What smart phone should I get?

[Thorin]

Yeah, battery life on smartphones sucks compared to battery life on the old text-only phones.  My old phone would last a week or more with light use (20-40 texts a day, 1 call a day), my Galaxy II-X lasts three days if I _don't_ use it (used as an alarm clock in the morning and to check time a few times a day, no texting, no games, no emails, no calls).

[Tom]

Yeah, like I said, my phone lasts over 4 days idle. Which is completely alright with me. It lasts more than a day, sometimes two with more active use, including 2 hours of calls, and some web browsing.

[Melbosa]

For me 1 day of heavy use in a battery is good enough - that's what I consider "good" battery life.  But when I say 1 day I mean 1 day - 24h at least.

My wife has an iPhone.  It is a toy with a phone to me.  I don't like its reception coverage, I don't like its design, and I don't like its limitations - always seem to run into "why can't I do..." On it.

I'd like to do 1080p video view or record, hence the screen and expandable storage.

[Tom]

Depends on how heavy is heavy. I had a day where I talked to my mom for over 2 hours, possibly 3+ across two days, and did some web browsing and rss reading for a few hours. I still had some juice left after I plugged it in.

I think there are a lot of other phones that get similar times, so long as you don't leave GPS on, or the screen on for hours at a time.

[Lazybones]

Coming from an older generation BB I am confused about the functionality issue you have with the iPhone since given its apps it does a lot more.

On the reception front that is both carrier and model dependant. My 4S has far superior range (we travel into the mountains often) to my wife's 4 and we are on the same network.

I will hand it to the old BB that is had superior quiet time functions and notification options for contacts.

The iPhone 5 also shoots 1080p and comes with a 64GB storage option.

However if you dislike the UI there is no getting around it, and yes there are more customizations on other platforms

It's a toy really doesn't indicate WHAT you dislike , many of the androids also come locked down as well as window phone and BB10 devices.

[Mr. Analog]

Also out of everyone I'm the most surprised at how much I actually like the touchscreen keyboard over a tactile interface, the success of it is thanks to the word suggestions, which seem to be adaptive or at least grammatically aware of what you are writing.

I love tactile interfaces (I wonder why) but honestly I can converse much faster with the touch keyboard than I thought possible.

The other feature which I feel has significantly matured is voice recognition, a lot of times I can dictate to my phone directly and go back an make minor corrections (or correct it on the fly).

I honestly never thought I would see the tech get far enough that it would annoy the piss out of me.

[Melbosa]

Yes the iPhone GUI is not for me along with other things that, while I can't remember them off the top of my head, do bother me enough that I decide through use of the wife's 4S that I wouldn't want one.

Which Andriod devices aren't locked down?

And you keep assuming I have a very old BB?  I currently own a 9810 which is one of the last OS7 BBs made (only the 9900 and Z10 are newer).

So I am used to higher functioning smart phones between mine and the wifes.

Truely I want my phone to be very business centric over fun apps and media stuff. I want the 1080p stuff for video playback and recording for personal use but I don't want to edit videos or photos on my phone, etc.  So the app strore system should be mature but doesn't have to be the top market.  This is where I think BB loses for me cause the app store gets no love outside of Blackberry corporate distro software.  Even M$ app store has some good 3rd party apps.

I think Android might be the route for me though through this convo... So I ask again, which are the non-locked down or cstomized versions of Google's OS?

[Mr. Analog]

When you say "not locked down" what do you mean exactly?

My phone has a SIM card in it, I can swap it with another carrier whenever I want, so in that sense it's not locked. I choose to use the Google software that came pre-installed, so I guess I'm locked to Google but honestly I could uninstall everything and install what I want.

As far as OS freedom, Android is probably one of the more open platforms out there being OSS (with all the pros and cons that that encompasses). If you want you can download the source build a whole new GUI for it and install it on your phone.

Also I have to say, you keep referring to the iPhone as a toy, I'm not sure where this perception comes from, it seems kind of nebulous, it's a toy in that you can download games on it yeah but that's a user preference thing. Or is it a toy because it's not a super-hardened General Dynamics spec'd BlackBerry which can take a bullet??

There's so much choice out there, personally I feel like you should go with the operating system you feel the most comfortable using, for some people that might be Windows 8, iPhone or Android.

Honestly, I picked the Galaxy Note II because it had a screen that I could get a lot of mileage out of and I'm VERY comfortable with the Android OS (having used it on my tablet for a couple years now).

So yeah, at this point I guess my advice would be pick what you're comfortable with using the most.

[Tom]

Getting a phone from most providers will give you a locked down phone.

The google phones are all as open as you can get. I think HTC does unlocked and unencrypted bootloaders.

I kindof agree with the toy comment. It feels so inflexible, and I don't much like using iOS devices.

[Melbosa]

So to be clear, I've only called it a Toy once, and haven't referenced it as such since, although the statement has been commented on by almost everyone.  The iPhone seems to be an everything but Phone or Business device first, then those second.  This is very evident in the Apple device world that I deal with every day at work.  Apple is very much driven for home and retail consumer use, and is secondary to the business life - although they have made leaps in that direction since iPad 2 release, making that bridge more manageable and expandable.  We have to work with the BYOD concept and BYOMD concept at work heavily now, and Apple is very much the hardest integration above Android and obviously Microsoft (especially when your primary technology base is Microsoft).

Maybe Apple products are akin to certain Car Manufacturers for me...  While I like the look of some Dodge Models, and respect the features they have, unless you willing just give one to me I wouldn't choose it over a Chev, Ford, Toyota, Nissan or Mazda.  As has been said, personal preference for what you like and don't like will be a key factor in choice.

I know one thing I really don't like about the iPhone is it's native email client.  It just doesn't work well for me at all.  I've used pretty much every one on all the mobile devices, and the Apple Email Client is amoung the least of my favorites.

So locked down or customized Android OS is things like: you have to install the "version" of software that your provider or manufacturer dictates.  You are restricted on functionality because someone somewhere decided they didn't want to support the open standard of the Android core OS.  I know Samsung does this to a degree, and I know Verizon is horrible for doing this to their phones of any OS.  I was wondering, as I know there are some, which phones really just stick to the Android OS feature set and don't restrict to much.  This is what I meant by Locked Down.

I appreciate everyone's feedback and information.  It has really helped me narrow down my choices.  We've established that I am not an Apple person; we've determined that Blackberry is most likely out of the question; we've narrowed down that its probably Android based I'll be looking at (although I really do wish I could trial a Windows 8 phone).

[Lazybones]

The "nexus" phones get direct google OS updates. Just about everything else depends on manufacture release delayed till their custom UI works or never if the device is EOL.

Some have locked down boot-loaders so you can't change out the OS, others can be rooted by force to load custom firmware. I would narrow your search to the hardware you like then figure out if this is an issue.

I find Androids to be harder to work with in a BYOD network, just getting an android to connect to a WPA2 connection with 802.11X authentication can be a challenge finding the right settings under custom UIs and changes between releases.. Should not be much o an issue on a new device but still...

If it is the Email client you dislike do some hard research on support. Active Sync support is not cut and dry between custom and native clients an Google has been all chopping features from GMail so who knows what is happening in their native clients.

[Lazybones]

Don't forget to check things like VPN client support if you need or want to remote in to the office.