I wanted to write a comparison between the Galaxy Nexus and the Samsung Galaxy S3. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the S3 long enough to do that. The other day, I went ahead and sold it so I could buy the Nexus 4.
Love For Pure Google
I did this because, well, what can I say, I am a purist (and one other reason which I will talk about in another post soon 🙂 ).
I LOVED the Galaxy Nexus when I had it, I have the Nexus 10, and I even had the Droid Incredible, which was probably one of the closest things to pure Google at the time aside from the first Generation Nexus.
The only reason I got the Galaxy S3 was because of a trip I took to Israel. Verizon makes it nearly impossible to make your phone a world phone. I had phone connection with the Golan SIM card I had, but I was unable to use data which pretty much cramped my style. Hillel Fuld was nice enough to lend me his Nokia Lumia while I was there, but I had a hard time adjusting to it. It was certainly simple to use, but it felt like the syncing and full integrated experience I was looking for was missing.
Verizon is Annoying
I am glad to see that there is a petition going around about making phones become unlocked because Verizon is really a bunch of jerks about that. It makes no sense that I couldn’t add a new APN to the phone so I could use data. Even though its your phone, they basically make it impossible to use it with another carrier. The only option was rooting and flashing it, but I have to be honest, that is not my specialty by any means and I didn’t want to spend money on that. At one point, I did figure out how to root it, but I couldn’t seem to figure out how to make it an open phone.
And anyway, while I liked the S3, I never felt as comfortable on it as I did with the Galaxy Nexus (I guess I am doing a small review after all).
The out of the box keyboard isn’t that great. As opposed the the nexus one. Typing on the S3 was never as good as I would have hoped.
The one feature on the the Galaxy Nexus which I loved was no home button. The S3 sports the center button whereas the Galaxy Nexus didn’t have one.
So I Sold It
The other day, I posted the Galaxy S3 on craigslist so I could sell it. I think I made a nice ad:
But it wasn’t getting picked up as quick as I would have liked. I had a few inquiries, but I couldn’t tell if they were a scam or not. And I have had those kind of experiences on craigslist before. I wasn’t interested in getting taken for a ride on this one.
Since I already ordered the Nexus 4 but there was a 1-2 week shipping delay, which totally sucks.
Why Wait! I Will Improvise
I figured, no biggie, I will just tough it out with another random phone in the meantime. The only 2 I have are my old blackberry curve, and my incredibly broken screen droid incredible. I opted to use the Blackberry and dear Lord that was a MASSIVE mistake.
Honestly, I can’t even begin to tell you how lost I feel without pretty much everything at my fingertips (which is sad, I admit it). I distinctly remember how back in the day, I LOVED my blackberry. I mean, I loved it so much that I almost didn’t buy the droid incredible. But I did and never looked back. Since then, I have pretty much integrated my entire life onto my mobile device. Not having it available is like forgetting a basic necessity in life (which feels a little pathetic, I admit it again). But that’s the situation. I know people that can testify to this because they have personally seen how flustered it makes me.
Silver Lining
Back on this Blackberry makes me remember what life was like before smartphones (stop calling me pathetic already, I get it!). When I was a boy, Blackberry WAS the only smartphone. I can’t help but feel slightly embarrassed and technologically inept when I noticed this in my email signatures:
I imagine that the new Blackberry is much better (I am happy to test it out and prove myself right if you want me to Blackberry), but to me, its just fascinating how outdated this technology has become. It’s hard to use, doesn’t sync well with all the Google products I have, and its not nearly as intuitive as I remember it being.
I suppose I could use this to recalibrate my life and help bring me back to a point where I wasn’t nearly as dependent on it, and don’t get stressed when I want to put a photo on Facebook but realize the camera is horrendous.
We will see how this goes, and you know me, I will probably be vocal on what I decide to do. Bottom line is this, I see 1 of 2 options right now… well maybe 3. Either my brother in law lends me his old droid phone, or I am going back to the broken Droid incredible. I suppose the 3rd option is to just ride out this blackberry situation and learn a lesson from it.
Lets see how long I can last. Right now, I don’t think I can take this curve for another second!