Comment by ilamont | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ilamont | Hacker News Reader

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iOS (iPod and iPad2) and Android user (Samsung Exhibit II) here.

The OP brings up many valid concerns, and asks, as a consumer, how much is one willing to tolerate this?

My answer: A very long time, as long as Android phones and plans continue to smoke iPhone on price and provide an "almost iOS" experience.

The Exhibit II has Android 2.3.5 installed. T-Mobile charges US$30 per month for 100 minutes of talk, unlimited messaging, and 5GB of 4G data; thereafter it reverts to slower data and 10 cents per minute of talk. I am not a heavy talker, nor do I stream video or audio (and when I do it's usually within wifi range). When I was looking for a plan, I saw a similar offer for a Virgin plan (I think it was US$35). Friends overseas tell me even cheaper Android plans are offered through local carriers.

For owners of Android handsets, using Facebook, Twitter, email, Web, and most mobile news sites is comparable to iOS. I miss Instagram, but it is coming soon to Android, and in the meantime I make do with Path. There are a few other missing Android apps, and the UX is slightly inferior, but considering it's $30/month, it's good enough.

To many people, that's the value of Android. The UX is very similar to iOS, it handles most smartphone functions, and it's a lot cheaper.

So what about WP7? Both as a user and as a developer I was completely frustrated with Android, so I went out and got myself a Lumia 800.

Here in Europe you pay about $525 for this device (off contract), and the 710 and 610 are about $330 and $260 respectively. An HTC radar goes for $380.

As another Android user looking for other options, I'd love to hear your opinion of WP7. Especially on how you're finding the selection and quality of the available apps.

It all depends on what you're using your device for. Personally I'm missing internet tethering (update coming soon, apparently) and Spotify, which exists but is so buggy I removed it and downgraded my account. I'm not too happy with the calendar app but I've been too lazy to look for a replacement. You're tied into Bing for search which I don't appreciate. File transfers over bluetooth are not supported, not sure if anyone still does this.

On the other hand, the UI is silky smooth, not at all like the Galaxy Nexus I have lying around here for development. I guess it's just a personal thing, but I really can't live with the UI lag and jitter on Android. You don't have a ton of options to play around with, but the features that are there just work without hassle.

Things like email, messaging, facebook all work great. The browser is nice and responsive too. You get Office for free so you can open Word documents on the go, and Nokia Drive 2.0 gives you free navigation with free offline maps. It works well here in the Netherlands and is a big plus for me. Skype is available as a beta which is still rough around the edges, but it's nice to be able to call my mom over Wi-Fi without wasting minutes.

So I guess it's a bit of a mixed bag. For me the positives greatly outweigh the negatives, so I'm a happy camper. Maybe you should just go play with one at a store and see if it's for you.

valid point. i'm actually considering a WP phone recently.

i had to switch to android when nokia made me a sucker with the lousy E70 right before the N9, making me hate them so much to the point of never buying from them again.

now android just did the same with the lousy Nexus one. i simply can't see myself buying another android.

that leaves me with windows phone for now, mostly for the benefit of doubt they still have... IF we still care about phones in a while. big IF there. i strongly feel that phones as we use today will soon be the devices of the unwashed mases of late adopters

> iOS (iPod and iPad2) and Android user (Samsung Exhibit II) here.

When I first read your post, I thought you intended this as a snarky remark about the ongoing lawsuits, until I looked it up and found that Samsung really does have a phone named the "Exhibit II". Why do phone manufacturers in particular have such poor taste in naming, and keep picking names with no obvious naming scheme or consistency?

I would be very curious to know the history of this phenomenon (product naming, and in particular electronic product naming). It seems like Sony electronics in the 80's followed this pattern. It was always like the Trinitron DX-3095 and the DX-2085.

Cell phones also follow this throwaway name pattern. I guess there are brands like the RAZR and Droid, but the individual models have throwaway names.

Where do those numbers come from? Does some one just make up some nonsense? Sometimes they put the screen diagonal in there but I think more often than not they have no bearing on the product.

Is it because finding trademarks is hard? After all, Apple paid a ton of money for the iPhone trademark.

Was there a time, like back in the 50's, where companies used normal names for electronic products like stereos?

Software used to follow version numbers, like 1.0, 2.0, etc. But then Microsoft changed it to 95, 98, 2000, XP, etc. And then Apple changed it to Leopard, Snow Leopard, Lion, etc. Which I think are more friendly names. Ubuntu seemed to follow in Apple's lead with Hardy Haron and so forth.

I guess with software you have a linear sequence of products. With hardware, they seem to produce a lot of useless variants (except Apple), so you can't number them 1,2,3 / A,B,C.

I do not see why you think "Exhibit II" on the one hand and "DX-3095" and the "DX-2085" follow the same naming pattern.

To me, the first looks like a marketing name, and the second like one that only makes sense to the manufacturer. I am assuming that the numbers do have meaning here.

Marketing names may or may not be intended to be short-lived. Sometimes, they just become short-lived, either because of how they behave in the market (see: Edsel), of internal politics (a new brand manager steps in; (s)he cannot claim the previous manager did a fine job, so something must change), or due to short-term profit hunting ("device named 'X' sells well! Let's make a low-budget one and sell even more!"-"But we would have to cut quality to make it cheaper"-"Yeah so?")

There also seems to be this notion "if consumers are confused, they will pick a brand at random. The more brands there are, the easier they get confused. I will make lots of brands, so that they will get confused, and pick a random brand. Since I have so many brands, chances are they will pick mine.". That approach leads to short-lived brand names.

As to that DX-3095 naming scheme: chances are that it was taken directly from the manufacturer's internal tracking system. The first digit might indicate the factory or the PCB version, or whatever, the second the quality of the tube, etc. That may or may not give useful information to customers.

> Ubuntu seemed to follow in Apple's lead with Hardy Haron and so forth.

To a degree but very few people I know use these names. Most use the 9.10/10.04 which imho is one of the best naming patterns for an OS.

It is very convenient to look at the OS version and be able to tell instantly if it is a LTS or standard build and when it was released.

Maybe these are only benefits due to how often Ubuntu releases new versions but I've found them useful.

disclaimer: I'm a sysadmin.

There's sort of a naming scheme: http://blog.intercom.io/whats-in-a-name/

I've found the android phone and apple tablet is a good combination.

The ipad is good for things I want comfort for (reading, web-browsing, etc.) and they are reasonably price competitive (assuming you get the wifi only version, not a plan), but the android phone is much more versitile (if sometimes annoying to use) and generally cheaper than a tie-in iphone plan.

Plus then you get to use applications for either OS.

And, if I get it correctly, that way you can tether the iPad via the android where there is no wifi?

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