A year of being punched in the face (metaphorically) by the Windows journalist intelligencia for using Windows Phone 10 longer than I should finally took its toll on me. When my almost two year old 950XL started having problems and behaving bizarrely, I thought, “now’s the time” to move on. Microsoft had given up, why shouldn’t I?

I had owned various iPhones long ago, but I wanted more control. All the ‘Windows people’ had moved to Android.

“You can make it just like a Windows/Microsoft device!” they shouted. “It’s so customizable!”, they squeed. “Gadzooks! So many apps!” they proclaimed. These are people I read, generally trust and respect. Plus every one of them were busy bashing Windows Phone and calling anyone who dared stay on that platform hopeless wishful thinkers. It was fun sport making fun of anyone who even hoped for a Surface Phone, “folks, it ain’t gonna happen! (even though we were huge proponents of it previously).”

So I did it. I went all in. Samsung Galaxy S8+, the S3 Watch, even the VR Headset. I installed ALL the Microsoft apps, changed the assistant to Cortana, changed the launcher, I was SET!

Or so I thought. Things that were once simple on my Windows Phone were now a chore. I had access to every app possible, but found I really didn’t use anything that useful (except Starbuck’s, I love that app). Here’s a comparison of what the old versus new is like:

Then: Wake up with WP alarm, push dismiss button
Now: Wale up with Android alarm, but have to now slide to stop. If I accidentally unlock, the alarm continues with no obvious way to silence.

Then: type my PIN to unlock. Stays locked when not in use.
Now: fumble to get my finger just right on the fingerprint sensor. Pulling phone out of my pocket some how turns it on, but locked. Phone turns on in pocket. Phone does not turn on when I actually want it to. Lock screen is noisy array of notifications cheerfully telling me what apps it updated. I. Don’t. Care. But never actually tells me I have an appointment in 10 minutes.

Then: Notifications are big ‘toasts’ for things like calendar, reminders, Cortana, etc. They actually tell me to leave to make an appointment. They remind me (in large, noticeable ways) of things when alarms or geolocations are set off. Cortana pops up when I’m near the store to remind me of things, large clear toasts pop up to show relevant alerts. Somehow it produced the right alerts in the right way for me.
Now: Notifications appear in a scrolling list on the lock screen, important things muddled in between garbage alerts of unimportance and total crap (and advertisements by the annoying and ever present Samsung Pay that I can use it HERE! at Target should my car drive too close to a shopping center).
Once in a great while, a ‘real’ Cortana notification will pop up in a large box with a Complete or Snooze, but this only serves to remind me of how it should work and never is consistent. I just makes me sad.

Then: I get a text message in the car. My playing podcast pauses, then Cortana asks (over the car’s audio system) if I’d like to read it or ignore. After reading, she let’s me reply or finish. All via voice. I never even look at the device as it’s in my bag. Safe. Sane. I even have a Cortana button that let’s me initiate contact over the audio system.
Now: I get a mystery tone. My watch buzzes. Nothing big, just one of the bazillion Samsung Pay ads. Then I hear the unmistakable weird new message sound. I see a tiny scrap of it on my phone. It’s from my boss, but I can’t see it because I’m driving. I can’t tell anything to read it to me. I panic and pull over, get out my phone, open to messages and read/reply to it. No voice read, no reply hands free, all manual.

Then: Calendar alarms work.
Now: Silence.

Then: I push the camera button and take an incredibly beautiful photo (and I suck at photography). Photos are in OneDrive almost instantly.
Now: I finally figure out that double tapping power will act as a camera button and I get a mediocre photo. I have OneDrive set up to auto backup to cloud. But I have to open Photos and go into the ‘uploads’ section for it to actually start uploading.

Then: Used Huerto to control my home lighting. I have a lot of Philips Hue lights I’ve accumulated over the years and this third party app is fantastic. I have scenes, individual light control, disco effects, auto/motion sensing, timers, geolocation. All in a clean easy to use interface.
Now: The nightmare that is the first party Philips app. It’s terrible. Awful. They should be ashamed of themselves. Luckily I have Windows tablets in the house I can use instead of the phone.

I could go on and on. And the phone itself is beautiful, a wonder of engineering. But Android is nothing but frustration. And this may be entirely me set in my ways and expecting things to work conveniently for my workflow. I know that there are Android people that will now point me to a giant list of apps that probably solve each and every one of these things, some special tweak or setting, or the best one: ‘just move everything into Google’. But that’s not how I work. That’s not where my stuff is. And I don’t want to be more grist for the Google Ad mill. And after using this for four months I’ve come to a few conclusions:

1. I no longer care what the Windows pundits say about what’s useful. They can use what’s good for them. They can dump all over Windows Phone all they want but I don’t give a crap.
2. Android is a mess.
3. Google services aren’t that great.
4. The Starbuck’s app rocks.
5. The Galaxy S8+ is a beautiful piece of hardware but utterly unusable for me (a very expensive mistake).
6. My app needs are actually modest. Email, messaging, phone, corporate apps, podcasts, music, digital assistant, banking, Twitter, to-do’s, payment, photo/camera, and home automation. I have all of these.

So I packed up and went to the AT&T store, talked with a very nice person who helped me add a second line to my account and I stuck the new SIM in the Galaxy and returned my main SIM to its rightful place in my 950XL.

I have two phones now, one that’s useful (a properly reset 950XL) and one that’s basically a 6″ Android tablet that can run apps with LTE. Or actually one app–Starbuck’s. I don’t know what I will do when my 950XL finally gives up the ghost, maybe there will be some futuristic Andromeda device. Or maybe not. I live in the Microsoft ecosystem, and I found leaving it on the phone to be a huge problem–a thousand little paper cuts all during the day that really impacted my ability to get things done. And at the end of the day, that’s what my phone is, a tool to get things done…not use the latest fad app. Except Startbuck’s. That one stays.

So next time…

SATISFIED (Never). Yeah I have 3 Invokes.