new smartphone: iphone or android ?

[Asrian]

Hi,
I plan to buy a smartphone and would like to ask You:

As of today, if You don't own a smartphone yet, would You, as a private pilot, prefer to buy an iphone or a phone with the android OS?

With these points in mind:
-reliability and stability of the GPS
-availability of useful apps for private pilots
-battery endurance
-web surfing, checking weather forecasts etc

(I don't care about the camera functions...)

What would You recommend and why?

[gyrotyro]

Buy an iphone and install this app it is brilliant for navigation...


Air Navigation Pro (http://www.i-flyte.com/?page_id=1439)

[RTN11]

I have the HTC desire on android, and the GPS is great, the browser is fine for TAFS METARS and NOTAMS, but there are plenty of apps too.

Battery life is abysmal though, particularly when using GPS together with 3G or WiFi connection.

[dan_vector]

Definitely the iPhone 4! My father had the HTC on android and didn't really get on with it for a range of reasons he has recently swapped it for an iPhone.

There are so many useful free apps for the iPhone on the app store. The ones I use in particular are AeroWeather, NOTAMs, Logten Pro, Air Nav, Memory map to mention but a few. All are really easy to use and being an apple product it has the intuitive user interface you become accustomed to!

I'm sure both phones have their pros and cons but for me the iPhone wins hands down.

[Proteus9]

I'd reccomend an android phone, as they aren't crippled the way that apple does. I think alot of it comes down to wether you find alot of the google software more useable to you or you prefer mac stuff. I'm quite happy running google mytracks to record my local bimbles in the background whilst multasking my other apps.

Iphones have the edge on style, they are a super looking phone. However, I'd be more worried about them actively not honouring their warranty if the phone has been used below 0 C

[IO540]

An Iphone 4 has real street cred, a great screen, a very good GPS (when on the ground), but is severely crippled in annoying ways.

However I don't think any of the smartphones are much good as phones. The best phone ever was the Nokia 6310i :)

Everything else is a compromise...

Basically any smartphone with a readable screen will do www access and you can get weather etc on that.

[englishal]

I have an andriod HTC and I wouldn't swap it for an iPhone due to apples software and the way they like to use their own sim card size. I won't buy an Ipad, cool though they are, for that reason. I'll get a Google tablet thing when they come out because as Adroid is open source, there are TONS of apps for it (for free) and it will work with everything (like Macromedia Flash, which apple doesn't 'do')....

[W2k]

iPhone seems to have a better selection of apps for pilots at the moment (this is likely to change as Android-based phones continue to dominate the market). That said I have found plenty of nice and free Android apps for stuff like weather, NOTAMs and flight planning.

Disregarding apps, Android phones, of which I've mostly used HTC's, are superior in pretty much every other aspect. I would recommend the HTC Desire HD. One important point against the iPhone for aviation use is that it is very temperature sensitive. It will overheat if exposed to direct sunlight for any prolonged period of time and the warranty does not cover use below zero degrees C. (There is at least one PPRUNe thread about this if you care to search)

As an additional argument against Apple, they have a history of extremely anti-consumerist behaviour which continues to this day. From banning any apps that are considered the tiniest bit controversial, to using special screws in their devices to keep independent repair shops or private individuals from performing repairs (replacing the battery in an iPhone4 is NOT straightforward compared to any HTC phone!) ... I would not buy anything with an Apple logo on it until this behaviour changes, if ever.

[sternone]

No question, the iphone. Changed my life and the world. I used to travel with a laptop, not anymore, the iphone 4 will do the trick.

Funny that all of the so called problems about the iphone are reported by people who don't have one. I had zero problems in my planes. ZERO.

Stable, fast, and a gazillion applications, nothing beats the original.

[englishal]

One thing I like about Android is it is essentially Google. This might apply to the Iphone too, I don't know, but one day I was lost in London and looking for the station. So I logon to Android Market and download Google Maps Navigation. It gave me turn by turn walking direction to the station, and you can even use the street and satellite view on it. Bloody amazing for free.

If you are an amateur software developer, you can download the Android SDK and make your own apps. It is easy to make simple stuff like W&B programs etc...My buddy is a software developer and develop Iphone apps, he had to buy a Mac.

You're more likely to see professional software developers develop professional apps for Android than you are the Apple software IMHO because it is open source.

{Though saying that, if you happen to live in the USA you'd be better off with an Ipad as there is a load of aviation software over there for it.}

[IO540]

I wonder what European flight planning apps people are running on smartphones.

Navbox, Skydemon and Flitestar are windoze only. There is no sign whatever of any of these being ported to Apple or Android.

There is nothing else for Europe that I know of - unless you are happy with a US app which contains some Euro waypoints and you can knock up a wind corrected plog with it. Years ago I used Copilot (on a PDA) like that; it was OK but there were no maps and if flying with GPS it didn't really offer anything useful.

I have an Iphone 4 here (not mine) and it makes a perfectly usable - for the screen size, anyway - web browser, so one can do the usual weather / notam / FP filing stuff on it because all of that is nowadays just websites. As indeed one can do with any other smartphone with a decent size screen. The fancy finger gestures are not necessary; I was doing all this just the same with a 4" Pocket/PC PDA with a stylus, 6 years ago (except one could not file flight plans over the www back then).

In that usage mode, a smartphone "can" do "all" a travelling pilot needs.

Personally though I find a 4" device a hassle. The browser font on the Iphone can't be changed in size (which is stupid, though I can understand the marketing reasons for that) and I need reading glasses to read it, whereas a lightweight laptop running winXP works a lot better for me, and runs absolutely everything straight out of the box.

Whether a smartphone can do everything else you need outside flying depends on your lifestyle. For me, the Iphone is packed with irritation. It cannot print (except in an extremely narrow context) and cannot even print to a PDF, which I do all the time. The only way to get stuff "out of it" is to email it to somebody, which is a hassle if you like to fly with the primary data printed out. Most hotels will print stuff for you but you have to get it out of the "thing" somehow :)

[RatherBeFlying]

Android is outselling Apple and is set to overtake it in total phones; so, the app developers will in time be motivated to port their iPhone offerings to Android.

I am personally looking at the Motorola Atrix. However it
is coming out with Android 2.2; so, the first question is your carrier's support for OS upgrades as they become available.

If you are happy to stay within Apple's restricted proprietary environment and are happy with their restrictions of app developers, iPhone can and does work well.

Note that software with the GNU GPL has been barred from Apple's app marketplace:mad:

[PompeyPaul]

I think "Religion, good or bad?" as a question would probably have got slightly less polarised opinions!

I went iPhone, but I've got an Android tablet. Both have strengths and weaknesses, on balance I prefer the iPhone but you could buy either and they'd be fine.

[PotentialPilot]

Iphone 4

Blackberry Torch is latest device to try and keep up, still not as good though
:)

[LH2]

IPhone? Android? Bah!

Give us a Psion Organiser any day :ok:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b4/Psion_Organiser_2.gif/180px-Psion_Organiser_2.gif

British made and all!

[IO540]

I had one of those... sold it on Ebay not so long ago. It made a good RS232 comms analyser. Didn't have VT100 emulation though ;)

[Asrian]

Thanks for Your replies! Looks like as of today, the Iphone has the better selection of apps for private pilots. Would be cool to have Air Nav Pro for Android. I recently stumbled upon the Samsung Galaxy 7'' tablet with Android 2.2. Could be a good compromise between a phone and a pad/Notebook.

Is the quality of the GPS on all devices equal / good enough, stable etc? Or did You encounter any GPS problems during flight?

[liam548]

I wonder what European flight planning apps people are running on smartphones.

Navbox, Skydemon and Flitestar are windoze only. There is no sign whatever of any of these being ported to Apple or Android.

There is nothing else for Europe that I know of - unless you are happy with a US app which contains some Euro waypoints and you can knock up a wind corrected plog with it. Years ago I used Copilot (on a PDA) like that; it was OK but there were no maps and if flying with GPS it didn't really offer anything useful.

I have an Iphone 4 here (not mine) and it makes a perfectly usable - for the screen size, anyway - web browser, so one can do the usual weather / notam / FP filing stuff on it because all of that is nowadays just websites. As indeed one can do with any other smartphone with a decent size screen. The fancy finger gestures are not necessary; I was doing all this just the same with a 4" Pocket/PC PDA with a stylus, 6 years ago (except one could not file flight plans over the www back then).

In that usage mode, a smartphone "can" do "all" a travelling pilot needs.

Personally though I find a 4" device a hassle. The browser font on the Iphone can't be changed in size (which is stupid, though I can understand the marketing reasons for that) and I need reading glasses to read it, whereas a lightweight laptop running winXP works a lot better for me, and runs absolutely everything straight out of the box.

Whether a smartphone can do everything else you need outside flying depends on your lifestyle. For me, the Iphone is packed with irritation. It cannot print (except in an extremely narrow context) and cannot even print to a PDF, which I do all the time. The only way to get stuff "out of it" is to email it to somebody, which is a hassle if you like to fly with the primary data printed out. Most hotels will print stuff for you but you have to get it out of the "thing" somehow :)


Im pretty sure there are ways to print from smartphone, via bluetooth cable or even over a net connection with web printers.

[duncan_bayne]

+1 to the Psion Organiser ... all you need to be happy is a Z80 and a copy of Zaks. (Wow, I'm getting old ...)

Seriously, I own an HTC Desire and I'm very happy with it. To my mind, one of the major advantages is that HTC doesn't have a paranoid desire to control what you do with your phone.

If you want to install apps from something other than the official Android Market, you just have to check a box. And at least on my Telstra-supplied Desire, that box was checked by default :)

This (humorous) video pretty much sums it up: YouTube - iPhone4 vs HTC Evo (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL7yD-0pqZg)

[tmmorris]

Intended to solve some of the GPS problems of the iPhone:

GNS 5870 MFI GPS Bluetooth Receiver for iPad (http://www.transair.co.uk/sp+GNS-5870-MFI-GPS-Bluetooth-Receiver-for-iPhone+1774)

Reviewed in Flyer last month, I think.

I'm thinking seriously about this sort of solution as I need to replace my Lowrance Airmap 1000 due to the stupid decision by Lowrance no longer to provide database updates. I already have an iPhone and am thinking of an iPad anyway, so the GPS addon might be all I need to get a working solution.

Tim