Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Like many of us, I've been fantasizing about the day I could leave WinMo behind and run Android full time on the Rhodium hardware.

Excited about all the progress for the TP2, I decided to dig out an old Vogue and see how Android runs (apparently, the Vogue port is just about as near 100% working as possible, with many people flashing Android to the internal memory). Found Myn's warm donut build for Vogue, and fell in love with it. Everything works- Sound, BT, GPS, camera, etc... and it works WELL. Like, REALLY WELL. They've even managed to get hardware video acceleration working, which makes the UI experience buttery smooth- far better than WinMo ever was on this handset, and even some that came after it.

Obviously, the lack of a keyboard and limited memory on the vogue really make me long for the TP2... We've clearly got some great things to look forward to when the Rhodium port is further along! However, I also found myself longing for Windows Mobile at times.

Not that I have any particular love for WinMo- the only reason I've stuck with it for so long is because no other OS offers the power and useful functions that it does.
I always said if something better came along, I'd switch.
Here's what I noticed during my 2-week long stint with Android:

1) Tasks are not part of the PIM system! As an Outlook user, I expect my PDA to be an mobile extension of the organizational tools I'm used to. That includes Contacts, Calendar, and TASKS. I organize my life with tasks, use them as to-do lists, and sometimes drag them into my outlook calendar to create appointments with reminders. Why people seem to have forgotten about them lately is beyond me (HTC's sense seems to always omit tasks as well- why? They're so useful!). Sure, there's plenty of 3rd party task/to do list applications I can install, but then my information is all segregated. With WinMo, everything is part of the PIM system, and syncs directly with my Outlook- its all in one place. Much more efficient.

2) Exchange sync is iffy. Again, I use Outlook on my PC, laptop, and work computer to keep my things organized and up to date via Exchange. Google sync is pretty great, but it only pushes real-time to the phone. It does not connect live to my desktop Outlook. This is unacceptable to me, since I rely on my data being in sync and up to date on a daily basis. Its exactly why I use an Exchange server, and this is severely lacking to me in Android. There is a commercial app called Touch Down, which you can buy and will sync your exchange PIM to your Android device... but it keeps everything seperated! In other words, your contacts, calendar, emails, etc are all part of Touch Down's database. You won't find them inside your regular Android calendar or contacts. This is pretty weak.
I've heard that Android 2.1 will support Exchange, but I'm not clear on if it will do it like TouchDown or actually do a native sync. I'm also skeptical because I know Google hasn't paid MS for the Exchange rights (unlike Apple, Palm, etc, who all paid MS to have activesync developed for their platforms). Also, even if they DO support native Exchange... YOU STILL DON'T HAVE TASKS!

3) Then there's the voice command system. It works pretty well, but unlike MS Voice Command, I can't do it with my phone in my pocket. If I say "Call John Smith", it will pop up with a message box on screen that asks me to click if John Smith is correct. If he has multiple numbers, it will present them all and wait for me to push one. On MSVC, I can say "Call John Smith", and it will respond to me "Call John Smith on mobile, home, or work?" and I can respond "Mobile". All the while, my phone stays in the holster. Awesome.
Then there's queuing up media... With MSVC, I can say "Play Dream Theater" and it will create a playlist with all songs that match the Artist tag "Dream Theater", and begin playing. Android does not have any support for that (although the Hero has some proprietary command system from HTC that does this, its not part of Android and apparently doesn't port well to other devices).

Those are the big three things that struck me as lacking. Then, there are just some apps I found myself really missing (but will probably come out eventually):
1) Groovefish/NanoGroove. Grooveshark actually has an official Android client, but they charge you $3 a month for it. A MONTHLY FEE, meanwhile on WinMo I stream unlimited music for free from them with some homebrew app. Or, pay $5 one time for nanogroove to get a much nicer interface. $3 a month?! no way!

2) Logmein. Yes, Android has RDP and VNC apps in the market, but logmein is great for some of my computers behind firewalls I don't control (and therefore can't forward ports to). I was actually rather surprised logmein has no support for Android yet, although I've heard that they will be releasing it soon. Still, I had to reboot into WinMo to fix something on my work computer the other day, and it was pretty annoying.

3) Skyfire. Ok, I have a kind of love/hate relationship with this browser. The remote server model is kind of slow and laggy, and I would never use it as my primary browser... however there are times that I want to see a page the way a real desktop would, with flash, streaming video, and everything. And for that, nothing beats Skyfire, and there's no alternative for Android. Again, I found myself rebooting into WinMo just to see how a particular flash-based website looked. Lame.
Yes, Adobe has announced full-on Flash will be available on Android, however Skyfire tones it down Opera-mini-style, and only sends your phone a compressed stream it can play back with ease. There are some kinds of flash that would easily bog down our mobile processors, and that's where Skyfire really shines.

4) Office support. Ok, obviously WinMo has MS Office and Android does not. But what about Google Docs?? I don't use Excel all that often, but sometimes I like to use it on a whim to play with some numbers. Word I use a lot more. Why doesn't Android have anything like this? It doesn't have to be Office, it could very well be Google Docs. You know, part of their whole live-in-the-cloud-computing set of services? The closest thing I found was a rather expensive suite of tools to buy from the market. Found that disappointing as well, since I'm used to it being free and part of my phone.

5) Rar. Ok, this is a weird one, but it came up and I'm listing it for illustrative reasons. Someone sent me an attachment to my email, and it was in .rar format. Well, the team behind WinRAR actually has a Pocket PC version as well, believe it or not. If I were running WinMo, I could opened it up right then and there. But nothing exists on Android to open a rar file.
Now, granted, I don't think the ability to have rar on my phone is something that I care THAT MUCH about. In fact, I would probably give this one a great big Who cares?! however it proves a point that I've been starting to suspect here... Windows Mobile has over 10 years of application development behind it, which means that someone, somewhere has probably already written an app to do what you want it to do. Whether its opening a rar file, downloading a torrent, turning it into an FTP server, etc... Android is catching up really fast, however right now there is still so much more available for WinMo than Android.

Ok, now that I've said all that (and you're still reading this which means you either have too much time on your hands or actually found this interesting), I'll just say: I much prefer Android's UI to Windows. It runs smoother, reacts faster, makes more sense. However, when it comes to power and versatility, the ability to do ANYTHING, Windows Mobile still wins.

For now.

I'm still very excited for Android and look forward to some dual-booting on my device, but I feel like people should just know that there are some things WinMo is worth sticking around for.

/rant.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I tend to agree. My app list might vary, but there are still some essentials that would keep me coming back to WM for quite a while. And although the iPhone finally offers basically every application I need -- offline GPS, great RDP/VNC apps, a good selection of music streaming services, awesome jailbreak scene that addresses most/all of the platforms weaknesses -- I can't stomach AT&T's data and messaging rates. Plus, there is some really sexy hardware coming out for Android and Windows Mobile these days.

It's really a love-hate relationship with Windows Mobile. I love the fact that WM is as close as you can get to a mobile computer (file downloads, file system access, unrestricted software installation, etc), but many times those are the same things that are aggravating from an ease-of-use perspective.

I dug out my wife's old Vogue recently to play with as well. Even loaded up SD cards with Myn's build for some family members that got Vogues back in the SERO days. I'd be ecstatic if the TP2 builds get that far along; and with the great group of developers working on the multi-platform builds we just might get there sooner rather than later. Not that I see myself flashing to internal storage though. I just can't cut the cord on WM.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

+1. I was sort of hinting that in the "Ready for Everyday Use?" thread but I was by far in the minority. Most people in that thread and perhaps this whole sub-forum seems to think that Android TP2 project is the answer to everything.

Don't get me wrong. The Android project is by far one of the coolest and perhaps most compelling projects to come around in a loooong time.

Again, this is just my opinion, I just have a feeling that it is not going to be the "be all, end all" OS for our devices. It is easy to jump on the Android bandwagon right now but I think once people start using it long term, they'll figure out that there are nagging annoying issues just like there are in the Winmo arena.

This is not to say that people may prefer Android over Winmo, but it'll be far from perfect.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Most of the things you mentioned seem to be just things you are not used to on the Android platform or things you can get to install with some effort.

Rar = Androzip = can extract RAR

Office = There are a few office suites...most are paid like androffice and etc..Thinkfree has a free one for viewing files and you pay if you wana edit or do calc..documents to go is also free for viewing only

Exchange = I hope there is never activesync for Android...Activesync is the worst piece of application in existence...I personally prefer SyncML. Activesync is proporitory to microsoft which pretty much makes ppl stick to microsoft..things like this should be open source and follow "Standards" this allows you to choose products based on their quality and not be locked down to microsoft..try Funambol for example

Tasks = there are some patches to make them integrate by default..as for outlook..again your mentioning microsoft products...why not use thunderbird or zimbra desktop or etc?


Voice Recognition = I do not know much about that so can't help there

Logmein = Ok so blaim them not android and I am sure there are alternatives..they are developing an android soon too

Skyfire = I don't see why people like this browser at all but ok..

Groovefish/NanoGroove= there are alternatives...

Now I am not saying Android is 100% up to par with everything winmo was but you gotta give other things a chance..if your ideology is Android won't be good until its 100% microsoft software compatible then maybe your looking at things a bit different

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Well spoken dishe, you basically outlined all the reasons I'm still on WinMo.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I admire your love of Android. But your post is funny in that your most common phrase is "there are alternatives" but you don't seem to mention any alternatives.

But Android is indeed a nice mobile OS. Alot of likes and dislikes are subjective so that can determine which one you like better.

This discussion would probably be a bit more concrete if we had a more complete version of Android. Right now, things are just hypothetical.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I actually gave a few alternatives..some I did not give alternatives for some because I don't use them..how can I give alternative for something I myself don't use? but I am sure there are..

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Thanks for the explanation. That's fine. It just that you sounded so confident in your previous thread that you actually knew of the Android alternatives.

You'll probably know more once the Android TP2 becomes more robust.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Microsoft has become very well ingrained into the business world. There are solutions to Android's missing functionality like you mentioned, such as the ability to view office docs from the device. With Microsoft products having a rather large presence in the world, I think it should be expected that in today's smart phone world, there is compatibility with these products.

Nice write up Dishe!

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I do not disagree Microsoft's presence, mostly in the business world but the use of Exchange makes me sad. Syncing is part of making all technology work together and those need to have standards and be open source for it to have competition and variety.

Also viewing is free but editing costs $$$..but that aside from the microsoft is not the only one setting standards for documents..many formats exist including PDF, ODF and etc which are commonly used.

There is compatibility with use of 3rd party apps but in general I believe people should migrate off solutions that do not allow flexibility. If Microsoft wants to sell exchange they should open up activesync. But Microsoft tries to get both which is bad for consumers and businesses.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

gTen, I hear what you are saying and I WANT to agree with you. But sadly, my experiences have not matched up with what you describe. And I think you've missed my point.

I'm not glued to Microsoft, for the record. I would gladly switch to ANYTHING that worked just as well. I'm also a big fan of open source and standards. However, I'm also willing to admit that sometimes open source does not work as well or offer the same features as the commercial alternatives.
Funny you should mention Funambol, I'm actually very familiar with the product (I've actually got a picture with me and the creator, Fabrizio Capobianca, at a tech conference). SyncML is a great concept. In practice, Exchange just works better and more efficiently. I tried Funambol, I ended up going back to Exchange.

Good call on the un-rar tool, btw! But if you read over my point in the first post, you'll see that I admit most of my gripes are things that will most likely come out sooner or later. But right now, those inconveniences are legitimate for anyone coming from Windows Mobile who used their phones the way I do. There are certain things I've come to expect from my handset, and while Android is catching on extremely fast, its not quite there yet.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Oh I don't disagree that Exchange is a lot simpler then running funambol or other sync clients. Even in my installation of Funambol I had to modify it to my needs to get it to work properly and their documentation is pretty bad...

One problem that happens in open source communities is when open source is done by a profit business they try to keep a difference between the "paid" version and "free" version. Let me use zimbra as an example..their free does not include things like mobile sync and real time backups. In turn this makes a struggle between open source people and the company. (which is why they got crappy mobile sync)

M$ in my opinion is the worst at sticking to standards. But what makes open source apealing is when I have a custom solution I can modify the code myself to make it fit my needs a lot easier on open source platforms.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I do not think MS is really the issue. Take a look at the Pre. The way exchange is fully integrated into the device is beautiful; tasks, email, calendars, and contacts all sync very nicely into the native UI. In addition, Palm's layering of contacts, emails, calendars, etc from multiple accounts is revolutionary. I think Android could have incorporated something a little better into the native UI.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

to the OP great points
truly valid and a lot of reasons why I prefer the htc rosie builds - even slower, they give me as a user the well needed balance the stock android lacks
I don't run android often (maybe to keep up with development) but so far, yes i tis incomplete and not ready for prime time. Comparing my android to the moment for example makes me realize the moment is 10,000 years away from our builds, but it also gives us something to aspire to in that the overall speed of the device will be very snappy.
All in all, personal subjectivity varies, but as far as sending an sms or something, android does it well. As far as getting work done, in my experience, it is lackluster. Take it as it were though because your experience in the ever burgeoning battle of balance may be different than mine

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Thing is, I'm referring to Android as an OS in general, not just the still-in-progress port on the Touch Pro 2. The Vogue port is pretty much finished, and just about the same experience you'd get on a pre-installed Android phone.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

http://sites.google.com/site/gdocsforandroid/

hey I just bumped into this, its suppose to be GDocs for Android and its free to view and edit Google Doics...haven't tried it myself yet but it does fir your criteria so I figure I'd share.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

What makes this thread a bit unique from other xxx versus yyy threads, is that we are generally speaking about the same phone.

In this case, you don't necessarily have to choose one over the other. Once Android TP2 gets more robust, you can do either.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I want ubuntu to have internet via cdma and make phone calls then triple boot >.> lol

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

The other thing that makes this thread different is that we're 2 pages into it and we have yet to start a flame war. It's still a discussion, and a reasoned one at that.

I personally go out and grab the daily builds once a week starting about 3 weeks ago on friday (most recent build) and play with Android over the weekend because I frankly can't take the risk that I won't hear the phone ring or miss a work call during the week (how pathetic is that, huh?). I can't believe the strides that have been made in such a short time and I think it's amazing what's been done. Maybe I'm just too used to WinMo, but I'm really not in love with Home or Home++.

I was also one of the first people to take HP/Compaq up on their promise to fix my iPaq back in the day if I bricked it putting Linux on it and home soldered a serial connector onto my USB cradle so I could flash Linux onto it, so I've been screwing with *nix variants on PDAs for a good 10 years...I like to think I'm open minded when it comes to the OS on my PDA.

I will say that I keep coming back to WinMo. I've tried Palm and just couldn't get used to the interface and the 'difference' between my desktop/laptop and the PDA. I had a Wizard (no, not the HTC Wizard and it's variants but yes I had one of those too) for a time but that was a joke. I had a Handspring which is just a glorified Palm with a compact-flash slot and had the same problem with it.

Compatability, availability of apps, ease of configuration of those apps and customization of the device coupled with a semi-familiar interface have brought me back to WinMo time and time again, warts and all. If I had a Mac at work or home I might feel differently about an iPhone, but I don't, so I don't. Not slamming, not hating, just sayin'.

All of that may change when my contract is up and WP7S (or whatever the acronym for Windows Phone 7 is) has been out for a while and Android has been out for a good couple of years. Here's to a long and fruitful life and people developing like the wind for Android. It can only help, don't see how it can hurt.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Just curious. Why would there be a flame war? It is all personal preferences.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

you must not have read the other android vs winmo posts lol, good points dishe very well thought out

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

flame wars don't need reason..they just need 2 people who disagree with each other then begin belittling each other rather then sticking to factual info.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Sorry, I wasn't clear. (Yes, I've read plenty of flame wars.)
But this thread is very different. Why would you think a flame war would break out in THIS thread?

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

he is going by trends that usually happen to threads like these so he is surprised there is actual debate and not a flame war. This section though generally is pretty clean as not to many visit it yet.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

It's those iphone threads that are the dumbest. People are wholly incapable of having a reasonable and respectful discussion. Andoid discussions are alot calmer.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

i really am disappointed in windows decision to dump winmo 6.x. i own the tp2 and am in love with this phone. thankful for all of the great apps that have been developed. the ease of cusomization is freakin awesome. we have all of these options for ui and sense with those mods is way better than any other ui i've tried... even android imo. i think we owe all of this to those people that complaind so much about the smallest bugs in winmo over the years. now we'll have to go to the winPhone 7 os or android which still has many bugs. good post btw!

well, that's my 2.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

+1. I just talked to a friend who has had a genuine Android phone for a couple of months. I asked him how he likes it. His very first word out of his mouth was "good". The second word out of his mouth was "But..." and he spent the next 5 minutes talking about just some nagging issues that he hopes gets fixed.

I think the people who are so anxious to jump to Android 100% once this project progresses farther will find out that Android is nice but definitely not perfect. It is just human nature to believe that grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. For certain users, Android will be much better and they'll stick with it long term. For others, I suspect that they may quietly come back to boring winmo.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I don't know about grass but I know the robot is greener on the other side :P

Android is still young so that is to be expected but at least they are updating the platform regularly and it is publicly available...so if you don't like something you can always contribute to the project...winmo we have to hope M$ get it..which by WP7 looks like they don't get it

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I guess there are 2 ways to look at Winmo 6.x. It is a VERY old OS (that's why we hate it). But it's a mature OS so it works with most of our communication needs, email, exchange, outlook, office, etc. (that's why we stick with it).
Windows 7 is a completely different animal, err robot. lol.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

One thing to remember is that we had to jump through our share of hoops to get WM running just as we like, so of course we'll have to do the same for Android. My address book is in the Palm Desktop contacts app (with the nice Agendus overlay), so I had to install Outlook, then get the PDT -> Outlook export working, and then sync with the horrid ActiveSync just to get my contacts on my TP2!

Another example -- I used to have multiple Gcals, with stuff like kids' sports seperate. The google cal sync only lets you sync the primary calendar (which G says is WM's fault), so I had to merge everything into one cal. Wouldn't have had to do that for Android.

Of course, I had to jump through a whole different set of hoops when I went from a HP200LX to a Palm E2 a few years back. It's just par for the course.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

That may be true, as far as transitions go. However, that seems to be assuming that all things are otherwise equal (in other words you can do the same things in Android that one used to do in WM).
My original post was not about trouble with transition, but rather that there are things you just can't do in the newer platform yet. I should emphasize "yet", since it may very well catch up soon... However certain things, like the lack of Tasks as part of the synchronized PIM, may really take some time if it is to ever be resolved. This is true regardless of any "hoops" one may have to jump through during the transition.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

I completely agree with dishe about the TASKS! That is one of the reasons I hold out. I'm beginning to think I will need to change the way I manage tasks if I want to move off WinMo, as it just doesn't appear to be an important thing to any other OS out there.

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

:D Speaking of tasks...
Anyone try pTasks:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/show...ighlight=tasks

or HTC Tasks:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/show...ighlight=tasks

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

i use task a lot and the task apps on android are honestly better on android than winmo. most of them allow interactable widgets on the homescreen, much like mobile shell, but where i give them the edge is that they easily integrate into the calendar as well. the got to do app on android also allows subtasks which is very useful and is something i havent seen on any winmo tasks app. ive tried tasks manila and ptasks, i found both to be buggy and retreated back the pocket outlook. while both are very finger friendly and look much better than the stock task program i found them to be slow and dont work perfectly.

got to do + pure calendar widget = damn near perfect task experience for me personally, your results may differ of course

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

The worst part about WinMo is how MS threw devs and users under the bus with WP7.. So now, companies like Bank of America or Barnes and Noble don't even bother to have a WinMo section/app/comingsoon. It'd be one thing if they scrapped 6.x and built something cleaner with the same set of 'tweakability' - but they didn't, they switched to closed-out applesque style.. Its aggrivating because I (and I'm sure others as well) would like to ask "How stupid do you think we are" (to decide to close out 3rd party apps and other mod-friendly features)... but the answer we'd get is based on the entire phone-buying population.. and that answer is "pretty ****in stupid".. Smartphones being mainstream really kinda sucks..

Re: Android versus WinMo - a personal experience
 

Very well put. Blades. Right under the bus. And you'd think that they would have learned from the Zune that they can't out-Apple Apple.