Number pads are dead, long live the touchscreen! Ever since Apple showed the world how it’s done with the iPhone, practically every phone maker on the planet, from Nokia to Samsung has tried to jump on the bandwagon.
Not all touchscreen phones are created equal though. We’ve jammed together three of the latest entries, the T-Mobile G1, HTC Touch HD, and arch rival RIM’s BlackBerry Storm, to see which one comes out on top, and which deserves the pleasure of your fingering.
Screen space
The Touch HD isn’t called HD for nothing, packing one of the most exquisite screens we’ve ever seen on a mobile, measuring in at 3.8 inches. It may have slipped under the radar compared to the other two 3.2 inchers, but the Touch HD should be proud of its giant display.
Winner: HTC Touch HD
Touch much?
That screen real estate doesn’t count for much mind if it’s not responsive to prods and pokes, and the Touch HD can’t quite compare to the BlackBerry Storm and T-Mobile G1 in this respect. While the G1 has a frighteninly responsive screen, it’s not a multitouch display, and there’s even a keyboard in case your fingers are just too chubbly. Meanwhile, the Storm’s tactile, responsive screen lets you push it like a button. Except it’s a screen. Genius. It also supports multi-touch for copy and paste functions with two fingers.
Winner: BlackBerry Storm
Size and weight
As the G1 is the only one of the three that packs a slide out QWERTY keyboard, it’s no surprise to find that it’s also fatter than James Corden after he’s eaten both Gavin and Stacey, weighing in at 158g. Still, the other two are fairly chunky compared to an iPhone too, with the Storm clocking in at 155g, and the Touch HD just edging it at 148g.
Winner: HTC Touch HD
Bonus hardware
While we like the tactile Storm touchscreen, the T-Mobile G1 manages to squeeze far more in under the bonnet, including a full keypad, trackball, accelerometer and compass. We wouldn’t be surprised if someone opened it up and found a Swiss Army knife in there as well, to be frank. The Touch lags far behind either in this respect.
Winner: T-Mobile G1
Killer camera
HTC and RIM have forgotten to put a decent snapper into their flagship models – something of a major omission, as we expect a bit more than 3.2 megapixels these days. The Touch HD has it covered though, letting you take 5MP shots, and giving us a winner by knockout. It’s still no Samsung M8800 though.
Winner: HTC Touch HD
Media mogul
Since HTC and Google are quite clearly gunning for Apple’s iPhone with the T-Mobile G1, it’s a wonder they didn’t think to fit a proper headphone socket or a decent movie app in as standard. Feature films are a bit of a chore on the G1, even with the third-party video player available through the Android Marketplace.
Windows Media Player comes installed as standard on the Touch HD, so it’ll play music and movies without too much fuss, but it’s the Storm that really kicks backside in this test. Not only will it hapily chew over most media formats, it’ll sync with iTunes using RIM’s BlackBerry Media Sync software. What’s more, there’s a proper headphone jack. Take that T-Mobile!
Winner: BlackBerry Storm
Storage
None of these phones will compete with the 16GB guts of an iPhone or Nokia N96 out of the box. Both rivals have 32 times more internal memory than the Touch HD’s 512MB, and even that towers above the G1′s 256MB and Storm’s measly 128MB onboard. Yes, they all have microSD slots, and can support 16GB once it’s slotted in, but what good is that when you have to pay more for it? They’d all be disqualified were it not for Orange being nice enough to include an 8GB card in the box.
Winner: HTC Touch HD
App-alicious
The T-Mobile G1 is the Michael Phelps of this competition, dominating thanks to its open source Google Android operating system. There are plenty of programs on BlackBerry OS, true, but it’s back to the drawing board for most of these with touchscreen in the mix. In fact, BlackBerry’s app store won’t go live until next year.
Meanwhile, Windows Mobile on the Touch HD offers plenty, the Android Marketplace is already the place to be. What’s more, every Android app is free until 2009!
Winner: T-Mobile G1
Email master
There’s a reason RIM owns the business mobile sector – perfect push email. And while it’s ditched the keypad that made it famous for the Storm, it still pushes it real good, as Salt’N'Pepa might say. We don’t think that even the G1′s QWERTY keyboard will be able to compete with instant email on a BlackBerry, even with Gmail beavering away behind the scenes, and as for the Touch HD – well, it’s got neither the keypad nor the intuitive interface. Tsshh.
Winner: BlackBerry Storm
Web while you walk
What on earth is RIM thinking? No WiFi? How’s a man supposed to watch iPlayer in McDonalds without it, tell us that!
Both RIM’s rivals pack Wi-Fi, and all three use HSDPA to rip broadband speeds from mobile networks. However, with the Touch HD being exclusive to Orange, it’ll be saddled with some pretty mean download limits. So, for unlimited browsing on the go, and the luxury of Wi-Fi, the winner has to be…
Winner: T-Mobile G1
Network and tariff choices
Whatever happened to the free market? Each of these phones is on an exclusive contract with a single service provider, Touch HD with Orange, Storm on Vodafone and the T-Mobile G1 on T-Mobile.
Unsurprisingly, these captive markets lead to some not so great bargains for us consumers: the Storm is up for pre-order now, free on a £35 a month contract, so long as you’re prepared to keep it for two whole years.
The HTC Touch HD comes with an astonishingly low 250MB monthly data allowance, ruling it out from the start, and the T-Mobile G1 comes free for £40 each month for a year and a half.
On balance, we’re going to award T-Mobile the win. Its contract length isn’t too excessive, its HSDPA network is fast (and wide-reaching) and they’ll even bundle Wi-Fi access to their massive hotspot network if you pay a bit more.
Winner: T-Mobile G1
Overall winner: T-Mobile G1
Electricpig deals
Get the T-Mobile G1 free with 800 minutes and unlimited texts for £40 per month from Carphone Warehouse
