SE Xperia X10

On June 27th, 2007 (shortly after I got married) the iPhone came out.. I sort of waffled back and forth as to whether or not to get the iPhone or the N95..  The decision was very much made for me when they announced the SDK for the iPhone back in January of 2008, and I got one a day or two later..  I found out that the iPhone wasn’t all hype and that I seriously made the right choice.. The N95 is a good device but now that I have handled both, I can say that the iPhone was superior in the one way that mattered the most;  the interface.

I continue to use just about all of the features of my iPhone on a daily basis and can honestly say it’s one of the most useful tools I have ever owned..  I have loved this device.. When the 3G iPhone came out I briefly had some unfaithful thoughts and considered upgrading but to be honest I just didn’t feel the improvements were enough to warrant the cost even though it was only $200..  I passed..   Then the 3Gs came out and again, I didn’t see the advantage.. Sure a few extra go faster stripes, but just not that big of an improvement..  Pass again..

With each iteration of the OS, they continue to upgrade the first generation device in lock step with the later generations which I felt was a really good thing to do.  I personally believe that you should never, ever cripple your hardware through software.   If a device can do a thing, it should be allowed to do a thing..  And it appeared they weren’t crippling their older device just so you would upgrade… Until it became apparent that they were doing just that..

The irony of course is that Apple is sort of known for doing exactly that and yet I still bought in..   The iPhone has been wonderful and will likely continue to be wonderful as a device, but the more I use it and the deeper I get into the user experience as well as the developers experience the more I realize that there are a lot of limitations in place.  Some of those were put there by Apple intentionally to get you to upgrade to the latest revision of the hardware..  And that’s shitty..

I recently purchased a very nice bluetooth stereo headset with the intention of using them with my phone..  However Apple has disabled the A2DP bluetooth profile on the first generation iPhone..  Just ’cause..   The phone certainly can do it, it’s a software profile not a hardware difference but they decided do turn that feature off.   They also didn’t enable MMS for the first generation iPhone even though I’m pretty sure we were promised that along with everyone else.. again that simply sucks..  Don’t even get me started on the “new” voice activation shit the new 3Gs can do and that my p910a could do 5 years ago..   I can say that this sort of thing has made me pretty angry at Apple..

I am also somewhat annoyed with AT&T of late as their network is completely and totally hozed.  A buddy of mine that works for AT&T said their network in the Austin area is something like 400% saturated and yet are forced (by the consumer) to continue to add new features like the recently added MMS stuff..  3G is great if the network actually has bandwidth..  When my phone first came out the Edge network (2G) worked fine.. sure it was a tad slow but it worked… NOW it doesn’t work at all because they have throttled it down to nothing trying to eek out more 3G bandwidth to support the customer demand..   So while previously my wife with her 3G iPhone would load a webpage in 30 seconds that would take me a minute to load, now her phone can sometimes load it in a minute and mine times out every time.. So effectively my iPhone’s network is gone.. (Depends largely on the time of day.. )

I had told my wife that I was going to get the next version of the iPhone.. whatever came after the 3Gs.. I told her that the 3Gs was tempting but wasn’t quite better enough to warrant the cost and that I normally hang on to a device for 2 or so years before upgrading anyway..  So whatever Apple came out with next would do me..  I assumed at the time I said this that Apple would continue to actually support my device in the form of upgrades..  Now I’m less sure of this..

In my mind they have intentionally crippled the first generation iPhone such that I can’t use stereo bluetooth, MMS or the new Voice activation stuff even though the hardware supports it..   And that’s shitty..  And all so I would rush out and purchase the latest hardware..  (Which I couldn’t do anyway in the case of the 3G because I was contractually obligated to AT&T..)

So.. Now I’m forced to consider alternatives..  Or rather not forced, but am shopping for alternatives because Apple & AT&T has pissed me off..  Their business tactics smack of greed and I just don’t like that..

And while my iPhone still very much works and for the most part still does everything I need, I would like to get a new phone simply for the newer abilities that are out there..   The problem was the iPhone (even the original one) set the bar extremely high..  The interface just wins.. The application store system works very nicely and is a huge win for both developers and customers alike..  The native applications all work extremely well, are user friendly and functional.. etc.. it’s gonna be tough finding something that works as well and has the features and functionality of even my crippled phone..

Or so I thought..  I had looked into quite a few different devices, most of them were either the latest Symbian or Android style phones.. None of them really did what I wanted.. the form factor was just all wrong in most cases..  They had unnecessary things like slider keyboards or just uncomfortable shapes, or they weren’t enough of a convergence device..

Then a co-worker pointed out the Xperia X10 by Sony Ericsson.   Wow..  It’s not out yet, but the specs are available online and I must say I’m impressed..  I have a fairly high opinion of the SE line of devices.. The p910a was a great device for its day.. I really had zero complaints about it and think back on it fondly..

In my opinion, the quality of the iPhone where the physical device is concerned is pretty high.. It doesn’t feel flimsy for easily breakable even though the whole front of it is glass.. It has a nice weight to it and it’s comfortable to hold..  The only thing I don’t like physically about the iPhone is the volume is really low by comparison to some of my other phones (the Nokia Communicator I owned was so loud I had to hold it away from my head..)

I’m seriously hoping that the the Xperia phone matches the iPhone for physical quality..  If it does then it’s a shoe in for my next device..  ALL of the spec’s for this device beat my first generation iPhone by a landslide..  Plus it appears to have the same touch screen style interface and it’s an “Android” with 1ghz processor?!   Christ it’s a phone that’s more powerful than my first two IBM PCs combined..

The biggest complaint most folks have is that it doesn’t have a keyboard..  Are you fucking kidding me?  I just don’t understand that..  I used to think a keyboard would be nice until I had a device that had one and never used it..  Once I got used to the iPhone style of on screen keyboard I was done with physical keys..  Touch screen is where it’s at folks..  Real keyboards in a device this size are simply not practical nor are they useful…

The real big complaint is that this phone will likely cost around $800… or more…

Either way I think this phone is it.. It’s still a ways out yet though.. it’s slated to be released in “the first half of 2010″ which knowing SE will be the very last day of that time frame or pushed back later.. heh

I’m also not entirely sure about the UI code named “Rachel” by Sony Ericsson..

Looks good to me!  It’s getting bashed by a lot of folks for some reason though.. I think it’s very pretty and seems fully functional.. *shrug*  I dunno why people hate it so much.. I guess change is scary.. They may just want the row after row of icons and nothing else..

The other complaint is that it’s being shipped with android 1.6 instead of 2.0 which people can’t understand.. I think that decision has a lot to do with the development cycle.. The phone has likely been in development for a while now and its currently written on 1.6.. When does 2.0 come out?   They would have to completely rewrite to get 2.0 crammed in there at the last second before the phone was due to be released..  I think by writing it on 1.6 they get the software down pat and can then release the 2.0 version in a upgrade down the road..   Quality folks.. they want the OS to work the first time around..

I can appreciate that..  I’d take a stable 1.6 over a buggy 2.0 package anyday..

Anyway.. that’s it.. This thing looks hot.. Here is another video of the music player and photo viewer.. Looks great..

I’ll keep you posted.

A single device that does a bunch of different stuff — My very own “tri-corder” if you will. I had been using a Sony Ericsson P910a that for the most part I was happy with, but it had some limitations that annoyed me and kept me from really using it to it’s full potential. One of the big ones being the lack of Wi-Fi and the need for a stylus. But I get ahead of myself;

I had been seriously looking at a couple different phones to replace the 910.. I pretty much had the list down to two possible contenders; One was the Nokia n95 and the other was Apple’s iPhone. It was a close race.. And one the n95 was winning, right up until the Steve Jobs Keynote speech just a couple days ago.

The n95 looks like one heck of a nice device, but upon further review it suffers some of the same issues as the p910.. Firstly, it’s clunky. Its difficult to navigate and use the various tools because the interface relies on you using the little button pad which I found to be a royal pain in the ass. And sure it has a very nice camera on it, but I’m buying a phone and convergence device.. not a camera.. but if you go line by line, the device has a lot of very nice features!

The iPhone looked like a nice device to be sure, but I wasn’t sold on Apple. I’m not exact what you would call an apple fan — but I will admit that they make good hardware. It’s just I didn’t want to be stuck with a device that was completely closed, with no ability to add new software. When Steve Jobs annouced that they were releasing an SDK for the iPhone in his keynote speech the other day, it pretty much won the race for me. Even so the phone does have issues.

Lets compare;

Compare Phones:
Phone	Nokia N95	Apple iPhone	SE P910a
Required Carrier	Any	AT&T	Any
	A lot of people have complained about the fact that the iPhone is basically an AT&T only device. I don’t mind simply because I had been using AT&T anyway. For whatever reason, they are the only carrier that we can actually get within a 300 yard circle of my house, and at full bars in my house. Everyone else we get nothing. So this is a non-issue for me.
Weight	4.52 oz (128g)	4.8 oz (136g)	5.47 oz (155g)
	Some folks have mentioned that the iPhone is heavy.. bah.. compared to the P910 its light! So again.. this is a non-issue.
Battery Life	Talk: 5 hr Standby: 280 hr (11.7 days)	Talk: 8 hr Standby: 250 hr (10.4 days)	Talk: 13 hr Standby: 400 hr (16.7 days)
	These are the “official” numbers as released by the manufacturers and I must admit, I think they are completely bunk. The P910 has a good battery. If you left it sitting on a counter turned on it would take 3 or 4 days to die. Not sure where the 16.7 days number comes from — infact I think these numbers mean nothing. As it stands I sync my phone every night nearly so its just about always in its little stand on my desk.. so it gets charged every night. If I went on a long trip, I’d likely bring the charger.. And I don’t think I’ve ever needed to make a cell phone call that lasted more than an hour or two.. Any one who says the battery life is too short on a modern device is out of their mind..
Display	240×320	320×480	208×320
	The iphone wins this one by a long shot. It’s ALL screen by its very design and let me tell ya coming from the little p910 screen to this thing.. Christ, it’s HUGE!

Other things:

GPS — Everyone is gahgah about the fact that the Nokia N95 having a GPS antenna in it and bash the iPhone for not having one. Yet those that have used it in the N95 have repeated stated that it takes forever to get a signal and sometimes doesn’t work at all. And while having a GPS locator sounds nifty and all, when was the last time you ACTUALLY NEEDED ONE? Sure.. there was a time when I was in the Army in Korea stuck out in the middle of BFE when a GPS device would have been handy.. other than that, I can’t see the use. The iPhone can already give you a very accurate location using google maps, so adding GPS would be nearly pointless. If you need GPS that much, you’d likely get an actual GPS device instead of hoping the one in your n95 was working that day.

Infrared — Some people have complained that the iPhone doesn’t have an infrared antenna.. and I must admit at first I was a little stunned that it didn’t. But then I realized, why would it?! My SEp910 has one and in the years that I have carried that phone I have used that IR port, ONCE! And that was just to see if I could. Adding an IR port to the iPhone would have been a waste of space..

MMS — A huge complaint of a lot of folks is the fact that the iPhone can’t do MMS messaging. I don’t do MMS much.. I do SMS constantly, but not much MMS. I’m sure with the SDK coming this will get fixed, but even if it doesn’t.. I don’t mind. Most of my friends don’t have phones that can even recieve a MMS, soooo…

FM Radio — N95 supporters love to point out that the n95 has an FM Radio.. uh.. So? Firstly, how often do you listen to the radio? I personally don’t.. Ever. If I want to listen to music I use the built in music playing ability of the device. And had I got the n95 I can assure you I would never turn the radio feature on. I just don’t like being pelted by the constant ad’s they run on modern FM radio. So this is another non-issue.

Camera — Oh man.. the n95 people are absolutely drooling over the 5 megapixel camera and use it to cast disparaging remarks at the iPhone. And yes, that’s a very nice camera. If you consider that I’m coming from a VGA camera to a 2 megapixel, I’m already taking a huge step up. But most of all, I realize that this is first and foremost a phone, that can take pictures. Not a camera, that has a phone. A 2 megapixel camera is ample for me. I just don’t take that many pictures.. Now maybe that will change now that I have something better than the VGA camera.. We shall see. Right now I’m just glad to have anything.

Video Capture — lots of folks say the iPhone sucks because you can’t record video with it. Again.. Phone! Not Video camera. But, since it does have a camera I’m just sure with the SDK coming out someone will invent a video recorder soon enough.

etc.. etc.. etc..

Where the iPhone wins over all other phones, hands down? The interface — period. The end. The iPhone’s interface is so intuitive and simple to use that I really see everyone else following suit. Its a no brainer, and makes the device extremely attractive simply because of it’s ease of use. The only thing that really kept me from getting the iPhone previously was the closed proprietary nature of the device and Apple in general. Now with the SDK in the offing, hell I’m sold.

It really is a very very nice device.. I’m shocked at how good it is to be completely honest, and I very much like it. However, in the interest of being fair — here are my complaints/wishes in no particular order;

• Phone Volume — This is my biggest complaint. IT’S NOT LOUD ENOUGH! Even the speaker phone isn’t loud enough.. If I’m in a loud airport or in my truck driving, I can’t hear the caller. The speaker phone is down right bad. The SE P910 was awesome for this in that, if you turned it all the way up you could hear it across the room while running a jackhammer. heh.. I wish they’d let us turn that volume up higher, you let me worry about my hearing.
• Greasy screen — This is something I’m going to have to get used to. But since you do everything with your finger and your touching glass, you end up with a very greasy screen that seems impossible to keep clean. Or even remotely clean. You only really notice it when you hold the phone just right, but when you do — gah! I’m not gonna touch that!
• Yahoo Mail is buggy at best — This is a disconnect between Yahoo and the iPhone. Basically, as a long time yahoo customer I can receive my emails just fine through the phone, but if I try to send it errors out saying “The connection to the outgoing servers “(null)” failed” .. We think its a known issue that they are working on. See, even apple has the occasional bug.. =p (though I’m just sure they’d say it was Yahoo) I’m sure this will get fixed.. too many folks are complaining.
• iTunes is the devil — I really don’t like having to do everything through the iTunes interface. Infact, I don’t much care for iTunes in general. I have had some issues with them in the past, and I don’t care for them too much. But what can ya do. I want to be able to drag and drop my files to the iPhone directly without being forced through your interface. Give me access to a directory. Fix likely with the SDK coming.
• No Copy & Paste function — I’m a little surprised at the lack of copy and paste.. It’s a simple functionality, and it doesn’t exist simply because there is no real way to do it via the touch screen. I understand why.. but it would still be nice to have. Maybe a “touch and hold” followed by a second finger “tap” puts you into the edit mode or gives you a hover menu that allows for additional functions? I bet this will get addressed with the SDK.
• Better USB support — if I plug the iphone into a computer without iTunes installed, it should act as a harddrive. Period.
• Saving things to the phone in general — I realize why its this way, but again I wish I could save an email attachment or dump a file to the device for transport. This will likely come with the SDK.

More as I think of them.

Note I didn’t mention the lack of 3G… this is because you don’t need it folks.. you usually will have Edge or Wi-Fi.