. The browser froze on me, leading to a force close while trying to get to Engadget. I didn't judge harshly since I figured it could have been problems with HC, the device, or both together.

Now some other points:

Android has "true" multitasking: iOS has a Cydia app available called Backgrounder that has been available since iPhone 3G. It basically makes the app believe it is still running in the foreground while it's really in the background. This worked at the time when there wasn't any other option available and as expected, it drained batteries. Since iOS 4's introduction of "multitasking", I've seen no need to use Backgrounder. Apps are coded to use the new API and perform whatever functions it may need to. Music apps like Pandora continue to play music, downloads go uninterrupted, and all other processes continue in the background assuming the dev has coded them to continue. Although it may not be "true" multitasking, it just works without unnecessarily draining the battery. I assume that one of the main causes of battery drain in Android devices is poor management of backgrounded apps because of the amount of "task killers" on the market, but please feel free to guide me in the right direction.

Android supports Flash: I see this as a necessity for tablets, but never been of much use in phones for me. The Fascinate crashed a few times while trying to play Flash content, but I did like the ability to watch *most* Flash videos that I couldn't watch in iOS. There is a Flash port for iOS in development, but it's crap right now.

iTunes sucks: Yes, it's sometimes slow to start up. I don't mind the syncing issue too much. I have all my music organized nicely on it. The only movies I have in iTunes are those I've encoded to put on my iDevices, but I use WMP with codec packages. Overall, I'm fine with iTunes.

File management/Drag & Drop: Goes in hand with the iTunes section, but this is a great function that I missed when going from an old iPod clickwheel model to the Touch model. Fortunately, there's an app available in Cydia that will allow the iDevice to show up as a hard drive. iTunes management is sufficient for many iOS users, but this is still something that should have been implemented.

Android's homescreens are customizable: This is a great thing that can be somewhat achieved with iOS through Cydia apps, but Android wins hands down on that. Especially on a tablet, OUT WITH THE GRID! I want my widgets!

In conclusion (**TL;DR**), both iPad and Android have lots of support and large userbases, but iPad has the edge. iPad undoubtedly has more tablet-optimized apps regardless of how good or crappy they may be. HC has a few tablet-optimized apps and the list is growing (as is for iPad). Apps not optimized for tablets work fine on HC, but lots of wasted space. The similar hardware in the HC tablets will help tremendously in the development of apps. iPad's app launcher is a waste of screen estate as compared to HC's customization options and widgets.

Sorry if I may have missed a few things or wasn't too clear on a few points, but it's late and I start my first day of work tomorrow in 7 hours. If you made it this far, I applaud you. I hope you kept an open mind throughout and see things from a somewhat unbiased point. This is what I see based on NOW.