- Jan 20, 2011
- 1,237
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First, a little background...
Last year, on launch day, I bought an iPhone 6. I'd planned on buying the 6 Plus but decided against it last minute because I thought it was too big. The 6 was a great phone and I loved it but 9 months later, I bought a Galaxy 6 Edge just to try for 14 days because it was just so beautiful and interesting. Well, it lasted an hour before I switched back and wanted to throw it in the garbage but because I paid full retail in cash, the store didn't have enough cash to give me back the full sum of what I paid and though the manager extended my return period indefinitely, I waited and waited and they just never had enough cash so I just decided to snag a 6 Plus instead for two reasons; I already knew I'd be happy with it (aside from the size, which was a wildcard) as I've loved all my iPhones and I also wanted to try out the size prior to the 6S launch because I knew it would be impossible to exchange a 6S Plus for a 6S or vice versa within the 14 days because as we all know, brand-new iPhones sell out for weeks, sometimes months at launch. So I loved the 6 Plus and the size was actually pretty great. I have huge hands so I was never worried about handling it but the pocket situation wasn't nearly as bad as I anticipated, so I was ready and anxious to get my hands on the 6S Plus, that is, until I played with the Note 5 while in Best Buy. I've always wanted to try a Note but since they're always released a month or so after the iPhone, I've never bought one because I'd always just bought the new iPhone. This year, however, Samsung bumped up release to a month prior, and while I thought it seemed nice enough after it was announced, it wasn't until I used it in person that I was blown away by it. The quality is near Apple territory (and it should be since they shamelessly ripped off the iPhone 6 Plus design) and the new, refined version of Touch-Wiz is actually quite nice. The S-Pen is so handy and I constantly use it, but I'm also constantly double-checking myself to make sure I'm not inserting it backwards (Google it if you don't get the reference), which, by the way, if it were an Apple phone with that issue, it'd be on the front page of every paper in the world illustrating just how big of a failure Apple has become - but that's a story in itself. All in all, after the keynote today, I will not be returning the Note. When I bought it, I never expected to keep it, just give it a try since I'd never tried one before. However, it has knocked my expectations out of this world. The only two big drawbacks are the lack of native iTunes syncing because every last bit of my media is in iTunes and the second, possibly bigger drawback, is that the $700+ Watch that I just got on April 24th at 9:05am is now useless. I bought a Moto 360 to go with my Note, but it's not the same. The Apple Watch is worlds ahead of Android Wear, and that gap will only widen with the release of Watch OS 2.
So, I was just curious if anyone else is going to opt for something else this time around? While the 6 Plus and 6S Plus are phablets by nature, they don't seem to take advantage of the screen size the way the Note line does. If there's one phone that I see more people on this forum with that's used in tandem with an iPhone, it's the Note. I always thought it was probably a good phone, but now I know that it's really something special. It just makes me wish that Apple would port over some of the iPad features to the Plus line to really take advantage of the hardware. It didn't feel like as much of a missed opportunity until I got something that truly takes advantage of the larger screen, but now it's hard to oversee. The Note isn't the only other good phone or phablet out there, though, there are also great products from Moto, HTC, other Samsung phones like the Edge Plus), etc.
So, anyway, those are my thoughts and experiences. I'd like to hear from anyone else who's thinking of trying something else or from someone who has tried something else and ended up going back. I should also probably note that if I'd been using Touch Wiz instead of iOS for the past year (9 months of which was a single phone, which is the longest I've ever used a phone without switching), then this story would be reserved. My thoughts about the particulars of the OS's would remain, but I wouldn't be able to use Touch Wiz for that long either without a change. So it isn't that Apple really did anything horrible to lose me, I just needed a changed and noted a few things along the way.
Last year, on launch day, I bought an iPhone 6. I'd planned on buying the 6 Plus but decided against it last minute because I thought it was too big. The 6 was a great phone and I loved it but 9 months later, I bought a Galaxy 6 Edge just to try for 14 days because it was just so beautiful and interesting. Well, it lasted an hour before I switched back and wanted to throw it in the garbage but because I paid full retail in cash, the store didn't have enough cash to give me back the full sum of what I paid and though the manager extended my return period indefinitely, I waited and waited and they just never had enough cash so I just decided to snag a 6 Plus instead for two reasons; I already knew I'd be happy with it (aside from the size, which was a wildcard) as I've loved all my iPhones and I also wanted to try out the size prior to the 6S launch because I knew it would be impossible to exchange a 6S Plus for a 6S or vice versa within the 14 days because as we all know, brand-new iPhones sell out for weeks, sometimes months at launch. So I loved the 6 Plus and the size was actually pretty great. I have huge hands so I was never worried about handling it but the pocket situation wasn't nearly as bad as I anticipated, so I was ready and anxious to get my hands on the 6S Plus, that is, until I played with the Note 5 while in Best Buy. I've always wanted to try a Note but since they're always released a month or so after the iPhone, I've never bought one because I'd always just bought the new iPhone. This year, however, Samsung bumped up release to a month prior, and while I thought it seemed nice enough after it was announced, it wasn't until I used it in person that I was blown away by it. The quality is near Apple territory (and it should be since they shamelessly ripped off the iPhone 6 Plus design) and the new, refined version of Touch-Wiz is actually quite nice. The S-Pen is so handy and I constantly use it, but I'm also constantly double-checking myself to make sure I'm not inserting it backwards (Google it if you don't get the reference), which, by the way, if it were an Apple phone with that issue, it'd be on the front page of every paper in the world illustrating just how big of a failure Apple has become - but that's a story in itself. All in all, after the keynote today, I will not be returning the Note. When I bought it, I never expected to keep it, just give it a try since I'd never tried one before. However, it has knocked my expectations out of this world. The only two big drawbacks are the lack of native iTunes syncing because every last bit of my media is in iTunes and the second, possibly bigger drawback, is that the $700+ Watch that I just got on April 24th at 9:05am is now useless. I bought a Moto 360 to go with my Note, but it's not the same. The Apple Watch is worlds ahead of Android Wear, and that gap will only widen with the release of Watch OS 2.
So, I was just curious if anyone else is going to opt for something else this time around? While the 6 Plus and 6S Plus are phablets by nature, they don't seem to take advantage of the screen size the way the Note line does. If there's one phone that I see more people on this forum with that's used in tandem with an iPhone, it's the Note. I always thought it was probably a good phone, but now I know that it's really something special. It just makes me wish that Apple would port over some of the iPad features to the Plus line to really take advantage of the hardware. It didn't feel like as much of a missed opportunity until I got something that truly takes advantage of the larger screen, but now it's hard to oversee. The Note isn't the only other good phone or phablet out there, though, there are also great products from Moto, HTC, other Samsung phones like the Edge Plus), etc.
So, anyway, those are my thoughts and experiences. I'd like to hear from anyone else who's thinking of trying something else or from someone who has tried something else and ended up going back. I should also probably note that if I'd been using Touch Wiz instead of iOS for the past year (9 months of which was a single phone, which is the longest I've ever used a phone without switching), then this story would be reserved. My thoughts about the particulars of the OS's would remain, but I wouldn't be able to use Touch Wiz for that long either without a change. So it isn't that Apple really did anything horrible to lose me, I just needed a changed and noted a few things along the way.
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