Education and Technology

As my online friends know I switched to an iPhone for my personal use back in July 2009. I have enjoyed it very much since then except for AT&T’s poor overall 3G coverage. I have a Blackberry 8330 Curve as my work smartphone and I do enjoy using it for the Exchange Server email and the faster typing. The other day I decided to test an application install using the Blackberry App World and the iPhone App Store.

Before I get started I want to poll everyone to see what smartphone they are using.

I did the test in my dining room, next to a large Window hoping to give both units good coverage. I knew what was going to happen before testing, but I wanted to verify my knowledge with a hard test. I picked the Weather Channel Application as my app of choice for this test because I wasn’t using it on either phone. I actually use Accuweather on the iPhone for its ease of use over the Weather Channel app. I did the install on one device at a time and installed it twice on the iPhone using WiFi once and 3G the next time. The Curve 8330 doesn’t do WiFi and it doesn’t have 3G so I know there is some Oranges to Bananas comparisons here. Knowing this, I didn’t expect the Blackberry to beat the install time for the iPhone, but I also understood the results I did get for reasons I will explain later.

The iPhone loaded the App Store in just over 5 seconds, found the app in search in the time it took me to type “weath” and  the install took just under 30 seconds. I then started the app, let it GPS me and I was up and running the Weather Channel in less than a minute.

Now it was the Blackberry’s turn. Open the App World…….Open the App World…..Open the App World…. Well it took 3 minutes for the App World to open. The next thing was getting the Weather Channel downloaded….DL….DL….DL, which took 1 minute 22 seconds including the accepting of the http connections. I then launched the application and GPS’d myself. Total time to a running app on  the 8330 Curve? 4 minutes and 53 seconds for me to get the weather on the Blackberry.

Now, as I said above the Curve doesn’t do 3G or WiFi so I should expect it to take 2 minutes total time based on speed of service, not the almost 5 minutes it took to install the application. So lets look closer at why it took so long for my Blackberry to download and install the same application. I knew this answer before I started and I’ll let you in on it, the carrier for the Blackberry for some reason has a dead zone around my neighborhood. Anything except the signal for email I have to go outside and walk 100 feet from the buildings to get a clear connection. I have great reception on the iPhone no matter where I am at in this area so I knew it would install in a heartbeat via 3G and the WiFi was a no brainer.

Let us conclude with this gem that I have always lived by because of the math background I have. You can massage tests and data to be whatever you want them to be by how you read the numbers and administer the test. I could just as well have done this test at another neutral location and gotten closer results, or I know of a location that I can go to that the iPhone will be a complete epic fail and not install the app at all because once I get to the front door of this location I lose service on the iPhone, but not on the Blackberry.

Moral to the story? Never believe everything you read unless you have read a lot of different opinions from a lot of different sources that have not worked together to get their results. Mileage will vary depending on the end user. Both the Blackberry and the iPhone have positives and negatives. Whether you like one over the other is more a personal choice or a business one based on your needs.

I like both, my iPhone is great for a lot of thing, my blackberry is great for a lot of things. Which do I like better? Let me ask this, can we marry them both into one smartphone?

Internet, App Store, App World

Have you been watching the feud over the Verizon 3G commercials about AT&T’s terrible coverage? A judge has denied AT&T’s request to pull the ad’s, but what is it based on, truth or just the way you read the copy?

As an iPhone user, I can tell you in just a few words that the AT&T coverage is terrible. The 3G is spotty and I lose it just a few miles out of town. Not only that but I can’t get the EDGE network either, while a friend with a Verizon BlackBerry Storm is kicking tale with a great signal. I love my iPhone, it’s a complete computer, smartphone all in one and is much better than the BlackBerry Curve I used to own. The App Store actually works with decent speed, the browser works like a real browser while the browser on the BlackBerry is useless. The only thing that the BlackBerry does well is Exchange Server email and the camera has a real zoom and flash.

AT&T is in for an eye opener when Apple gives up its exclusive license and goes to other providers with better service. When that day comes AT&T will lose at least 25 percent of its customer base. That’s a lowball number in my opinion, but I’d rather be on the low side than state some outrageous number. If the day comes before my contract is over I will pay the termination fee to move to another provider, just for the coverage.

Wake up AT&T, you are living your last years if you continue on the path you are now walking.

Smartphones, AT&T, Verizon