iPhone vs. N95: Pocket Clutter

I wore my Nokia 6620 slap out. I texted (is that a word?) so much that the letters were rubbed off and I had scratched up the screen. OK, the jump in the lake with it in my pocket didn’t help it much – even though it still made calls. So I needed a new phone. And being the trend-setter that I am, it had to something functional AND, well … special. What phone should I get?

I haven’t been on Mars, so I knew about the iPhone (http://www.apple.com/iphone/) debut. Like everyone else, I am infatuated. But in May, I also saw the Nokia N95 (http://tinyurl.com/25x9os) – I fell in love with it. It was down to these two so I spent a little time with each. Since they both cost just about the same (yeah, $700 is a lot for a phone, but what are you going to do?) I needed to consider other factors. I am carrying one of these in my pocket right now. But I’m not going to tell you which one. Instead, I am going to tell you the questions and issues that I struggled with in making my decision. It is pretty in-depth so I am only going to address one issue at a time and I am only going to cover one issue a week – that’s to keep it short and to keep you coming back. This week I am going to talk about device convergence.

And for all of you have truly have developed an almost religious zeal for either devices, I’ll ask you to hear out my points first. And if you are reading on the blog, you can leave your own comment. After you hear everything I have to say, let’s see if you can guess which one I picked.



Pocket Clutter – Or
“Is that technology in your pocket or are you just glad to see me?”
I hate carrying crap in my pockets. I have made a solemn promise that I will never wear a cellphone holster on my belt – for me that is the pocket protector on steroids and only one step away from those silly Bluetooth Borg earpieces. Here is what I carry in my pockets now: keys, wallet, pocketknife, cellphone, iPod, and a camera. Thus equipped, I am ready to meet any challenge. But I jangle like Jacob Marley dragging his chains. I want to cut down. Can some of these be merged? Keys, wallet, and pocketknife aside, can I merge music, pictures, and phone into fewer than three devices?

Music + Phone
The iPhone has an 8GB iPod. I currently carry a 60GB iPod that I love. On it I have every bit of my music, podcasts, and even a couple of (legally procured) movies. This iPod has truly changed my life because I don’t have to plan anymore. When I am in the car and want the lastest tech news, iTunes had made sure the most recent NPR podcast was downloaded onto my iPod the last time I cradled it. No more deciding which CDs to take to the lake – the iPod I carry with me has any of my songs I want to hear. And I was stuck in the Cleveland airport during a storm with no book to read, so I watched the Ken Burns documentary “Empire of the Air” – I had totally forgotten I had put that my iPod. The iPod has made it possible to carry all of your audio and most of your important video with you everywhere. No more media planning for me – with the iPod my media is with me always. Now, I am nowhere near using up all the space on my 60GM iPod, but my stuff takes up a lot more than an 8GB iPhone can hold. Right now in my iTunes Library I have about 7GB of music, 15GB of movies, about 1GB of TV (love “Desperate Housewives”), 1 GB of audiobooks, and just under 4GBs of podcasts for a total of 28GB. The biggest iPhone would only be able to hold less than a third of all my stuff. My iPhone fanatic friends tell me not to worry about it – I can set up profiles on iTunes that will determine which music to download to the iPhone and which not to move. Wait a minute, that feels a lot like deciding which CDs to put in the car. Didn’t I just say I hate managing media? So to accommodate everything, I would still need to keep both the iPhone and my indispensable iPod.
Now I am not even going to try to suggest that the N95 can combine music and phone. It isn’t an iPod. ‘Nuf said.

Pictures + Phone

Both the iPhone and the N95 have cameras, but let’s talk megapixels here. OK, don’t worry I won’t get too technical (because I barely understand it myself). Just
remember, the more megapixels the better the pictures. The iPhone has a 2 megapixel camera. Pretty good, right. I mean most camera phones are one megapixel or less. Although there is a pretty good debate running online right now about the quality of iPhone pictures, these pictures will work fairly well for showing on your phone and maybe posting to a web page – if you don’t try to enlarge them in any way. And the images wouldn’t be high enough resolution to be printed. I have gotten spoiled. I need better images. I started carrying around a digital camera about a year ago. I ran into a lot of uses for it – all in good taste, I promise. I take pictures for newsletters, presentations, and to make prints. It is quick and easy. My Canon PowerShot A540 is a 6 megapixel camera – it is small and takes great pictures. I am always amazed at how good they look when I load them to the Kodak Gallery. And since they are high resolution I can zoom in and crop the images without losing any real quality. The N95 has a 5 megapixel camera. The pictures are truly gorgeous – definitely of high enough quality to manipulate and print. Plus, the N95 has autofocus, flash, and a timer just like my Canon . And one final point, the N95 can record video – and it looks pretty good as well. The iPhone doesn’t do video. Bottom line, with the N95, I don’t need to carry the Canon with me.

So in terms of reducing clutter in Scott’s pocket, the N95 comes out on top. Next week, I will evaluate iPhone and N95 connectivity.