[HD2 General] the-uki:
Hi,

This thread is to provide comparison and feedback exclusively from those that have both an iPhone 3G or later and an HD2, as is my case.

So here's my first go at comparing a 3G vs. HD2:

First and foremost: Handability and visual - which one is really usable

HD2 of course has a bigger screen, easier to read for those over 40 and more fancy, more show-off than a 3G, however:

- 3G easier to hold in the hand

- 3G can be operated one-handed. nearly impossible with HD2 due to its size

- HD2 easier to drop on the floor - it's not very handy, even for big hands

- Lets face it: Apple User interface is light-years ahead. 3G has an A LOT more intuitive, and more ergonomic user interface compared to the HD2: just compare how SMS threads are managed on the iPhone compared to the 3G - despite WM65, HD2 is pre-historic compared to the iphone. Same for email, browsing, ....

- The 3G touchscreen has a more responsive screen. On the HD2 sometimes you have to repeat swipe, pinch. Never happens on the 3G. The HD2 screen is nice and big, but close to the boarders, so you get many unwanted keypresses depending on how you hold it. Pinch zoom not native to WM65. Look at how iPhone handles the internet browser and compare with Explorer and Opera on the HD2 -WM65 is lagging behind the iPhone. (You do get pinch zoom on video in HD2, but who really needs that?)

- what about copy and paste on HD2? Pre-historic and not finger-friendly on WM65 - check out the cool new copy-paste feature on the iPhone latest firmware.

- HD2 keypad impossible to type with - I get one error per word; Apple 3G since the 3.1 firmware is more usable (try turning of the click sound - you will be surprised how fast you can go without error)

- in car handling while driving - you have to really pull over with the HD2, where the iPhone only requires a swipe and a keypress.

Conclusion: clear win to Apple on ergonomics and usability. WM65 suffers from its heritage. Unless MS decides to develope a new mobile OS from scratch, the game is lost against Apple. And there's a lot more non-tech people buying smartphones than there are WM geeks. MS - wake up !!!

Next, what you can do with it: the apps: the app store speaks for itself

Ever since I bought the HD2 3 weeks ago, the number of available apps in MS marketplace has not changed: a total of 60 apps only (!!!!!!!!!!) - compared to how many tens of thousands for the iPhone (!!!!!!!!!) including superbe games that beat a Nintendo DS. On WM65, there's nearly nothing. Now that I realized this after buying the HD2, I would not have bought it in the first place, because in the end, that is what counts for a smart phone. What good is a smart phone if you have no apps to do anything with it, no matter how great the smartphone looks? Here again, MS beware and wake up !!!

Proprietary vs. open platform: who's really open and who is not?

The long standing critique on the iPhone is that it was a closed, proprietary platform compared to WM65. Well, given the app note above, think twice. Even without jailbraking the iPhone you get a lot better than what you get for an "open" WM65 machine. And if you can't withhold tweaking everything, you can also jailbrake an iPhone and tweak everything on it. No advantage to WM65

Comms

HD2 a lot better. For instance when listening to streaming radio, the iPhone often disconnects / interrupts in the car when reception is more difficult, where the HD2 keeps on reception without interruption on the same route.

GPS functionality

Clear win to HD2, despite using an inferior non-SirfIII GPS chip I believe from Qualcomm. The iPhone GPS in contrast is the worst of the worst of all on the market. I mean even my old HTC P3600 without any quickgps works a lot better than an iPhone. For some reason on the iPhone the position is always wrong, the signal lost every 20 seconds, ....

That said, the HD2 is only good as long as there's Agps available. Traveling to a different country, you lose the AGPS advantage. In place, you will discover the joy of 2minute warm fix times, when you need the quick fix the most (note my official ROM does not have the Quickgps). I never understood why HTC dropped the Sirf III chip after the P3300 model, replacing with the inferior qualcomm chips. If anyone from HTC is reading this: do you know a Sirf IV is out, its cheap, consumes less power, small, and a lot quicker / precise than anything else available for civil use?

Now the GPS apps: None available on MS Marketplace so far. That said the GPS apps are generally better on WM65 - richer functionality (you can add your own POI and have POI warning when approaching) which is not possible on the iPhone.

Other technical and other features

Battery not exchangable in iPHone? who cares? I've had an iPhone for more than a year, using and charging every single day. Performance has not been impacted to date. the HD2 has the same battery charge life approximately as an iPhone

Memory: HD2 only comes with a 2G micro SD card. You need to put another 100 EUR for a 32G micro SD on the table to match iPhone's 32G.

Periferilia:

Did you notice since several months in the electronics and mobile phone stores, all of the periferilia was replaced and more than 90% of it today is exclusive to the iPhone. If you chose something else, tough luck - a lot less chargers, cases, screen protectors, etc. Everything in the shop today is for the iPhone.

My conclusion:

First and formost: the HD2 is a lot better than all other WM65 smart phones.

But, despite that I only have the 3G, not the newer iPhones, and the 3G has a slow processor, I feel the iPhone usability and app availability makes up for some of it. HD2 is a lot faster, and in the end WM65 is good for the disguised computer scientists and geeks like me. But anyone non-computer or IT savvy will feel a lot more comfortable with the iPhone- this is not against HTC, it's the OS the machine runs, WM65 that is at fault, and furthermore, there are currently really very few Apps for the HD2 where you have 10 of thousands for the iphone. The size of the screen, the processor speed, the show-off effect surpasses the iPhone, but app availablity and usability is lagging behind.

Would be interested in your thoughts

[NEW] Camera: HD2 is a lot better than iPhone, and the video is better than my old camcorder