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T-Mobile G1 Faster Than iPhone 3G

An anonymous reader writes "CNET UK have run some very simple in-house tests comparing the T-Mobile G1's 3G connection against the iPhone 3G's. Result? The G1 loaded Web pages almost twice as fast as the iPhone's. Of course, the test only applies to the CNET UK offices if you're being scientific about it, as stated, but it's still impressive nevertheless."

30 of 304 comments (clear)

  1. Re:The thing is still ugly by MikeDirnt69 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I still believe iPhone is all marketing, the product itself is just average. But that's only my opinion...

    --
    Am I eval()? - http://www.monst3r.com.br
  2. Re:somebody read it by BobMcD · · Score: 5, Informative

    3 and 4, per the conclusions of the author.

    Don't worry, though, I'm sure some apple fan will be along shortly to debunk it.

  3. Re:somebody read it by dnwq · · Score: 4, Informative
    From TFA:

    Taking into account that we tested it against another 3G phone with a T-Mobile SIM in it, we believe that it's not a network factor, it's the G1's browser and processor being able to render pages much faster. So if you're looking for a fast Web experience on the go, we strongly recommend checking out the T-Mobile G1.

  4. How would it fare elsewhere? by MikeRT · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The first time I saw an iPhone in person was in rural Virginia. It wasn't fast, but it actually worked out there. T-Mobile doesn't even really have any service out there, so I guess it really is just a moot point for a lot of people.

    1. Re:How would it fare elsewhere? by multipartmixed · · Score: 3, Informative

      Look in the top left-hand corner(ish). If it says "3G", you have a 3G connection. If it says "E", you have Edge. Edge is roughly dialup. It works, but it's slower'n'piss.

      I have a Rogers iPhone, I live in a rural area, and get 3G on one side of my house and Edge on the other. The difference is astounding.

      --

      Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
    2. Re:How would it fare elsewhere? by Teilo · · Score: 3, Informative

      Edge is roughly dialup.

      BZZZZT! Wrong.

      GPRS (2G) is roughly dialup. EDGE (2.5G) is more like slow DSL, in the 128K to 230K range. GPRS can actually do better than dial-up. It maxes out at 59K.

      The G1 does all three, and it distinguishes between them on the display. Perhaps your iPhone doesn't.

      --
      Mir tut es leid, Menschen daß Einfältigfehlersuchenbaumfolgendenaffen sind.
  5. Re:No it's faster because: by b96miata · · Score: 4, Funny

    I can see how that would come into play at the CNET UK offices.

  6. Re:somebody read it by dnwq · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Gah! I read it again and what they actually did was run a T-Mobile Samsung Omnia against the T-Mobile G1 on silicon.com and barackobama.com. The G1 wins... And then they run the (O2-locked) iPhone against the T-Mobile G1 on eHam.net, and the G1 wins.

    Great for the G1 and all... but seriously? CNET, you fail at comparisons. Different sites? For the love of the experimental method, why?

    And there's absolutely no way to conclude that the G1's processor or browser beats the iPhone's on this test alone... maybe O2 just really, really sucks? Who knows?

    If you really want to do a comparison... just unlock the damned thing and put in SIM cards from the same network!

  7. I actually quite like the trackball by grahamsz · · Score: 5, Informative

    I didn't think i would, but it's a nice touch.

    Still by the time it's got a keyboard, a touch screen, some buttons and a trackball... it feels like it's perhaps over doing it.

    Do you think it's ugly in person? Like my last HTC device, it's much nicer in your hand than in pictures.

    The integration between the phone and third party apps is wonderful.

    When a call comes in that isn't in my phone book, the whitepages app does a reverse number lookup and shows that on screen.

    I can use shazam to identify music and then go straight to youtube or the amazon mp3 store to buy or listen to it.

    I can scan the barcode of a book, compare the prices at online stores and it'll tell me which local booksellers have it and give me driving directions to the store (although it only seems to work for b&n)

    Of course that's all mostly android and not the device.

    1. Re:I actually quite like the trackball by JCSoRocks · · Score: 4, Informative

      You've just given more useful information about the phone than I've found in all the billions of hypefest articles on the 'net. It actually sounds really appealing now.

      --
      You are using English. Please learn the difference between loose and lose; they're, there, and their; your and you're.
    2. Re:I actually quite like the trackball by Lemmy+Caution · · Score: 3, Informative

      The music comes from wherever you are - watching TV, on a bus, sitting next to some guy in his car who is playing his stereo too loudly, whatever. Shazam identifies music in your environment that you record. Pretty neat, really.

    3. Re:I actually quite like the trackball by grahamsz · · Score: 4, Informative

      It records it from whatever radio station, coffee shop or party that it's being played at. It then analyzes the audio and identifies the band.

      However rather than leaving you with a song id, you can buy it on amazon and download straight to your phones music library or you can hop over to youtube and find the video for that song.

      I get my music from a mix of sources, sorry for not towing the slashdot corporate boycott line.

  8. Re:somebody read it by goombah99 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The author tries to conclude it was not the network (offering no reasons) ans was the browser's "page load speed".

    But this is mentally ill. The page load too 1.5 minutes versus 30 seconds. SO is he trying to say it took the apple iphone 1 minute to render the page?

    this is absolutely illogial. Of course it's the network. They did not even check to see if the iphone was on a 2G or 3G network.

    retards.

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
  9. T-Mobile in NYC by C_Kode · · Score: 3, Informative

    I've been with T-Mobile since they were Voice Stream back in 2000 when I was living in Dallas. In Dallas they were great, but I've been in NYC since early 2005 and their service sucks in this area. Most of the time my Internet access doesn't work at all.

  10. Simply... awesome. by s13g3 · · Score: 4, Informative

    My room mate, a senior T-Mobile Engineer, did a test just last night of his new G1 on T-Mo's 3G network versus his iPhone on AT&T's network and saw a full 150kbps difference between the two, with advantage going to the G1. On a later test they ran the G1 against the iPhone with both on T-Mobile's network and saw between a 50 - 75kbps difference between the two, again, advantage G1.

    So far I'm rather impressed with the device. The trackball is very functional, easy to use, and seems well made. The device is fast and responsive, and while the screen may not be quit as big or pretty as the iPhone's, it's still plenty nice enough. Ok, it doesn't have multi-touch (as far as I can ascertain), but it's fast, very functional and I really really want one now. Web-browsing was a wonderful experience (first time I can say that about a phone), and did I say it was fast? Also the native console and SSH functionality was awesome, and I was very surprised by how well it represented my SSH sessions, including irssi - I must have one.

    It really does look better in the hand than it does on photos. Ok, not quite as slick as the iPhone, but I'm also not one of those people who will shell out an extra $X just to get a pretty PC case when all I want is functionality - I don't need my mobile device to be sexy in an artistic way, I want it to be sexy in a functional, useful and powerful way. The teenage emo girls on 4chan can have the iPhone, it's G1 for me.

    Don't forget open standards for the phone too, and the fact that with the time and effort you can make it do anything you want to, and not have to be beholden to what Apple thinks you should be able to do, or a glorified pager that is the Blackberry.

    --
    "Inveniemus Viam Aut Faciemus" 'We will find a way... Or we will make one!' --Hannibal of Carthage
    1. Re:Simply... awesome. by mcgrew · · Score: 3, Funny

      My room mate, a senior T-Mobile Engineer, did a test just last night of his new G1 on T-Mo's 3G network versus his iPhone

      Now THERE'S an unbiased test!

    2. Re:Simply... awesome. by Teilo · · Score: 4, Funny

      Yeah, because, as we know, T-Mobile employees have special SIM chips that enable secret Traffic Shaping protocols for T-Mobile branded phones.

      Please.

      --
      Mir tut es leid, Menschen daß Einfältigfehlersuchenbaumfolgendenaffen sind.
  11. Re:somebody read it by grahamsz · · Score: 4, Informative

    o2 has 3g coverage for 80% of the country. I find it very hard to believe that the skipped "London" when they were doing that.

    T-Mobile UK is delivering a 7.2Mbps connection whereas O2 are still at 3.6Mbps - either way i find it hard to believe that download speed is a major issue.

    Quite why they didn't use wifi - i dont know

  12. Re:one key iphone advantage by Stan+Vassilev · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Apps written expressly for the iphone run faster than the java apps on the G1.

    Where's your benchmark to prove it? The truth is Java runs "on hardware" in most mobile devices. There's a chip which translates the Java opcodes to native ARM intructions without any delay or slowdown whatsoever. Naturally nothing less could be expected on a device so strained for power and speed.

  13. Re:The thing is still ugly by 2nd+Post! · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Better than what? The average phone is the RAZR, so in THAT standpoint the iPhone is better than the average.

  14. Re:Chrome vs Safari by TheRaven64 · · Score: 3, Informative

    They're both based on WebKit, but there are some huge differences between the two WebKit branches. They have different JavaScript implementations, and they have completely different code in the platform-dependent layer. This layer is responsible for, among other things, network connections, URL parsing / handling, text glyph loading, and drawing.

    --
    I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  15. Re:Not sure about the US... by PeterChenoweth · · Score: 3, Informative
    Why did you call AT&T? In an attempt to get the old $20/month data plan? Because it's trivial to disable 3G on the 3G iPhone....

    Settings->General->Network

    Where it says, "Enable 3G" slide the switch to "Off"

    Problem solved.

  16. Re:The thing is still ugly by binarylarry · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've had a G1 for about a week and I don't think your comments make much sense.

    The trackball is very convenient, it gives you mouse-like control over the screen. On the G1 and the iPhone, the touchscreen is good but it's no replacement for a mouse. The iPhone would be better with a trackball. The moving screen is handy, because there are so many good apps for Android already, you'll run out of room. The titled bottom piece causes absolutely no issues whatsoever. The only complaint I'd give credit to is the audio jack thing. They should have included a regular 3.5mm jack.

    I've used both the G1 and the iPhone and I like the G1 a lot more so far.

    It has a nice smooth interface, in the same ballpark as the iPhone. It has an easy to use app store, which is nicer than Apple's because it already has apps that you'd have to jailbreak the iPhone for. It uses standard mechanisms for thinks like uploading music, etc. Instead of locking you into their stupid iTunes product. As a developer, you get to develop on any platform you want and the dev kit is free.

    So, honestly, the iPhone is a decent product, but it's been bested by Android already IMO. It will be interesting to see just how awesome Android becomes on future products.

    --
    Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
  17. You all fail at controlled experiments. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Almost everybody here is comparing phones on different networks. The only way you can say anything useful about the phones is if they're using the SAME NETWORK.

    "3G" is not a bandwidth value. Neither is "Edge". For both of these, data transfer rate depends mainly on how far you are from the cell company's antenna, and how many walls and trees are between you and it.

    Unless those factors are identical for both phones, your comparison says nothing about the speed of the phones, and nothing useful about how the phones will behave for someone else. The only person here who's made a sensible comparison is dnwq, who said

    If you really want to do a comparison... just unlock the damned thing and put in SIM cards from the same network!

  18. Re:The thing is still ugly by Dog-Cow · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You forgot what it is that Apple sells. You just listed a bunch of parts.

    Apple sells an integrated interface to as many digital devices as they've come up with components for. Music, video, TV, the computer, phone, and whatever else I'm not recalling.

    That's what people are paying for.

  19. Re:The thing is still ugly by PopeRatzo · · Score: 3, Funny

    "Apple-fans...MOBILIZE!

    I'm not really sure, but I think something in this article says something bad about iPhones.

    You know what to do..."

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
  20. It's about more than a feature list by sjbe · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Other than the lightsaber app, that's pretty standard on most high-end phones. I pay a lot less for my Nokia N95 8GB, and on features alone it beats the iPhone.

    My primary phone these days is a Nokia E70. Nice phone overall and I like it. The features are roughly identical to my wife's iPhone 3G - but only if you are just doing a checkbox feature comparison. Technically it has the "same" stuff but not all of it is usable. In actual usability there is a pretty wide gap for most people. Why? The interface.

    The interface on Nokia's S60 phones just sucks in comparison. Yes, a geek like me (and presumably you) can make it work just fine but ONLY a geek like me would bother. Getting an iPhone configured is a breeze by comparison - not to mention using it. It took me hours of navigating obscure menus to get my E70 working "properly" and I've had a series of Nokia phones for 10 years so I'm plenty familiar with their interface. The physical keyboard is nice but the iPhones virtual one works adequately. Particularly galling were:

    • the poorly considered default options
    • the need for special headphone adapters to use the MP3 player
    • the need for special Nokia specific cables
    • the lack of attention to the interface in many of the applications including the MP3 player and the camera

    By comparison, setting up my wife's iPhone took 30 minutes and I had never held one before hers. Is the iPhone perfect? Heck no, but I've spent quality time with plenty of S60, Blackberries and Treos and for 9/10 people I'd recommend the iPhone over any of them if they have a choice. It's just less hassle. Fortunately it seems to have gotten the handset manufacturers off their rear ends so we are seeing a nice wave of innovative new phones coming out.

  21. CNET's Update Negates Their Findings - Phones Same by laoudji · · Score: 3, Informative

    Turns out it's an O2 network issue: From TA: "Update: A previously published version of this article concluded that the G1's browser and processor were able to render pages faster than the iPhone's. In response to reader comments regarding a Wi-Fi test, we have now run a set of tests and concluded that, indeed, both phones load pages at a similar speed over Wi-Fi. This means there's little difference in processor or browser performance. Clearly the G1 is a superior Web phone to the Omnia, but it seems to be O2's network that is holding the iPhone back."

  22. Re:The thing is still ugly by esampson · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I agree that I would like a 3.5" jack but at the same time I also understand why there isn't one. This is sort of the elegance in design AshtangiMan likes in the iPhone. Everything is done through a single port on the G1 rather than having to place multiple ports on it. If you want to use earphones other than the ones provided or plug it into your car stereo you can get an adapter fairly inexpensively.

    I know that's not a perfect solution but then what is? It is six of one (single port with adapters) or half a dozen of the other (multiple ports).

  23. Re:somebody read it by Achromatic1978 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Why? Until the average man on the street is able to use his iPhone 3G on another network, give me one reason it ISN'T a valid real world comparison. You're not going to be using your iPhone on T-mobile's network, you'll be using it on O2. End experience and perception. "Oh, it's not my iPhone, it's the network!"? Seems reasonable to me.