Yep. It is brilliant. For years, until very recently, the iPhone was well ahead of the mar

ket in terms of hardware and software quality.

But this new generation of android foons, the LG Nexus 4, Samsung Galaxy Whatever have got the same detailed build quality, screen quality (actually, better now than the ifoon), capacitive touch-responsiveness.

So the big plus for the iPhone always was that it was better kit - but not any more.

But it's Android itself where the improvements really are - Google have actually finally turned out an OS that competes with iOS in terms of nice look and feel but also in system performance. It's a really connected experience, and if you have a Google account (gmail etc) and use chrome on your desktop as well, it's massively so.

Two for instances: I'm going to give blood today (yes, I know, I am an hero, you don't need to keep going on about it) at a new place I've never been to before. I'll have a look at google maps on my lappy before I head off, to get the best way to go. And I know that by doing that, if I look at my phone during the journey at all, right in the middle of the front screen will be a little panel telling me how long it will take to get there, and offering me turn-by-turn navigation at the push of a button. And it does that itself, as standard, without being told to.

Second thing: within a week of me having the phone, it learnt all by itself what route I drive to and from work, so in the morning and evening, if there are traffic problems on my route, it'll show them by default. Even if there aren't it;ll show my spookily accurate estimated travel times. If there are really severe traffic problems it'll even BING to draw my attention to them. All by ltself without being told to.

The negative of those two examples, as naysayers will tell you, is that Google are storing all this data about peoples' behaviour and Big Brother is watching, etc etc. All true.

Android does still suffer from the same problems that Windows always has, and that iOS products do not - they let any programmer at all right down into the kernel of the OS to do whatever they like. SO if you install various bits of software to do bits and pieces, there's always the chance that poor coding practices by the devs responsible might degrade system performance over time. This is why any given Windows install is s**t after 2-3 years of use, and re-installing makes it run like a dream again. It isn't that Windows (or Android) is s**t per se, but it allows s**t developers to be s**t. Apple mitigate that in iOS by doing quality control on apps, and not letting through anything that they don't like. Some people say that that is too restrictive, and they might have a point, but it does mean that users are protected from s**t programmers. Or, you could just not install any apps, but what then would be the point of running a phone with an extensible OS? You might as well use a Nokia 5110.

Get one, you won't look back.

Posted By: Arizona Bay, Apr 9, 08:51:25