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Apple iPhone 3G and its Rivals
Sep 17th, 2008 | By Premnath Sah | Category: Gadgets, Hot, Mobile, Reviews & Comparisons
We are all mesmerised by the look’s and usability of iPhone. But, We thought lets see who else is in the game to compete with iPhone. You should always remember the disadvantages of owning a iPhone. Lets see who are all in the game.
One of the criteria we have for comparing with iPhone is sufficiently big display minimum of 2.8inch or Touch screen.
This is going to be Apple iPhone vs Samsung Omnia SGH-i900 vs HTC Touch Diamond vs Nokia N95 8GB vs Nokia N96 vs Nokia Tube 5800 vs Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 vs Samsung Instinct vs HTC Touch HD vs LG KC910 vs Motorola ZN4 vs HTC Dream
Round 1: Display
| Phone | Apple iPhone 3G | Samsung Omnia | HTC Touch Diamond | Nokia N95 8GB | Nokia N96 | Nokia Tube 5800 |
| Size (inches) | 3.5 | 3.2 | 2.8 | 2.8 | 2.8 | 3 - 3.5 |
| Type | TFT | TFT | TFT | TFT | TFt | TFT |
| Touch Screen | Yes, Multitouch | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| Resolution | 480×320 | 400×240 | 640×480 | 320×240 | 320×240 | 640×360 |
| Phone | Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 | Samsung Instinct | HTC Touch HD | LG KC910 | Motorola ZN4 | HTC Dream |
| Size (inches) | 3.0 | 3.1 | 3.8 | 3 | 2.4 | ~3 |
| Type | TFT | TFT | TFT | TFT | TFT | TFT |
| Touch Screen | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Resolution | 800×480 | 432×240 | 800×480 | 400×240 | 320×240 | 480×320 |
When is comes to Touch Screen and size, iPhone wins the race with its innovative multi touch feature. HTC Touch HD is also a phone to watch with its 3.8 inch display with 800×480 resolution, it will be better than iPhone for browsing the web. Other players need to catch up in this segment.
Round II: Hardware
| Phone | Apple iPhone | Samsung Omnia | HTC Touch Diamond | Nokia N95 8GB | Nokia N96 | Nokia Tube 5800 |
| Network | Quad Band GSM | Quad Band GSM | Tri Band GSM | Quad Band GSM | Quad Band GSM | Quad Band GSM |
| Data Connectivity | Tri band UMTS/HSDPA 850, 1900, 2100 | HSDPA (3.5G),Quad band GSM / GPRS / EDGE GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800, GSM 1900 | GPRS, EDGE, HSDPA, HSUPA | HSDPA (3.5G),Quad band GSM / GPRS / EDGE GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800, GSM 1900 | GPRS / EDGE: GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 Dual band UMTS / HSDPA: UMTS 900 / 2100] or 850 / 1900 | NA |
| WiFi | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Numpad | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| QWERTY Keyboard | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| I/O | Proprietory Dock | microUSB | miniUSB | miniUSB | microUSB | NA |
| Memory Card | No | microSD (upto 8GB) | No | No | microSD (upto 32GB) | NA |
| Storage | 8/16GB | 8/16GB | 4GB | 8GB | 16GB | NA |
| Phone | Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 | Samsung Instinct | HTC Touch HD | LG KC910 | Motorola ZN4 | HTC Dream |
| Network | Quad Band GSM | CDMA EV-DO Rev A | Quad Band GSM | Quad Band GSM | Quad Band GSM | Quad Band GSM |
| Data Connectivity | EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 MHz Quad band UMTS,HSDPA,HSUPA 850/1700/1900/2100 MHz (or alternatively 900/1700/1900/2100 MHz) |
CDMA EVDO | HSDPA/WCDMA 900/2100 MHz
GSM/GPRS/EDGE |
EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA | - | EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA |
| WiFi | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| Numpad | no | no | no | no | no | Yes |
| QWERTY Keyboard | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes |
| I/O | miniUSB | Yes | ExtUSB (11-pin mini-USB 2.0) | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Memory Card | microSD (upto 32GB) | microSD | microSD (upto 32GB) | microSD (upto 8GB) | NA | microSD |
| Storage | 400MB | 32MB | 512MB | NA | NA | NA |
In this Round Apple takes some beating with other manufacturers packing lot into the hardware especially Sony Xperia X1, HTC Touch HD and Nokia N96 packing faster data connectivity and more standard complaint in case of connectivity and expandibility. We will have to wait some more time to get more information about HTC Dream and Nokia Tube and see if it can give iPhone run for its money.
Round 3: Multimedia
| Phone | Apple iPhone | Samsung Omnia | HTC Touch Diamond | Nokia N95 | Nokia N96 | Nokia Tube 5800 |
| Bluetooth A2DP | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Bluetooth Data transfer | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Audio File Support | AAC, Protected AAC, MP3, MP3 VBR, Audible (2, 3, and 4), Apple Lossless, AIFF, and WAV | MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA, OGG, AMR | MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA, WAV, and AMR-NB | MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WMA, M4A, RealAudio | MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WMA, M4A, RealAudio | NA |
| Video File Support | H.264 video, .m4v, .mp4, and .mov file formats, MPEG-4 video. | DivX, XviD, WMV, MP4 | WMV, 3gp, mp4 | Real Video, MP4, 3gp | Real Video, mp4, 3pg, wmv, h.264 | NA |
| FM Radio with RDS | NO | Yes | NO | Yes (no RDS) | Yes | NA |
| Camera Resolution (Mega Pixels) | 2 | 5 | 3.2 | 5 | 5 | NA |
| Camera Autofocus | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Video Recording | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Mobile TV DVB-H receiver | No | No | No | No | Yes | NA |
| Video Calling with front Camera | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| TV-Out | No | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Phone | Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 | Samsung Instinct | HTC Touch HD | LG KC910 | Motorola ZN4 | HTC Dream |
| Bluetooth A2DP | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Bluetooth Data transfer | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Audio File Support | MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA, WAV, and AMR-NB | MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA | AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, QCP, MP3, WMA, WAV | MP3, AAC | NA | MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA |
| Video File Support | WMV, 3gp, mp4 | H.264, MPEG4 | MPEG4, H.263, H.264 | MPEG4, DivX, Xvid | NA | H.264, 3GPP, MPEG |
| FM Radio with RDS | Yes | No | Yes (RDS NA) | No | Yes | No |
| Camera Resolution | 3.2 | 2 | 5 | 8 | 3 | 3 |
| Camera Autofocus | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Video Recording | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mobile TV DVB-H receiver | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| Video Calling with front Camera | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No |
| TV-Out | No | No | No | Yes | No | No |
In this round iPhone takes backseat in features where other manufacturers have put in lots of features like 8 Mega pixel camera by LG in KC910, DVB-H receiver in Nokia N96. iPhone being iPod in itself makes itself unique with audio, video capability and quality.
Round 4: Battery and other features
| Phone | Apple iPhone | Samsung Omnia | HTC Touch Diamond | Nokia N95 | Nokia N96 | Nokia Tube 5800 |
| Battery Capacity | NA | 1440 mAh | 900mAh | 950mAh | ||
| Standby Time | 300 hrs | 500 hrs | 396 hrs | 220 hrs | ||
| Talk Time | 5 hrs on 3G 10 hrs on 2G |
5 h 50 min | 5.5 hrs | 6 h 30 min | ad | |
| Operating System | OS-X | Windows Mobile 6.1 | Windows Mobile 6.1 | Symbian S60 3rd edition feature pack 1 | Symbian S60 3rd edition feature pack 2 | NA |
| A-GPS | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Accelerometer | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| 3.5 mm audio jack | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Proximity Sensor | Yes | No | No | No | No | NA |
| Ambient Light Sensor | Yes | No | No | No | No | NA |
| Voice recorder | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Removable battery | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Availability of third party free applications | No without jailbreaking | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Flash support | No | No | No | No | Yes | NA |
| Java Support (j2me) | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| MMS support | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Office document viewer | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Phone | Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 | Samsung Instinct | HTC Touch HD | LG KC910 | Motorola ZN4 | HTC Dream |
| Battery Capacity | 1500 mAh | 1000 mAh | 1350 mAh | NA | NA | NA |
| Standby Time | 833 hrs | NA | 450 hrs on 3G 390 hrs on GSM |
NA | NA | NA |
| Talk Time | 10 hrs | 5.75 hours | 6.5 hrs on 3G 5.16 hrs on GSM |
NA | NA | NA |
| Operating System | Windows mobile 6.1 | NA | Windows Mobile 6.1 professional | NA | Linux | Google Android |
| A-GPS | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Accelerometer | No | No | Yes | No | No | NA |
| 3.5 mm audio jack | No | No | Yes | No | No | NA |
| Proximity Sensor | No | No | No | No | No | NA |
| Ambient Light Sensor | No | No | No | No | No | NA |
| Voice recorder | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Removable battery | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Availability of third party free applications | Yes | NA | Yes | NA | Yes | Yes |
| Flash support | No | No | No | NA | NA | NA |
| Java Support (j2me) | No | Yes | Yes | NA | NA | NA |
| MMS support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Office document viewer | No | NA | Yes | NA | Yes | NA |
This part of the comparison shows that Apple’s iPhone provides usability features using sensors like accelerometer, light sensor and proximity sensor which is not available in many phone. Other manufacturer have packed only Accelerometer.
Conclusion:
Apple’s iPhone is still maintaining its leadership if you really don’t care of few lack of features what we see as deal breaker like absence of Bluetooth A2DP, inability to transfer files using bluetooth, video capture function, no free 3rd party software without jail break and more. Other phones to look for are Nokia N96, HTC Touch HD, Sony Xperia X1 and HTC Touch Diamond. We will have to wait for release of HTC Dream and Nokia Tube to know more information about them and see how they compare with iPhone.
