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« on: October 15, 2021, 01:19:03 AM »
So I switched to Android a couple months ago and planned to write a point-by-point comparison of that and iOS (specifically, a Galaxy S21 Ultra vs. an iPhone 12 Pro Max, and a Tab S7 vs. an iPad), but the more I thought about it the less I had to really say on the matter.
The phones are the things I used the most, and after switching I kinda started to wonder why the fuck people get so bent out of shape over platforms. I mean, Apple's been opening up iOS just as Google's been closing Android (mostly for security. Android's security used to be as awful as iPhoneOS's inflexibility). There are some things that iOS definitely can't do, like run a chrooted Linux install, but that tends to be so finicky (mostly dealing with the new permission sets with Android 10+) that even I don't feel like dealing with it aside from fairly mundane stuff like ssh.
So I dunno, I guess we're doing a rapid-fire comparison. iPhone 12 Pro Whatever has a faster CPU despite being a year older (The S21 Ultra's Snapdragon 888 is roughly on par with the two-year-old iPhone 11), but it doesn't really make the phone feel faster. Screen's roughly the same size. Battery life is about the same despite it having a lower capacity battery (3687 mAh vs the S21 Ultra's 5000 mAh).
The S21 Ultra has 12GB of RAM compared to the 12 Pro Something's 6GB, but that doesn't really allow it to do more. Camera performance is pretty close on average, but the front camera on the S21U smashes the iPhone one, and the 10x telephoto is pretty convenient. Low-light performance seems to be better as well, but I haven't tested that too thoroughly. The ultrasonic fingerprint sensor is super convenient and awesome. The folio case and its viewing window works well, and I use the S Pen a lot more than I thought I would. The 120 hz screen was a very nice upgrade, though the iPhone 13 uses one now as well. Counter-intuitively, I actually find the pinhole camera more distracting than the notch, probably because it's breaking up an otherwise full-screen experience, rather than reading like a shrunken bezel.
The only real phone feature I really have to complain about is the car integration. Android Auto's UI works better on my car, since my car has a fairly small center console screen. CarPlay's split view tends to make it so that both the map and music UIs are too small to be usable (this isn't a problem for larger screen units, like the one on my parents' Kia Forte), but since Android Auto has a persistent media bar/notification bar on the bottom, it's very easy for passengers to flip through tracks without having to disrupt navigation.
That said, it does have some outwardly user hostile "features." It forces you into navigation every time you plug your phone in, and gives you no option to turn that "feature" off. Most of the driving I do is local, so I'd much rather have my music app front and center (CarPlay just displays the last content you had running. What a concept).
Tablets? Whew. Samsung tries like hell to make it work, but Google clearly doesn't give a fuck about them. You can always tell when you jump from Google land to Samsung land, because Samsung's software refers to the Tab S7 as a tablet while most of Android refers to it as a phone. The bluetooth S Pen works very well, easily on par with the Apple Pencil, and it has integration with Galaxy phones, much like the way Apple's devices integrate with one another. Good stuff, and very convenient. Battery life is easily on par with my 3rd gen iPad Pro. Nice as it is, however, I tend to find myself reaching for the iPad. Android left tablets behind years ago, and it really shows. While having an iPad display your app as an enlarged phone app is a mark of shame, I've found it to be surprisingly common on the 'droid side of things.
Finally, smartwatches. I went from an Apple Watch 6 to a Galaxy Watch4 Classic. Gotta say, I really like the rotating front of the Watch4 Classic over the digital crown (which I would always accidentally bump on stuff), and the ability to set awake hours for standing notifications on Samsung Fit is nice, but...man, WearOS has a lot of catching up to do. In terms of responsiveness, the Watch4 Classic is more in line with my old Apple Watch 3 than the buttery smooth 6, with hitching sprinkled throughout, and the software itself is rough. It's really hard for me to consider it release-worthy when some of the core system software treats the Watch4's round screen as a square screen. How the hell did nobody notice that? One definite positive is that the Watch4's battery life kills any Apple Watch I've owned. I could comfortably get 1.5-2 days out of my Apple Watch 3 and 6, but I can comfortably get 3-4 days out of the Watch4. It also does offer up many of the same features (one-wire ECG, heart rate sensors, etc), it's just the software that lets it down. I think WearOS needed another year or two of polish before Samsung switched away from Tizen. Hopefully it gets better over time, because in several ways it feels soooo close to hitting that sweet spot.
In conclusion: iOS is fine. Android is fine. Windows Phone was fine. Fanboys fucking suck.
Edit: One point I almost forgot to mention: the S Pen vs Apple Pencil thing largely comes down to which feeling you prefer. The S Pen uses a felt tip nib, while the Pencil uses hard plastic. I prefer writing with the S Pen because it feels more like a pen on paper, but I suspect that the Apple Pencil will last much longer due to the material it uses. Both options are still far better than the shitty wobbly nibs that the Surface pens seem to have. Trying to jot down notes with my old, thankfully sold, Surface Pro 3 was just awful.
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