Entertainment For Lively Minds
ATM: Android phones and an iMac
I'm considering changing my ageing (5+ years) Blackberry for an Android phone. The Blackberry battery is tired and it runs slowly even with just email, Twitter and a few bits n' bobs: it looks like time to pension off the old beasty. Despite having an iMac, iPod and iPad I don't really fancy an iPhone as they seem to have pretty limited battery life and I prefer something a bit smaller, e.g. HTC Wildfire S size. I mainly use the phone as a phone, diary and email device.
My Blackberry syncs neatly to my iMac and this is what I worry about if I swap to Android. I don't want to pass all my data to Google, which I gather is one way of syncing, and prefer a good old fashioned cable or wireless sync. How do I keep my diary and contacts up to date? Any hints, tips and pointers?
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As far as I know, Mark
it's not 100% straightforward to do what you want with a Mac. I'm open to correction on this, but for instance, I've a HTC desire, and a Windoze computer. I got a programme with it that does 'sync'ing stuff and allows me to lump on music and so forth. It'll also (although i don't have it set up) talk to Exchange/Outlook on the home PC and do the contacts/mail/diary thing going.
I don't believe there's a Mac version of it; sadly the idea that Google/Android have is that you, er, *would* want to pass all your data to Google.
For the laugh, I googled Android and Mac and this was the first thing returned, which suggests that I *might* be right...
http://lifehacker.com/5801473/how-to-sync-android-with-your-mac-as-seaml...
On the other hand, there are apps like this coming along for iMac which might be changing the landscape somewhat.
http://www.androidauthority.com/have-a-mac-have-an-android-tablet-no-pro...
As someone in the same boat...
...who did roughly what you're proposing (i.e. from an almost total Mac ecosystem, added an HTC Desire Android based phone) I wish I hadn't been the cheapskate that I clearly was and bought the iPhone 4 (which was very new at the time).
The Desire has been an okay phone but not without its reliability issues. Battery life is very poor and Android still feels a bit cobbled together and disjointed (as compared to the iOS experience).
As soon as I'm free from the shackles of my contract I'm getting an iPhone. YMMV, but I suspect going Android is going to be a decision that you might (just *might*) come to regret.
Only saying. And I'm sure the iPhone's battery life is no worse than similarly sized/specced Android phones. Which is to say 'daily charge required'.
Android/Windows/Apple
I happily use an Android phone with Windows with no problems whatsoever. But I also use an Ipod with Windows and hate the experience.
Whereas when I first got an Ipod I had a Mac and thought the interface was absolutely fine. I'm not sure what the difference is, Itunes just feels like a different program on a Mac, like it's got both legs not one leg and a woodwormy pegleg.
Apple and Windows aren't designed to talk to each other, so I suspect Android and Apple will suffer equally. The translation process between the systems makes it painful. If cost wasn't an issue I would use my Android phone with a Windows machine and my Ipod with a Mac.
Oh and to echo oktapod up there, Android is daily charge required, and in my case after leaving the house with full charge by the time I get off my train - admittedly heavy usage - I have less than half my battery left. Charge in the office to enable me to leave with full battery, and by the time I get home 40% battery.
Large touchscreen, heavy twitter/blog usage mind = 2 or 3 times charge a day!
Mac & Windows talking to each other
What do mean about Mac & Windows not talking to each other. Surely most "conversations" are done via a couple of network layers (maybe more, can't remember the theory!) and as such there seems little or no problems. I have my Android phone syncing with either or both Windows PC and Mac all the time. I control my Mac via my Windows PC (I have no screen, keyboard or mouse on my Mac) and I transfer files between Windows, Mac to Linux based NAS drive all the time, seamlessly and without really caring which machine is which.
Doddle
I've got an Android phone and I sync it with my Mac wirelessly (in fact I don't have to do anything as I have my Mac on all the times and it automatically syncs as soon as I'm in range of my network).
I use Missing Sync (http://www.markspace.com/products/android/missing-sync-android.html). It's not free but it works very well indeed. It has the added bonus of Fliq Calendar which allows you to keep your whole calendar history on your phone if you want (rather than just the last 6 months or whatever the standard is).
Alternatively…
… have you considered a BlackBerry Torch? It's roughly the same size as a Wildfire S when closed, although admittedly somewhat heavier, but when you slide it open you have the benefits of a "proper" keyboard as well as a touch screen. My wife - a long time BlackBerry user - has had hers for about a year now and is very happy with it. The battery typically needs charging every two or three days, but this is certainly better than many of the other smartphones I've owned.
Interesting
I have a Torch and I hate it. The battery burns down during the day and it is a daily charge for sure. In fact some mornings I get up and it is dead as the battery emptied itself overnight when I definitely wasn't using it. Also, where I live the 3G and 2G signals fight and if you try to use 3G all calls go to voice mail. The only solution is to only use 2G. The web performance is rubbish as everything goes through the Blackberry servers, and the sync software takes what feels like 10 minutes to load and another 20 to sync. I cannot wait to cancel my Orange contract and get a new phone with someone else!
UPDATE - prompted by this thread I've discovered you can get it to automatically switch off at night. I've set it up to do so.
I find it amazing how utterly different…
…that is from our experience.
Obviously if the device is having to constantly hunt for a network signal, battery life is going to suffer. Interestingly I've often noticed that when I'm in the UK the standby time of my BlackBerry (a Bold) is also markedly reduced through network "hunt", although this is also partly to do with roaming. That said, something would seem to be not working correctly on your device; the problems you're having syncing are just not typical in my experience. I seem to remember that just after the Torch came to market there was a firmware upgrade that, amongst other things, vastly improved battery life and reliability - if you haven't done so already, maybe that could be worth a try.
The BlackBerry browser really isn't that brilliant, but it's useable. And as the OP is mainly using it as a phone, diary and email device, he's probably not too bothered anyway.
Orange
You may well be right, the Orange network is a total mess since their mergers, and I find I'm bouncing about between Orange, T Mobile etc, 3G, no 3G. But the sync software performance is bizarre. I had a series of Palm devices and the equivalent software would load in seconds, it would immediately recognise the device and the sync would take les than a couple of second. The Blackberry paralyses the PC and takes ages. It is even worse than iTunes as a piece of bad software. I can't wait till I can exit my contract! I'm intrigued that your experience is so positive. I must investigate further, but Orange's customer service is hopeless for something like this - you just get vague suggestions of what to do ("try taking the battery out.....") when It is clearly a network problem. As far as the desktop is concerned, try Googling "Blackberry desktop software slow".... It's not just me!
…"try Googling…
"Blackberry desktop software slow".... It's not just me!"…
No it's certainly not, that's a lot of posts!
Ironically, considering the "Apple and Windows aren't designed to talk to each other" comment in one of the previous posts, I'm actually syncing from a Mac, just like the OP and, despite syncing something like 900 addresses daily, "it just works" (© Apple 1984). And although the first versions of the BlackBerry Desktop Software for Mac were somewhat less than perfect and many of the options you find in the Windows version are still missing or hidden, for the daily chores it now works very well.
Job related I also run BlackBerry Desktop Software for Windows under XP, Vista and Windows 7 in virtual machines on the Mac and in all of these (admittedly basic) installations, have never experienced the problems you describe. If it wasn't such a hassle, I would recommend reinstalling everything - including Windows - this sounds like one of those generally unsolvable problems that stem from diverse software/driver/preferences conflicts that we all accumulate over the years and then carry over as "an accident waiting to happen" from one system update to the next. Aaagh!
iPhone battery
My iPhone battery isn't as terrible as I would have believed from the rumours I'd heard. Sure it needs charging every night, but that's not exactly a hardship is it? My wife's android seems to require the same level of charging. Indeed, she's gone down to work in London today. She left at 5.45am and won't be back until 7.30pm and she's taken her phone charger with her because she knows the battery will probably have discharged by the time she gets on the train home.
I asked about this here
http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/atm-iphone-battery-life
Lots of good advice about turning stuff off running in the background
Odd criteria
That's mostly the reason I have an Android phone — you don't have to worry about syncing the thing. Calendar, podcasts and email just update themselves wirelessly without any effort from me at all. I can stick an appointment in Google Calendar in a web browser and it appears on my phone about a minute later. I only ever plug the thing in to get photos off it or add music.
Seems to me most smartphone batteries will only last a day anyway. Although most Android phones give you the option of carrying a spare battery.
About two months ago
I paid off what was left of the contract on my Android phone and got an iPhone. Best thing I ever did. It's soooo much nicer to use.
I sync it with iTunes on a PC and haven't had any trouble doing so.
Another iPhone thing
Now that iCloud's up and running I am finding the sync pretty uch seamless. The only trouble I have is that my work machine currently only runs OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) so now iCloud there. home machine runs 10.7 and calendar and other sync is pretty much set and forget, even picking up google calendars with little effort.
The really annoying thing for me is the inability to sync the phone with more than one machine. It can be done but requires a bit of under the hood tinkering to do so.
OTOH, I can't really see a problem with using an Android phone with a mac. There are several apps (some already mentioned) and this article at Lifehacker, which lets you set up Android quite nicely.
Spanning Sync 3
I use it sync my HTC Desire to my Mac. It costs money, but it is seamless and I've had no problems with it.
http://spanningsync.com/