Major drawback of the Incredible vs I-phone

[mtxpert]

I see a lot of people point out how great the HTC Incredible is.And for the most part I agree.I like my incredible but other than the processor and the fact that its NOT on AT&T I'm not overly crazy about it as some are.Why you ask..One reason that may not effect some of you but I kills me.The fact that I cant hook it to my truck like i do the I-phone.Keep in mine I dont have an I-phone but I do have 2 I-touches.One I keep in my car and it plugs into my pioneer touch screens gps dvd player.That way I can download movies and mp3's and play them in the truck.And it has the same user screen as an i-pod.I guess I could hook the droid to the radio via the headphone jack.But I dont know what it would use for a menu or how to charge it.And as far as movies..i have a few on my droid but theres no interface to play them on the pioneer.I know most dont care..But it would be nice if the droid did all that it does AND could be used more for multimedia.I even have an i-touch that hooks to the big screen in the housefor movies that I download.You just cant do that with a droid.But I did make the choice to go with the droid over the i-pod mainly because of the server..verizon.Even thought their customer service is the worst I'v ever seen at least the actual network is good and hopefully you'll never need customer service.
Just my 2 cents worth...

I plug my incredible into my radio via the USB port and it mounts my SD card and plays the 6GB of songs on there just fine. I can listen to it just like the ipod, interface. Or I can plug the headphone jack into the auxillary input and listen to Pandora and navigation through my speakers. I did both this last week, I drove from Phoenix to Heber, UT for a wrestling tournament listening to Pandora and using navigation the entire way without one drop. No more need for Sirius/XM Radio although I miss raw dog and blue collar comedy channels

 

[kmo]

NICE, there you go. :icon_ banana:

 

[ksfrogman]

I see a lot of people point out how great the HTC Incredible is.And for the most part I agree.I like my incredible but other than the processor and the fact that its NOT on AT&T I'm not overly crazy about it as some are.Why you ask..One reason that may not effect some of you but I kills me.The fact that I cant hook it to my truck like i do the I-phone.Keep in mine I dont have an I-phone but I do have 2 I-touches.One I keep in my car and it plugs into my pioneer touch screens gps dvd player.That way I can download movies and mp3's and play them in the truck.And it has the same user screen as an i-pod.I guess I could hook the droid to the radio via the headphone jack.But I dont know what it would use for a menu or how to charge it.And as far as movies..i have a few on my droid but theres no interface to play them on the pioneer.I know most dont care..But it would be nice if the droid did all that it does AND could be used more for multimedia.I even have an i-touch that hooks to the big screen in the housefor movies that I download.You just cant do that with a droid.But I did make the choice to go with the droid over the i-pod mainly because of the server..verizon.Even thought their customer service is the worst I'v ever seen at least the actual network is good and hopefully you'll never need customer service.
Just my 2 cents worth...

I plug my incredible into my radio via the USB port and it mounts my SD card and plays the 6GB of songs on there just fine. I can listen to it just like the ipod, interface. Or I can plug the headphone jack into the auxillary input and listen to Pandora and navigation through my speakers. I did both this last week, I drove from Phoenix to Heber, UT for a wrestling tournament listening to Pandora and using navigation the entire way without one drop. No more need for Sirius/XM Radio although I miss raw dog and blue collar comedy channels

I was just about to say that. Use a mini-to-mini cable. Most new stereos have a mini connector input. I connect my iPod touch to my auxillary mini jack in my BMW. I can also attach my blackberry and Incredible that way. Using the iPod touch functions on my car monitor requires an optional interface installation, but I don't mind controlling everything from the iPod. The Incredible would work the same way.

 

[mrmomoman]

How can one make an arguement about a new phone interface that hasn't been around along enough for the people to make connectors that will interface with it yet? The USB works just fine, the AUX works just fine. The TV would will be a feature will sure to come out soon.

No offense OP but you knew going in what you were getting with the USB connections instead of the Apple Connector and a newer phone that hasn't been around for roughly 3.5 years. They had time to make interfaces for it. Give it time.

Grade the phone on the merits of the phones and its features not the inability to adapt to your previous system based on IPHONEs and IPODS.

 

[jpoutre]

Well this is why Apple is well received with their market, their products work the way people want them to. For me not a big deal because when I get in my car I'm there to drive not to hook up my "entertainment" system. Personally I think people are way to distracted while driving, and having more distractions are becoming the norm with all the new technology that hook up to your car. To each his own I guess, I think eventually the Android phones will be able to compete on ALL levels with the likes of Apple, let's face it they were the ones who set the bar for all the devices arriving on the market place today.

Just wondering, you must not ever listen to the radio then. I mean, if you did you would be as distracted as I would be if I had an iPOD type device hooked to my sound system, as it would be controlled by my radio. With my Incredible, I am more distracted because I have to pick up the phone to go to next podcast, pause, or whatever I want to do.

I hope that in the future, there is better integration. They would probably need a different type of outputs though, and with all different types of hardware, that might be tricky to work out. If they could , it would be awesome so we could be less distracted.

I know with some here, I am breaking a rule of giving Apple one area where it has an advantage.

Well, since you don't me or my habits your statement directed at me is pointless. All I'm saying is people should be less distracted while driving not more because your device has to be picked up to make it do what you want it to. You do make my point though, people are too distracted when driving their cars. I use a bluetooth if I have to pick up a call and I'm not in the habit of making calls when driving, oh and not sure where you live and drive but we here in CA. have a hands free driving law in effect so picking up the phone while driving is supposed to be illegal, not that you'd know that by looking around at others driving on the streets. Not looking to argue about this just sharing my POV...

I didn't think I was arguing, but I guess that does not come thru. I was simply saying that using the phone to listen to music is no more distracting than listening to the radio, that's all. And I wish that there was a hookup like the iPhone has so it would integrate to my radio better. And I do use a bluetooth speakerphone in my car. Another improvement that the Incredible needs is handsfree dialing which my flip phone had but not my Incredible.

 

[jpoutre]

How can one make an arguement about a new phone interface that hasn't been around along enough for the people to make connectors that will interface with it yet? The USB works just fine, the AUX works just fine. The TV would will be a feature will sure to come out soon.

No offense OP but you knew going in what you were getting with the USB connections instead of the Apple Connector and a newer phone that hasn't been around for roughly 3.5 years. They had time to make interfaces for it. Give it time.

Grade the phone on the merits of the phones and its features not the inability to adapt to your previous system based on IPHONEs and IPODS.

Why is it so horrible to state an advantage on phone has over another. I was not "not" going to by the Incredible because of the shortcomings. And I don't think that it will be easy for the Android phones to get the same tight integration as the iPhone has because you have all different types of phones and such. Just saying what I wish it had. My car does not have USB, and yes, more than 1 way to skin a cat, that will probably be the way it will work about the same way.

 

[mrmomoman]

How can one make an arguement about a new phone interface that hasn't been around along enough for the people to make connectors that will interface with it yet? The USB works just fine, the AUX works just fine. The TV would will be a feature will sure to come out soon.

No offense OP but you knew going in what you were getting with the USB connections instead of the Apple Connector and a newer phone that hasn't been around for roughly 3.5 years. They had time to make interfaces for it. Give it time.

Grade the phone on the merits of the phones and its features not the inability to adapt to your previous system based on IPHONEs and IPODS.

Why is it so horrible to state an advantage on phone has over another. I was not "not" going to by the Incredible because of the shortcomings. And I don't think that it will be easy for the Android phones to get the same tight integration as the iPhone has because you have all different types of phones and such. Just saying what I wish it had. My car does not have USB, and yes, more than 1 way to skin a cat, that will probably be the way it will work about the same way.

There is nothing wrong to state an advantage but it is not exactly fair to criticize the lack of features of a new phone to a phone that has had 3.5 years of market development and adoption. Also it was the OP's choice to get this phone knowing that he had heavy integration with the IPhone and IPOD interface and then posts about Major Drawbacks.

It is like me saying that I built my sound system around a certain brand of audio equipment that only accepted a certain type of plug and then moving on to a new system that doesn't have the same type of plug and saying that is a drawback of the new system. No it was not. I invested into the old system and if I want to continue to use it and not have an integration problem I would upgrade to the same type of system or live with the fact that I have to upgrade again.

The only standard at the moment you will see on the Car Audio system is the 3.5mm AUX input. USB is starting to become widely used as the "standard" if you will for music playback with limitations.

Not knocking the OP for wanting to have better integration but he was heavily invested into the Apple Integration and probably should have stayed there. Also he mentions he has 2 IPODs - so why not use them for playback and the phone for a phone?

Just my 3 cents.... It's all good. No harm No Foul..

 

[itzkr0me]

you've purchased specific ipod accessories, and are upset that it doesn't work with your phone? really?

 

[claustin]

Not having similar car accessories for the Incredible (or any other Android device) has nothing to do with it's "newness." The advantage Apple has in this market is A) The sheer popularity of the iPhone/iPod Touch and B) the fact that they have standardized connections. Manufacturers know that the connector is on the bottom and that their accessories can accommodate a vast majority of them year to year. With Android phones you have no such stability because the different manufacturers put the connectors in different spots on every phone. If this was standardized you'd see way more options for Android. As it is now it's just not cost effective to make integrated car accessories for Android devices because they would have to make them different for every phone out there, no matter how popular Android grows as a mobile OS.

 

[itzkr0me]

the only thing standard about the ipod connectors are their location. Aside from that, it's completely proprietary. They also have mainly two devices that work that way, iPod and iPhone.

Think about the number of android devices that came out this year alone. Numerous. It's impossible to create an industry standard of the location of the microUSB port.

And the number of accessories absolutely has to do with it's newness. Apple was the same way. As android has surpassed iPhone sales (not in total), if popularity grows as they expect, you'll see accessories for specific popular phones crop up.

 

[littlerick]

how old is your navigation unit? i thought pioneer has had a usb hook up for a while. my pioneer (middle of the line dvd player) has usb, bluetooth and both work great and its almost 2 years old. maybe the "top of the line" is just getting a little old and you need to upgrade. pioneer has many bluetooth problems with other phones but my droid has always seemed to work great.

 

[claustin]

the only thing standard about the ipod connectors are their location. Aside from that, it's completely proprietary. They also have mainly two devices that work that way, iPod and iPhone.

Think about the number of android devices that came out this year alone. Numerous. It's impossible to create an industry standard of the location of the microUSB port.

And the number of accessories absolutely has to do with it's newness. Apple was the same way. As android has surpassed iPhone sales (not in total), if popularity grows as they expect, you'll see accessories for specific popular phones crop up.

I never said they weren't proprietary. Just standard. I'm not saying they're an industry standard, just an Apple standard. And yes I know they have only the iPod and iPhone. That's why it's easy to make accessories for them. You're pretty much agreeing with me except for the newness angle, which I still don't think matters. No matter the popularity of a particular Android device, by the time enough people have one to justify making similar accessories as the iDevices, the next big thing for Android will be out with different port placement. That's the big issue. The best we can do with Android is a car stereo deck with a usb aux port on the front to accommodate the widest range of Android devices. Or bluetooth. Either way you have to control it through your phone. Unless some type of standard is used we'll never see the type of integration the iPhone and iPod have. What I could see is an Android specific deck either using bluetooth or auxiliary connection coupled with some kind of market app (or maybe the connection would be enough if the deck has software to communicate with the OS). I still see solutions like this being buggy due to variations in the Android OS from the different handset manufacturers. I'm sure it wouldn't be impossible, but just saying we're not going to see near the volume or quality of what's available for Apple's stuff due to all the variables in Android handsets/OS's out there at this point. I mean, it can't even due bluetooth hands free dialing yet, let alone integrate with a car stereo.