Is WP8 a better choice?

[Liam Perry]

I'm about to jump from prepaid to a plan. Android is infuriatingly complicated and I cannot put up with my Motorola any longer.

I've narrowed it down to two options.
The Nokia Lumia 925 for $58 p/month
or the Blackberry Z10 for $55 p/month
$3 difference between the two.

I love the design of the 925, but I have my reservations about battery life and apps on wp8.
On the other hand, from what I've heard BB10 has excellent battery life, and lets you install android apps? Spec wise and price wise there isnt much separating the two handsets.

Is there anything that really makes the Nokia stand out? Is WP8 a good OS for productivity and music? If you had to choose which would you recommend?

 

[gsquared]

BB is a dead-end platform in my opinion. You would be much better served by going with WP.

 

[crash1989]

925 advantages IMO over Z10
1. Design
2. Camera
3. beautiful design of wp8, you might get apps of android for Z10, but are they as good as wp8 apps. Completely unto you to see the beauty
4. Dolby equalizer and audio settings for music, xbox music and Nokia music are huuuugggggeee plus. Better than Z10 in that area
5. Microsoft office, onenote,skype, skydrive. lync etc... and a many third party stuff like teamviewer, webapps etc ... are all there for productivity.
6. Nokia apps are some of the best in Mobile industry with their HERE suite and lumia centric apps. Nokia is working like crazy on windows phone and this is really good for wp.

and since I love wp I recommend 925 over most devices including Z10.

 

[spaulagain]

The Android apps that are ported over to BB are horrible. Just look it up online. Its just a marketing catch, "we got these apps." But the experience is bad.

WP is getting a lot better with apps. If you are worried about apps, just use Microsoft's app that checks for AP equivalents on your current phone to WP.

 

[tk-093]

I'm going back and forth between the 928 and the Z10 (we are starting to replace old BBs with BB10s so I'm using one to be familiar with it.) WP8 blows BB10 away in regards with ease of use... blows it away... not even close.

Battery wise.. I know I have the 928 and not the 925, but the 928 lasts me the entire day as does the Z10. The Q10 has good battery life because the screen is much smaller, and the Z10 just started to get good battery life with some updates... when it launched it was rotten.

 

[raacut]

It comes down to *basic* phone functionality.

Screen Orientation Lock,
Notification Centre,
Sound Profiles,
LED Notification,
customizable tones for IMs (viber, whatsapp etc)
functional Facebook app that actually gives you notifications,
universal phone search,
a way to search text messages,
A way to kill apps directly ( you have to keep pressing the back button to exit an app in WP8)

The Z10 has them , WP8 does not.

The romance with live tiles and the UI will last about a month.
Then you will realize that WP8 is miles behind the competition and simple basic features are missing. I made a mistake with my contract when I got Lumia 920. It never crossed my mind to research whether the phone would have the above said features as I took them for granted.......

 

[11B1P]

It comes down to *basic* phone functionality.

Screen Orientation Lock,
Notification Centre,
Sound Profiles,
LED Notification,
customizable tones for IMs (viber, whatsapp etc)
functional Facebook app that actually gives you notifications,
universal phone search,
a way to search text messages,
A way to kill apps directly ( you have to keep pressing the back button to exit an app in WP8)

The Z10 has them , WP8 does not.

The romance with live tiles and the UI will last about a month.
Then you will realize that WP8 is miles behind the competition and simple basic features are missing. I made a mistake with my contract when I got Lumia 920. It never crossed my mind to research whether the phone would have the above said features as I took them for granted.......

These issues are personal issues. Not everyone will feel the same.

Screen lock - could be useful, I agree.
Notification Center - never had one to use, so I don't miss it.
Sound profiles - that was handy on BB, I could use it on WP, but it is not a deal breaker for me.
Customizable tones - don't use Viber, whatsapp, so no opinion.
Facebook notification are getting better, but in reality, is that important in the scheme of life? I have more important things to focus on.
Universal phone search - eh, possibly could be useful, again not a deal breaker for me.
Search Text messages - again not a deal breaker for me.
Killing apps - for the millionth time, in WP it is not necessary to "kill" the app. Hit the windows button and be done with it. Unlike the other OS's, the apps go into a suspended state and eventually roll off as you open other programs. This is one of the best features of the OS that makes it superior to the others.

 

[khunhorm]

I would prefer Nokia over BlackBerry anytime. But @raacut has very valid points.

 

[raacut]

@11B1P

Each one of the things I mentioned on their own arent too bad . But combined it becomes one big thing.

 

[MerlinJnr]

WP8 - Native social media integration. Me and People apps are ace. OS stability. Nokia camera, SkyDrive, xbox integration, xbox music, Nokia music. These functions are more favorable to me that the *basics* mentioned earlier. I think, only the lack of notification center is a minor issue for me.

 

[FinancialP]

Nothing is a better choice, its all subjective.

Ask this question on crackberry and youll be amazed at the comments you get supporting blackberry.

Just like some people on this site promote Office for windows phone without knowing that options exist on other platforms.

Better is whatever YOU like, not what WE on the internet like.

 

[crash1989]

Well the OP asked about Music and Productivity in WP , I think having Office, Nokia Music, xbox music etc .. increases the value prop.

 

[hopmedic]

These issues are personal issues. Not everyone will feel the same.

Screen lock - could be useful, I agree.
Notification Center - never had one to use, so I don't miss it.
Sound profiles - that was handy on BB, I could use it on WP, but it is not a deal breaker for me.
Customizable tones - don't use Viber, whatsapp, so no opinion.
Facebook notification are getting better, but in reality, is that important in the scheme of life? I have more important things to focus on.
Universal phone search - eh, possibly could be useful, again not a deal breaker for me.
Search Text messages - again not a deal breaker for me.
Killing apps - for the millionth time, in WP it is not necessary to "kill" the app. Hit the windows button and be done with it. Unlike the other OS's, the apps go into a suspended state and eventually roll off as you open other programs. This is one of the best features of the OS that makes it superior to the others.

I cannot thank you enough... I am so tired of hearing the same whine over and over and over...... When someone says, "*basic*" now, after that all I can hear is Charlie Brown's teacher.

 

[iamtim]

It comes down to *basic* phone functionality.

Things like screen orientation lock, notification centers, sound profiles, and Facebook apps are not "*basic* phone functionality". They're personal preferences. For instance, I think a notification center is useless; I have it turned off on my iPhone. Those things may be important - even crucial - to you, but don't confuse your preferences for basic functionality.

 

[iamtim]

Things like screen orientation lock, notification centers, sound profiles, and Facebook apps are not "*basic* phone functionality". They're personal preferences. For instance, I think a notification center is useless; I have it turned off on my iPhone. Those things may be important - even crucial - to you, but don't confuse your preferences for basic functionality.

Looks like I was late to the party on that one. Sorry for the redundancy.

 

[thomas wojcik]

Buy a 520\521, use it for a month or 2. If you don't like it, sell it for a minimal loss. Or if you may just like it and keep it. Try that with a BB.

 

[anon5657577]

Well.. you're asking on a Windows Phone fan site so 99.9% of the responses you will get are already biased and will tell you BlackBerry is rubbish.

For me however.. I think BlackBerry beats the 925 considering the basic functionality that every phone has except Windows Phone.. so yes, they are basic features. A lot of these people who knock the notification center for instance.. I'm sure loads of them came from either BB, IOS or Android and you can be sure as hell they had no problem with BB's universal Inbox, Androids Notification Center or IOS's Notification center. If they did have a problem then they had the choice of disabling them. On Windows Phone guess what... no choice but yet they go on about how that is how it should be. Even when clearly.. majority of Windows Phone users actually do want it.

Also.. when they tell you the Android apps run rubbish on BB10... DO NOT BELIEVE THEM. On BB you can get the real Instagram and not an imitation/3rd party you have to pay for just to do basic stuff like upload a picture which all other platforms do for free. The andriod app's that run on BB run brilliantly for the most part but no doubt some are slow and laggy but thats down to the app and they run just like they do on Android phones.. maybe a little slower. Having said that, a lot of the apps that were android ports in BB World are being built into native ones already so you have nothing to fear. The z10 battery is brilliant too ..as long as you don't have some rogue app draining the battery.

BB does messaging, gaming and multimedia just as good as any other phone so, you go try them out for yourself and try not to get sucked into the biased suggestions you would obviously get here.

 

[iamtim]

the biased suggestions you would obviously get here

And they should listen to your obviously unbiased suggestions, Mr. BlackBG (of course, not a tip of the hat to BlackBerry in any way) who has 6 total posts here, 4 of which extole BlackBerry in the first line?

 

[a5cent]

Saying that WP lacks a notification center is also somewhat misleading. The start screen ?is? the notification centre!

For the overwhelming majority of people the start screen handles notifications just fine, but situations can arise where it isn't enough.

If you want more details, you can find posts on WPC explaining the difficulties with notifications and the start screen.

 

[mase123987]

OP, let me clear some things up. I am a proud 920 owner, as well as a proud Z10 owners.

One post said they though BB was a dead platform. I think BB will be fine, at least for the length of time you will own the phone. I would not worry about the.

Apps-WP is def. better in this area. BB is in the situation that WP was back around early Spring of 2012. They have some big name apps, but a lot are missing. To those that say that all apps that are just ported from Android to BB are crap, they are wrong. There are def. some examples of crap, but I could just as easily find native WP apps that are horrible.

As far as sideloading Android apps, it is harder than you would think. You have to first get the APK file from somewhere (there are ways of getting them from the Play Store. You then have to use a program to convert them to a BAR file (which first requires getting a token directly from BB). Then you have to use another program to install it on your BB phone. I found apps that I sideloaded took longer to load at first, but then ran just fine. Currently, only Android apps compatible with Android 2.3.3 and below will work with BB. If they require a higher version, you will have to wait for BB10.2 (official current release is 10.1). There are other limitations as well. Bluetooth, for example, won't work with apps you sideloaded.

Ease of use - BB10 is def. harder to learn that WP, but not hard. It has a different flow than the other OSes. Once you get the basics it isn't hard at all. I actually prefer the way it does some things with swipe gestures compared to buttons.

Music - WP is better considering you can use a lot of the different music services plus Xbox music. That said, I do believe you can use Google Music through the browser on the Z10 (though obviously that isn't a perfect solution by any means).

Browser - Z10 kills WP for one reason: built in Flash support. I am not one of those people who believe that Flash is worthless. For example, I don't think any platform has a good Justin.tv app. They all suffer from problems. The Z10 is the only phone I can use Justin.TV from the website which is a better experience. Also, Amazon Instant Video works extremely well though the Z10 browser because of Flash. WP can't use the service at all because of no app or Flash. When it comes to video based apps, the Z10 can make up for a lot of them that are missing because of this one feature.

Camera - 925 will destroy the Z10.

Keyboard - Really good on either phone.

Multitasking - Z10 is the winner. With true multitasking (all apps are actually still running compared to WP), switching between is a lot easier. BB10 also puts open apps more in the forefront by turning the multitask selection page into the homepage.

Microsoft integration - Obviously WP is significantly easier and more powerful for this. I would say though that the z10 is better if you use a lot of Google services.

As far as the posts that talk about missing "basic features" on WP, they are missing, but are only "basic" to some people. It really comes down to what works for you. No need for me to go into each one.

It really is going to come down to what you use your phone for.

Click here to check out my review of the Z10 to get further details.