Hacker News Reader

Comment by chrischen | Hacker News Reader

I had the same experience when first switching to Android after a lifetime on iPhone. But after a year of really getting to use Android features it eventually became apparent Android has its own problems, and I ended up switching back to iOS. It'll seem great at first since it does things differently and improves on many aspects of where iOS fails at while it's fresh in your mind, but you'll need to spend much more time using it day to day to get a real sense of the pros and cons.

View on HN

This is the review I'd really like to see. I'm not interested in "first impressions" or "1 month in". I'm interested what happens after a year, two or even three years.

I have an iPhone 6S+, and it works almost flawlessly - animation is still good, very few app glitches, and even the original battery is in decent shape.

I'd like to hear how Androids from that era fare compared to iPhones from that era - because I plan on having my next phone for at least this long.

I am having my oppo a57 for over 2 years now. Longer than I had any other Android device before, and there are literally zero issues except it never really had a good camera to begin with.

What I am trying to say is that it's not easy to compare android with iOS because of all the devices. There aren't many Samsung Sx devices still alive from that time, yet my (never heard of) oppo still does a great job

> iPhone 6S+

I replaced my battery and the phone sped way up. Unfortunately, after the battery replacement, the new battery health UI doesn't work, saying it can't communicate w/ the battery.

Sounds like if you go to the apple store they will fix it or swap it again.

> I'm interested what happens after a year, two or even three years.

I can write an older version of this review, so it may be a bit out of date now. I owned the iPhone 1, 3g, 4, 4s, got tired of waiting for a larger less expensive phone, and moved to Android. I had the HTC One X, Nexus 4, and Nexus 5 (also a Nexus 7 tablet). I move back to the iPhone for the 6, and have had the 6s, 7+, and now the X.

The One X was almost a disaster that forced me to switch back. As soon as I had to deal with carrier and HTC crap, I immediately thought mistake but made it work and decided to never get another non-Google Android phone.

IMO, Google hit a sweet spot with the Nexus line because they were priced well and performed well. I had nagging issues with them, but for the price I dealt with them. The build quality was also not quite the same as the iPhone, but again at that price they were great. On my value recommendation quite a few friends left their iPhones and gave the Nexus line a shot (all have since moved back to the iPhone).

My main issues were around performance, camera quality, general quirks (a google process would randomly spin out of control causing the phone to really heat up and be fully out of battery in about 10 minutes). If I didn't notice this happening, then I would end up with no phone until I charged again. This issue along with Google moving the price up near flagship is what caused me to look at the iPhone again (I can write an entire other rant about how Google destroyed my perfectly working N7 with an update).

I looked at some of the other manufacture flagship Android phones and IMHO, none are worth the flagship pricing. The build quality is just not the same as with the iPhone at that price. And since Google decided to go flagship also, I decided to give the iPhone a shot again. Once back on the iPhone, only then I realized how much I took for granted all the things that just worked. At this point, I doubt I'll ever try Android again. iMessage, Continuity, my Apple Watch, etc... all rely on the iPhone now. Plus, I think my point is still true that even the latest Pixel2XL screen is not as nice looking at the screen on my X. I've looked at the them side by side and even the Android people in the office agree.

I'm sure someone will come along and say I'm an idiot and Android is the best thing ever (I'm sure it is for a lot of people), but you asked for opinions from someone who used both extensively :)

Thank you for your thorough review. The last Android device I used was a Samsung S3 which was very glitchy. Your review matches my experience and confirms my suspicions (based on that experience) that Android phones will never be as polished and "just work" as Apple devices.

What were some of the things that made you switch back?

The #1 reason is Apple's focus on user privacy and the device's purpose to serve the user through of specific set of features (note I do not mean they give us control of the features, just that they designed it for specific purposes). Apple's business model does not rely on monetizing user data and it shows in its products.

At the time I switched (Nexus 5) there were abundant issues with the Android OS from a memory leak issue that required rebooting the phone periodically to design flaws such as Android's UI rendering de-prioritization. Much lower quality of apps in general. Much worse customer service experience (you can't just walk into an Apple store and get an issue fixed). Much worse hardware quality (part of the reason I switched back was because the Nexus 5 charging port stopped working and started emitting smoke. For a while i was charging purely through the Qi charger. I've never had an iPhone break on me, and any other issues were always resolved for free at the Apple store) Not sure if these are fixed, but I cannot switch back as it's basically impossible to use Android without Google services and consolidating all my data with Google. If google wants me to give me data they're going to have to pay me more.

> you can't just walk into an Apple store and get an issue fixed

The vast majority of people can't do that anyhow due to the rarity of Apple stores. For example there are two on the island of Ireland, for a population of seven million.

Most people have to get the i-devices fixed by a third-party just like they do with Android.

Then you call Apple. A guy comes and picks your mobile up, and then another guy comes and gives you a new mobile.

There is no Apple in my country. I can't call them and they certainly won't come pick up my phone.

For places that do not have apple stores they usually have authorized repair centers. These arent as convenient as walking into an apple store but usually still better than shipling them something and waiting weeks to get it back.

Yes, there is an Apple authorized repair center. I had a sticky key on my laptop. It took them two weeks to fix it. They claimed it was because they don't keep parts in stock and have to order them from overseas.

I'm crossing my fingers that "the time is right" for Android, especially on a Google device.

Maybe they've improved their OS and features, but as far as I know their revenue model is still advertising based.

Anyone know if you can still get a high quality Android experience without being a slave to Google? Obviously things like Google Now are only particularly useful if you submit to Google, but other than that, what can be expected? Can I root it and disable all the bullshit?

For a while I tried using a blackberry that had android app support. One of the caveats was that the android support had no Google services support which rendered many apps unsable (including apps like Lyft that required Google maps).

I can’t imagine it’s gotten any better.

Of course it's entirely possible, depending upon your use-cases. If you want to use your phone as a communication, navigation and browsing device then there is no need to touch Google. You can disable Play, Maps, Chrome, Drive etc and install alternatives. Even WhatsApp offer a direct APK download, I wish more vendors did.

But if you want to play the latest games , install your bank's app or use voice agent then you'll need Google Play and an account.

I've run CopperheadOS a while ago (https://copperhead.co/android/) and in my opinion it's only gotten worse. As someone else mentioned; the "Google Play Services" are an essential part of apps these days. So expect any "mainstream" app not to work. You're forced to use open source alternatives from F-Droid (https://f-droid.org/en/)

Yes it's possible, but i wouldn't call it a "high quality android experience"

Sure you can. There are plenty of solutions for exactly that for several years now

I do pay for a Google business account, so that probably biases me in favor of connecting to their services. I use it for the branded email.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com