The phone or rather the mobile device as a whole is the future of the web in many ways. It’s important for us to be able to access all of our information more than ever. Why? Because we’ve linked it all together and put a lot of our eggs on the web. I still keep a moleskin because I’m a bit old fashioned like that, but without access to all my data, especially considering the field I work in…I’d be lost. On top of that there are a lot of cool apps to develop and you can let your imagination run riot 
The days of the old fashioned telephone are long gone! Phones got smart.
What should you buy though? At the moment the big 2 are the iphone
or the HTC Hero – Which is better? To set the record straight Jamie tried both and allowed me to share it with you here. Hope you find it useful.
Jamie Vinall – computer programmer and I.T. manager for a small engineering company. Experience mainly in Java and J2EE web-programming. I’m afraid I’m currently “between” websites at the moment so can’t provide you with a link!
” I would like a disclaimer just stating that the review was written quickly and informally and as such some of the more technical information hasn’t been checked and may be incorrect. You could also mention that I haven’t included any details about how the actual phone functionality performs because in this day and age its the bread and butter of a mobile. All phones can make calls of a respectable quality, so its hardly worth mentioning in a comparison.”
Contacts:
Winner – Hero: iPhone lacks ability to even create groups of contacts. You can see all the messages sent to a given contact on iPhone in a thread-style UI, with each message being shown as a different speech bubble coming from either side of the screen, but the Hero shows you all e-mails between given contacts as well as texts!
Memory:
Winner – Hero: I guess, technically the Hero should get it for being a little more versatile. It is able to expand memory using external Micro SD cards up to a hardware limit of 32GB (I think). iPhone gives you 16GB/32GB built in depending on your model but with no option for external card expansion so it’s really a question of which model you can afford. Mine is 16GB.
Web-browsing:
Winner – iPhone: Generally faster loading of web pages on iPhone from what I’ve seen. Very similar otherwise – both have ability for multiple tabs.
Synching with Gmail and Google Calendar:
Winner – Hero: But only by a narrow margin. Obviously running a google OS allows the Hero to do this effortlessly. Mail was effortless on iPhone, but the calendar feels like a tiny bit more of a hack. Even though it only took about 2 mins with an online tutorial using Google Sync, it still had to be configured as something other than a google calendar as there’s no onboard support for those.
UI:
Winner – iPhone: But only by a narrow margin! The skin that the Hero uses for Android is brilliant and very customisable when it comes to what you can see on your home screens compared to the iPhone which just puts every new app on the screen on a little icon of the same size. iPhone doesn’t allow you to rename the app icons either, making some of the downloaded ones annoying when developers call them silly things. BUT, iPhone does at least allow you to move the app icons between home screens like the Hero, and generally the UI is a little bit more slick all-round imho.
Camera:
Winner – iPhone: The Hero’s camera quality is bashed in reviews for being to blurry because pressing the shutter button shakes the phone. The iPhone is only 3MP in comparison to the Hero’s 5MP (I think) but it does seem to outperform it based on that. Video is also MUCH smoother on iPhone.
Battery Life:
Winner – Hero: The biggest let down of the iPhone so far. At the moment (with new phone syndrome meaning frequent use) I’m lucky to get through a day with the iPhone. If you’re not using it at all (even for calls), it will probably last 2 days. From what I heard from Stu, the Hero was a lot better right from the get-go.
Price:
Winner – Hero: Total cost of contract on Orange for 24 months with reasonable amount of minutes/texts included: £700. The iPhone on o2 is going to end up more like £900 for the same period. But, you do get unlimited 3G usage in that iPhone deal, whereas the Hero has a free limit of 500MB p/m. Probably doesn’t effect me or Stu that much though as we’re usually both on Wi-Fi networks when using the online stuff.
Apps:
Winner – iPhone: Just a LOT more apps available on the apple market atm. Maybe in time this will change, especially considering the comments in the following section…
App development:
Winner – Hero: This won’t be an issue for 99% of iPhone fanboys, but I’m really annoyed that to even have a go at developing an app for the iPhone you need a Mac OS to run the SDK. And you can’t use Java. With the open-source nature of the Hero this wins hands down.
Logistics
Winner – iPhone: Again, this is a marginal victory! Yes, iPhone weighs very slightly more than the Hero. And yes, it is very slightly bigger when compared side by side. However, the iPhone doesn’t have the Hero’s ‘chin’, and a flat surface just fits the pocket better.
Cheers Jamie!
