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Originally Posted by Usama A good media player, good camera, good screen. At the moment I have a Nokia N95. |
The HTC Magic and the iPhone 3G spring to mind instantly. The HTC Touch HD is close behind if you don't mind Windows Mobile and are prepared to work at making it work the way you want.
The N97 isn't going to be out for a while yet, so anybody with one either has a pre-production model or has broken a confidentiality agreement in leaking it. Therefore I would take any comments and recommendations about it with a large pinch of salty stuff.
Comparing the iPhone and Magic is interesting. These are two of my most recent phones and I use mine a lot for media use, so hopefully I can help here...
The iPhone has a more sophisticated interface, ala the iPod Touch. It's more touchy-feely, has cover flow and other such pretty things.
The Magic is more simplified. It has a more basic interface and isn't as fancy looking at the iPhone.
Both are just as good at getting access to your music and, if anything, I find the Magic easier as I tend to browse by Album rather than Artist, Track or Genre. It has less steps to get where I need to be.
Sound quality wise, I prefer the Magic. It has a more open feel to it, a cleaner sound. I made the comparison using the same headphones, with the only difference being the HTC ExtUSB-to-3.5mm adapter.
On that note, that's another thing to consider. Many people will bitch and moan about a lack of 3.5mm headphone socket on the Magic, but really it makes no difference. The HTC adapter is cheap and also features a play/pause button and can double up as a hands free kit. It's small and light too, so I don't see the problem with having to use it?
There isn't a lot in it really, as you can hopefully tell from my comments. I prefer the sound of the Magic and I actually like the simple interface it has. But the iPhone feels and operates like a more expensive and advanced solution. But ultimately, both deliver pretty much the same end result.
Same with the screen, you simply cannot put one above the other. Both are the same resolution and the same touch screen technology (capacitive). The iPhone is physically larger by 0.3", but the Magic has a finer dot-pitch. Pros and Cons of each... the same image displayed on both will look finer on the Magic due to the smaller dot pitch... but the iPhone has larger screen real estate.
One last thing on a functional side of the media interface.... iTunes. It's Marmite, of course. I don't mind it and still use it to keep my iPod Classic up-to-date. But others hate it with a passion. With the iPhone you're stuck with it, that's how you interact with it from your PC. With the Magic, you simply drag and drop music onto the memory card and within seconds, the media software knows about it. Just something to bear in mind