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I won't belabor the brewing smartphone and cellular carrier battle by publishing yet another "Deathmatch: Motorola Droid versus iPhone"   Galen Gruman of Computerworld already did a reasonably thorough job covering the technical differences between the Verizon-based Motorola Droid and the AT&T-based Apple iPhone.  Writing for Infoworld, Gruman produced a slightly less weighty, though more vendor-inclusive piece entitled, "Ultimate Mobile Deathmatch: iPhone -vs- Blackberry -vs- Droid -vs- Pre".  Between these two sites you will likely find as much information as you need to understand the technical specifications and design choices of the many, varied smartphones now on the market.

Yet for all the detail Gruman included in his respective articles, I found his conclusions lacking in substance.

Gruman spoke definitively about a number of Droid design aspects he considered lacking or poorly implemented, conclusions I found flatly ill-informed and misleading.

Whether Gruman's omissions were done out of overt iPhone love, intellectual laziness, or the pressure of a looming deadline is irrelevant. What is relevant is that "in the old days of journalism," (ie: print publications issued on predictable schedules and subject to close editorial scrutiny), fundamental omissions of the type and scope made by Mr. Gruman would have been snagged before publication. A solid editorial process is about the person with the broadest subject expertise rising to the top of the heap, insuring that the folks doing the leg work uphold a rigorous standard of commitment to accuracy and detail.  Mr. Gruman's omissions and oversights are not the first I have noticed slipping by the editors at Computerworld.  I suspect they will not be the last.

For example:

In the first "Deathmatch" piece, Mr. Gruman states authoritatively that the only way to switch between running programs on the Motorola Droid is to go back out to the home screen and relaunch the application.  This is flatly in error.  The truth is that switching among applications on the Motorola Droid is as simple as pressing and holding the "Home" button, then selecting among the six, most-recently run applications.  Quick.  Simple.  Painless.  Unlike the iPhone, the process does not involve pressing the home key and then trying to find your application among page after page of other icons.

For many readers, the way Mr. Gruman explained this process would indicate a fundamental design flaw in the Android O/S.  Why buy a Droid, supposedly a multi-tasking phone, when it makes navigating between running programs such a chore?

Mr. Gruman reveals a clear bias toward the iPhone by not having taken the time to read the Droid manual before conducting his review.  Had he spent a little more time reading the PDF manual, he would have found - prominently mentioned - the "press-n-hold" method I outlined just a moment ago.  Ironically, the iPhone Mr. Gruman lauds suffers from a similar shortcoming; switching between programs requires a trip back to the home page by pressing the "Home" button.

Full disclosure time:  I own an iPhone 3GS and it is my only cell phone.  I won't be giving it up any time soon, either, in spite of the horribly crippled status of AT&T's network compared to the stable nirvana of Verizon's. Worse yet, the tit-for-tat argument now brewing between AT&T and Verizon over the veracity of Verizon's claims that it's 3G network far outshines AT&T's holds a nugget of truth.  With Verizon I can get 3G speeds in such out of the way locales as Wellsboro, PA in Tioga County.  With AT&T...?  No such luck.

Compared to the Droid, though, the Apple iPhone's design, O/S, and user interface "feel" light-years ahead of the game.  The Droid "feels" like an incomplete, rushed design, with many compromises thrown in along the way.  The iPhone feels elegant, as if it is the result of years of labor, testing, and user focus groups.

At least that's my opinion and I'm sticking to it.

So why am I throwing a fit over Mr. Gruman's reporting on the Droid -vs- iPhone if I am such an iPhone devotee?  Why would I defend a platform I see as fundamentally flawed?

Because I hate sloppy reporting.  I hate it when editorial excellence gives way to rushing the story to press.  I hate it when opinion masquerades as fact, parroting marketing slicks before digging for the truth.

Because I have used the Droid and Mr. Gruman's conclusions represent inherent bias, not committed neutrality.

For the past two weeks I have carried the Verizon Droid in my jacket pocket, testing it side-by-side with my iPhone 3GS.  I loaded it up with a comparable mix of programs, tested it on the voice and data networks under identical circumstances, and studied hard for the tests I threw its way.  Unlike Mr. Gruman, I read the manual cover-to-cover first, discovering many design choices from which Apple could take inspiration.

Like Mr. Gruman, I now see the Droid with all its warts, stripped of the glamourous ads and imagery.  I'm just a little more appreciative of the positive value the phone brings to a developing market.

For me the choice between Droid and iPhone comes down to some easy-to-distill preferences.  Which one works the way you work?  (Note, by the way, that I agree with the conclusion of many reviewers that the co-launched HTC Droid Eris is the more appropriate analog to the iPhone.  HTC has done more homework on adapting the Android O/S to the challenge of competing with the iPhone O/S head-on.  The Droid Eris feels more polished in actual use, though the Moto Droid is more adaptable and holds greater long-term promise by virtue of its physical keyboard.)

Preference #1 - The One Hand Dialing Test

Pop quiz.  What is the primary purpose for a cell phone?

The answer is easy.  Making phone calls.

Okay, if the primary purpose for a cell phone is to make phone calls, what is the primary purpose of a "smartphone?"

The answer to that one is still easy.  Making phone calls.

It's the secondary purpose of the "smartphone" that often seems to overwhelm the primary purpose; carrying the power of a computer in your purse or jacket pocket.  Many smartphone manufacturers these days seem to be so fixated on the secondary purpose that they undermine the primary.  They make great portable computers but lousy phones.

Not so with the iPhone.  You can search, select, and dial a number in rapid succession straight out of the contact list and do it all with one hand.  Your thumb does most of the work, actually.

The Droid?  Not so much.

It's a silly matter of personal preference, but can someone please explain to me Motorola put the "Power" switch on the top of the phone and the "Home" button at the bottom?  Unlike the iPhone it takes two hands (in many cases) to power on the Droid and get to the work of dialing a phone number.  Press the power button first, swipe the screen to unlock the phone, make sure you're on the home screen, but if you're not you need to press the "Home" button, get back to the home screen and then find the dinky little phone icon.

On the iPhone you wake up the phone by pressing the Home button, you swipe it to unlock it, and then you grab the phone icon from a fixed task bar that shows up on all the program selection screens.

Simple.  Elegant.  So easy a child can figure it out.

After extensive use as a phone first and pocket computer second, I can assure you that the iPhone is made for one-handed use, while the Droid still wants you to treat it like a Burger King Whopper.  It takes two hands to handle it.

Preference #2 - Operating System Interface

Hands down, without question, the iPhone O/S represents the most elegant cell phone interface to come down the line.  The icons are large, the interface snaps to attention quickly, and the primary function - making a phone call - can be accomplished safely with one hand while on the road. The proliferation of programs for the iPhone and the simplicity of the App Store make it stupid-simple to grab and use just the right tool for the job. 

(I am particularly partial to the iPhone because of just one app.  Logmein Ignition alone is worth the price of entry for it's rock-solid remote control capabilities, letting you watch and manage dozens of computers of all O/S brands and variations from the comfort of wherever you have an AT&T signal.)

That being said, what the iPhone lacks the Droid attacks.  Multi-tasking.  There is nothing nearly as frustrating when working with iPhone apps than knowing that the next phone call to come in will completely suspend whatever you were doing.  Imagine using your spiffy Navigon navigation software only to have the entire application suspend mid-turn while a new phone call comes in.  With the Droid, that never happens.  The program keeps running in the background while you take your call and when you flip back you don't need to wait long for the program to come back to life.

And the Droid's approach to multi-task management, pressing and holding the "Home" button until it pops a task list (ala: the Windows "Alt-Tab" combination) is almost as stupid-simple as anything on the iPhone.

No, where the Droid's interface fails is in how it arranges programs.  Apple recognized early on that slide-up program pop-up lists get really, really hard to handle when you load them up with anything but a few applications.  The Droid's limited three-screen "home" arrangement further complicates life for those of us who really love to load up our smart phones with mortgage calculators, remote control widgets, network diagnostic tools, and the like.  With the newest version of the iPhone O/S (3.1) and it's partner iTunes upgrade, Apple has finally given end-users the power to organize their smartphone lives to their heart's content.  Not perfect, but still better than Droid's approach.

So when it comes to the end-user interface - about the only thing the typical end-user will care about when it comes to the scary words "operating system" - the Apple iPhone exhibits a maturity and elegance yet to be matched by the Droid or just about anything else on the market.  There is a reason the iPhone is so popular.  It just works the way people think a smartphone should work.  Droid is for geeks.  iPhone is for chics.

Preference #3 - Form Factor and Design

I wanted to love the Droid.  I wanted to finally have a physical keyboard in my hands to free me from the error-prone iPhone soft keyboard.

I'm still looking.

Having once owned an HTC 8525 Windows Mobile Phone, I can tell you what a decent keyboard should feel like.  The Droid isn't it.  The Droid keyboard practically begs you to screw up.  In fact, it's faster and more accurate to type on the Droid with the keyboard closed, letting the software prompt you with word suggestions as you type on the screen-based keyboard.

All of these vendors could take a clue from the Blackberry Curve 8900.  Proper key size, slight spacing between the keys, lots of travel.  Now THAT'S a keyboard.

What also irks me about the Droid's form factor and design is the way in which they manage to take a fabulous screen and surround it with beveled edges that actually hurt in your hand.  Have you ever held a ruler up to your ear?  Perpendicularly?  You get the point.  It's painful and it doesn't much make you want to repeat the trick.

The Droid's case design serves to undercut it's primary function; being a world-class cell phone.

The speaker phone works well.  The audio quality on the receive end seems decent.

Actually using it as a phone, though, really stinks.

Then there's something that goes to the issue of O/S design choices, but coupled with the overall form factor of the phone makes it just an unappealing choice as your one-handed-contact warrior.  The phone function is hard to find and even harder to navigate.  To scroll through a long list of names in your address book you must start the scroll first, then look down at the screen and find the scroll tab that pops up, and then scroll to the letter of the name you want to find.  Yech.

There is, however, one design trick Apple should apply to the next gen iPhone that Droid has down cold. The display screen on the Droid is fantastic.  It's probably the best screen available on a cell phone.  Rick, vibrant colors coupled with sharp, crisp text make it possible even for this bi-focaled geek to use comfortably.  In fact, the Webkit-based web browser - basically the same one available on the iPhone - is a revelation on the Droid.  I rarely found myself forced to zoom on the Droid.  On the iPhone, it is almost a necessity to zoom and unzoom screens as you scroll and pan around.

So when it comes to form factor and elegance of the physical design of the phone, coupled with the way that form factor enhances or detracts from the overall experience, the iPhone wins.  One physical button takes you home.  Everything else is easy to find with one hand from there.

Preference #4 - The Network

Let's cut to the chase.  The real reason why people are falling all over themselves about the new Motorola Droid has less to do with the hardware than with the network.

AT&T's network stinks.

Nah, that's not strong enough.  AT&T's network makes tin cans and string look like state-of-the-art gear.

Since earlier this year the frequency of dropped calls, failed call setup, and crappy call quality on the AT&T network has skyrocketed. With a pool of over 20 AT&T phones under my watch I can tell you that if there were a credible alternative to the iPhone on virtually any other carrier I would jump ship in a heartbeat.  Well, almost any other carrier.  Sprint still has issues.  But I'll take Verizon or T-Mobile over AT&T any day of the week.

Hence the pent-up demand for an iPhone killer on Verizon's network.

Like it or not, Windows Mobile still stinks.  After more than a decade they still haven't figured out how to do proper memory management, releasing programs from memory without needing to "kill" the process manually.  Windows Mobile 6.5 has lots of spiffy bells and whistles, but still does memory management the old way; they expect the end-user to kill off programs manually.

For all Blackberry's wonderful merits, their ability to bring a large-screen, browser-friendly, touch-enabled phone to the market has been stunted by their own lousy R&D.  The Storm was a joke.  The Storm2 feels like Jay Leno moving from 11:30pm to 10:00pm.  Same product, slightly different packaging.

So the promise of Android on Verizon was awaited with breathless enthusiasm by all true geeks.  Those of us who appreciate the importance of a stable network underneath our toy-du-jour have long awaited a Verizon-based answer to the iPhone.

The Droid comes close.  Is it close enough to justify a costly jump from AT&T to Verizon for the iPhone faithful who are fed up with AT&T's horrible customer service and equally horrible network?  No.  Is it close enough for a current Verizon customer to upgrade to the Droid?  Not yet.

Where the network is concerned, though, the improved stability of Verizon over AT&T is potentially reason enough to make the leap from the new "Big Blue" to the venerable "Big Red."

Preference #5 - Better for Business

Google the words "Android" and "Enterprise Security" and you'll get an armful of reasons why business is holding off on large-scale deployments of the Motorola Droid.  It simply doesn't do mail the way businesses do mail.  It doesn't let you encrypt the mail file on the phone, it plays very, very badly with Microsoft Exchange, and it has zero support for remote wiping and locking of the phone should it be lost or stolen.

The iPhone, on the other hand, is well on its way to enterprise friendliness.  Though it lacks support for a few of the standard Microsoft Exchange security policies, it does at least demonstrate that it can play nice in Exchange's sandbox.  Further, the iPhone lets administrators do a degree of remote deployment and management, something completely lacking on the Droid.

Further, with the release of Lotus Notes/Domino 8.5.1 and Lotus Notes Traveler, full Activesync support for calendaring, scheduling, and eMail has come to the iPhone.  The winner when it comes to enterprise-grade support for business functionality is clear.  iPhone.

So what does Droid do right?  Or, more appropriately, what does Droid at least try to do that iPhone could learn from?

1. Droid has a replaceable battery, iPhone does not.
   
2. Droid has the most vivid, readable screen on any smartphone.  3.7inches of sheer bliss.  You have to see it to appreciate it.
   
3. Droid's multitasking works.  iPhone's is a pipe dream.  Switching among programs on the Droid is a breeze as is looking at alerts.
4. Droid at least tries to cram a physical keyboard into the case.  It's a pretty bad design, but it's a start.
   
5. Droid includes a 5megapixel camera.  It's a pretty crappy 5mp camera, but it's a start.
6. Verizon's 3G data network flies along.  AT&T's crashes, crawls, and creeps.
7. The Android Market is more open to experimentation than Apple's draconian control over its App Store.
8. The Google GPS Maps Navigation on the Droid is head and shoulders above anything available on iPhone.
9. Use of a standard micro-USB connector.  Let's face it, Apple wants to corner the market on the after-market.

At the end of the day, the Droid is a perfectly fine smartphone for people who are loath to use AT&T.  It is not better than the iPhone, but at least it shows Verizon is serious about contending in the smartphone space.  It is the first legitimate smartphone answer for the aged Palm OS and the hideously slow and unstable Windows Mobile OS.  You won't be embarrassed carrying one.

Of course once you get your hands on a genuine iPhone you will be terribly upset that Apple didn't share it's wunderkind with the rest of the carriers.  iPhone still sets the standards other smartphones try to beat.