Consumer Reports: iPhone bests Pre, BlackBerry
Apple's recently released iPhone 3GS pulled out a victory in Consumer Reports' latest smartphone showdown.
(Credit:
Apple)
In handing the iPhone the top spot in this year's smartphone list, Consumer Reports on Wednesday praised the iPhone 3GS for its "superior display, reinforced by top-notch multimedia, navigation, Web browsing, and battery life." However, the iPhone didn't win in all of the categories.
Consumer Reports gave high marks to the Palm Pre and BlackBerry for their messaging functionality. The organization also praised the Pre as a "superior multitasker" for its "deck-of-cards handling of multiple applications."
In light of the changing features and needs of the smartphone category, Consumer Reports changed some of the criteria for this year's showdown. The changes helped some older phones--like the iPhone 3G--move up in the rankings, while other phones--like the Samsung Blackjack II and BlackBerry Pearl Flip--dropped due to the changes.
Changes include putting more emphasis on things like the display, navigation, multimedia, and messaging, while putting less of an emphasis on features such as talk time and voice quality.
It's unclear how the iPhone 3GS would have rated, had MMS messaging been available from AT&T at the time of the tests. AT&T said functionality would be available sometime this summer.
The full report is available to Consumer Reports subscribers.
Jim Dalrymple has followed Apple and the Mac industry for the last 15 years, first as part of MacCentral and then in various positions at Macworld. A guitar player for 20 years, Jim also writes about the professional audio market, examining the best ways to write and record songs on a Macintosh with Logic Pro and Pro Tools. Jim is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. 
Something to do with the data networks, at least that's what the cell companies say...
That's a little convoluted to be reliable. Also, I don't have a Pre.. I just read about this limitation as was surprised... I would have purchased one, but refuse to by a smart phone that can't do what it needs to do reliably. This is no different than me taking on my Nokia and using my iPod touch to check my email.. I can do that on a $30 family plan without having to pay $299 for a pre.. and watching the thing fall apart at the seems while I wait 10-14 weeks for my $100 rebate.
Jester.. it's not a limitation on all cell phones. This is a network limitation. AT&T does not have this limitation.. and capable phones (iPhone... etc) are able to do this without issues.
For Palm to bill their phone as a true multitasking phone.. and use a limited carrier seems silly. Maybe I'm wrong.. .but
Jester_Paul: it is not a limitation of all cellphones, but of the network the phone is attached to. You can't do simultaneous voice and data over a CDMA network like that of Sprint or Verizon. This was the main thing that annoyed me with the EDGE-only iPhone, as that too had the same limitation.
Put it this way, Verizon knows to put limits on the phones so they don't let people know the limits of the network until they fix it and start allowing the additional features. They want people to get broadband cards and limit the choices of smartphones. CDMA is a huge network and reaches father than GSM, but Verizon needs to work on it more. They are probably holding off until the 700Mhz 4G band is up and running. Until then, we wait.
I know iPhone suck when I can't pandora while surfing the web. But not being able to talk while checking email is even worse.
that wont be a problem anymore !
hopefully Palm wises up and starts offering the pre on all networks !
I mean they have $30 contract cheapo phones the support MMS.
Still not available till later this year.
And it took 3 OS versions to get this feature? I'm sorry but their is no excuse for that.
So how about the fact that the Pre cant do video recording or message forwards ?
30$ el cheapos can do those things too !
I guess that since the iPhone can now do these, that isnt important anymore
wats sad though is that the haters are running out of stuff
oh well you always have the Virtual keyboard and camera to ***** about !
Id much rather be abe to Open emails and webpages while also doing Navigation for FREE monthy all at the same time.ATT and Iphoney can not do all this at the same time.Also the battery life on the PRE is at least as good as the Iphoney with the standard battery. Consumer Reports is way off base as usual,yu can get already a 1350mah battery for the PRE and soon Seido wil make a 1500mah battery that wil double the battery life of the Iphoney. How you like them apples.Oh by the way the 1350 battery is less then $15 and the 1500 wil be less then $25..How much extra is the extra batteryfor the Iphoney?For that matter how much extra is insurance of the Iphoney if you wanted it? OH you can't have either I forgot. You FANBOYS realy suck,but that is the general attitude of most APPLES users!! MAC has such a small % of the computer market but you stil talk smack and though PRE has such a small market now you don't want to give them the same FREEDOM OF SPEECH. Damn APPLES users sound a lot like Nazi's or just typical hypocritical bigots ,not wanting to give the same rights to others that don't agree with them or think like them. HOW SAD!! BTW I don't even have to get a PRE to know that it is at last as good. I have Played with it and have a good friend that has it so I know what it can do and know that a lot of what you HATERS are spewing are lies...I am not fanboy like you either as I want all phones to succeed and even like the Omnia and the Touch Pro 2 which looks awesome but you won't have to be stuck with such a broken over priced network like Apples phoneys are stuck with.
Your statement only applies to the U.S. market. I believe Rogers in Canada already has MMS available for the iPhone. So does Softbank in Japan. As others have said, the lack of MMS in this country is not the fault of Apple in the least.
Sincerely,
ckhdipsh1t
BTW, people always complained about the iPod not having an FM tuner. After all, even cheap Creative mp3 players had an FM tuner. Somehow, judging by the fact the AT&T had the best sales ever for the iPhone 3GS, apparently MMS isn't really an important feature for most people.
I have never ever use SMS ... why can't u just send an email or twit?
Even a lot of Iphone users would call a person an idiot that says something like that. hmmm considering a sms is so much quicker then emai and generally you want to send it to one person.I have no clue why you wouldnt be a **** and twit it.
Let's have an iphone fanboy rant about how Palm and Blackberry fanboys will rant about how CR is biased, uninformed or otherwise deficient.
Why has nobody said the pre has a girly name and a girly looks. It is not for Men!
Who the hell surfs on the web and talks on the phone at the same time?
If the phone cannot browse the web/use email when on a voice call when it is released on GSM networks later this year in Europe & Australia, then complain. The Pre's multitasking capabilities are still pretty slick.
if you were using a bluetooth headset and the person you're talking to says "go to X website and check this out..." and you were doing it while talking to him, you'd likely be on here saying "who the hell DOESN'T use this feature?"
without bluetooth, or speaker, I'd imagine it to be very hard to surf the web and talk on the phone at the same time, especially with proximity sensor turning off the screen ;)
the GSM pre heading to U.K soon wont have that problem
and will hopefully make it's way onto T-mobile someday
Maybe I'm just old school, but when did voice quality and talk time start taking a backseat to multimedia, display, and navigation? But I guess apple forever changed the smart phone business when the first iphone launched lacking basic phone features and still rocketed to the top of the must have list of consumers.
I must say that you are old school. No offence. :)
I'm not young either, but even I find myself spending a lot more time sending/receiving mail/SMS on my phone than making/receiving phone calls. I can handle mail/text without bothering my fellow bus riders. I can also read mail/text when I've got the time to unlke phone calls, which you may receive when you're busy. :)
install the same exact windshield on Bentley and Camry, and ask 100 people which one is made of higher quality glass, and 99, if not all 100, will say the one on Bentley.
And the ones who do not agree with be harrassed ;)"
Ahhh...did someone get called out for spewing constant BS??
ummmm.. Nice Kool-Aid post Clive... take another drink, it'll be better soon..."
I agree 100%. Contradiction seems to be his/her middle name.
A phone's primary purpose is communications. Voice, and more recently, data. So, doesn't putting more weight on things like "display" and "multimedia" kind of defeat the purpose? I mean, it doesn't matter how good "Bleach Blond BImbos from Hell" looks on your iPhone if you can't hear the person on the other end of the line.
When it comes right down to it, I want my phone to have good voice quality and battery life. The fact that it can play videos is a nice, but limited-use benefit.
coudnt do things a el cheapo 20$ could do
but now when it comes to the Pre all of a sudden it doesn't matter anymore
the Pre can't record video
cant forward messages
multiple delete emails or sms messages
no voice dialing , no voice memos even with apps store SDK wont allow it !
crippled copy and paste
universal search isn't so universal
no onscreen keyboard for landscape browsing !
Don't get me wrong the pre is a great phone that I'm a fan of
but I smell double standard
That's why Microsoft still doesn't have an app store up and running, for example. That's why many of the handset makers still do billing through the telcos or paypal instead of directly. That's why Palm still hasn't released an SDK. People are surprised that the iPhone is still missing various "features." Big whoop. All those missing features haven't prevented the iPhone from becoming a >$5 Billion per year cash cow for Apple which did not even exist a little more than two years ago.
Google, Sony, Microsoft, Palm and Nokia can only dream of Apple's profits on the iPhone and all they seem to compete with is more useless features instead of simply making a device that is actually enjoyable to use.
But I do wish Palm would succeed, because it seems to have the best OS outside of Apple and I would much rather have the Palm OS then my current crap LG OS.
So now they want to save themselves with the Pre, and all is forgiven because it's not an iPhone. But Palm's been run so badly for so long, why are we expecting them to fix the Pre shortcomings any time soon? History tells us they will screw up the Pre over time, too.
- by justinpe July 3, 2009 12:01 AM PDT
- @ Maxwell Studly
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- by wmurch3 July 4, 2009 6:49 PM PDT
- yeah and thank god for that
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- by Notaphonegeek July 6, 2009 12:50 PM PDT
- Maxwell. Sprints plans more expensive? I dont think so. I have the everything family data, 5 phones (3 of which are now pre's) With my 15% discount I get 5 phones 1500 anytime, free mobile to mobile, nights and weekends starting at 6pm, Sprint Navigator and Sprint Family Locator (great option with 3 kids), free mobile to mobile with anyone on the sprint/nextel network, insurance on all 5 phones, free Sprint TV, youtube, my son has downloaded over 300 of his songs from ITunes to his pre and I could go on. I pay a grand total of about 205$ a month. Not too shabby considering my buddy has the new iphone 3gs and pays about the same for 2 phones with texting.
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (90 Comments)Who needs Pandora when you have 32GB to fill up with music?
Oh yeah, someone who only has an 8GB phone and enjoys burning through 4 batteries in a day. The iPhone can download from itunes (songs tv shows & movies) on the go. The iPhone can control music from within any app by double clicking the home button. The iPhone has a TV out option, so you can watch your movies/shows/podcasts on any TV, anywhere. The Pre has none of these things.
The only advantage the Pre has is "multi-tasking", as you call it. This basically boils down to being able to listen to Pandora while simultaneously accessing other apps, which, as stated before, drains your battery really fast and the quality is not as good as an MP3. There are about 12 apps available for the Pre while there are tens of thousands available for the iPhone. The only "multi-tasking" you do on your Pre right now involves the core apps (which the iPhone does) or pandora (which sucks for the reasons stated above).
I could go on about how the Copy/Paste on the Pre is horribly crippled (try copying text from a web site), or how the screen is plastic and scratches easily, or how it can't access a data network while on a call, or how expensive Sprint's family plans are, or how the Pre has no "find my phone" feature, or how it can't record video, or how it doesn't have voice control (only voice dialing), or how the pre has no autofocus camera, or how you have to go through an annoying rebate process, or how it has a smaller screen, or how it has no on-screen keyboard, or... I think you get the point.
Don't get me wrong, the Pre is a great device, but is certainly no iPhone.
As for battery issues, yes they could be better for my son but it works all day long for my wife and I with about 20% battery power at the end of the day. My son will usually have to recharge around 6 or 7pm because he is constantly listening to music, texting, and on Myspace and facebook all at the same time! I dont know where you get 4 batteries in a day, but we have 3 pre's in my family and at least 2 of us make it with 1 charge in a day (Do you have one that uses 4?). As for the rebate? Best Buy doesnt make you pay the rebate (trust me I know).
It's funny because I found this site looking for info on my phone, and all I hear are zombies bashing the pre. The iphone is a great phone, the competition makes them better. How many apps did the 1st gen Iphone have? I'm not a phone geek, but I heard they had none. As for the camera it takes great pics and even has a flash. By the way, my friend with the iphone?... Well he loves the real keyboard that the pre has, as do I. I tried his iphones keyboard and hated it. Sorry dont need video or skype, but from what I heard gen 2 of the pre will have it and more apps will be coming this summer, but really? How many do you actually need or use? My buddy says hes wasted more money on apps he never uses. No "find my phone feature"? Whats that? My pre has sprint family locator and I can find it if I lose it. If you mean physically locating where you are at? The pre will do that plus tell me where the cheapest gas is and navigate me there as well as restaurants, theaters (buy my tix). WIFI works great, I just cant see why you zombies bash the pre?
The bottom line is that they are both great phones, just different. Oh, the pre is no iphone, but the iphone is certainly not a pre. Oh and BTW, AT&T is a good phone company, but it's no Sprint. Maybe that's why Sprint treats me so good now? You see I had AT&T for 5 years, hated it and then switched to Sprint. I have now had Sprint/Nextel for 10 years and I admit, I almost left because of the service problems during the merger. But now? Sprint bends over backwards to make you happy (they still have some glitches). I'm happy you like your Iphone and AT&T, enjoy it while I enjoy my pre. I'm willing to put my bill up against anyone elses plan anyday. Just think about it, 5 phones for around 205$ with all I have. I'm pretty happy (even without a video camera).
I got your point, do you get mine?