Until few years ago, choosing a phone was not so much tricky. One only had to decide between brands. But with each brands bringing best of the hardware it is tough to only judge mobile on the basis of its looks, processor, storage capacity, camera, etc… The selection of the perfect mobile today largely depends upon the OS. Ease of use, availability of apps, graphics and all such software related features depends upon the OS. Lets see the OS options available today in the mobile market.
Symbian
This may the OS that many of you must have used on your first phone. Not too long ago, this was the most popular mobile OS. But with the coming of all other OS today, the market share of Symbian is dropping day-by-day. Symbian is a good solid OS for someone looking for ease of use and good performance. Symbian has got reasonable amount of apps both free and paid. This OS is also known for its good support of e-mail and efficient use of Battery. This OS not only supports high end or smartphones but also low end phones, thus you will find a lot of devices running the Symbian OS at every price points. The major versions of the Symbian OS are..
- Symbian S40: Due to its low hardware requirements this version is commonly seen on budget handsets. Though, not many consider it has a smartphone OS it still has Social Networking and E-mail capability.
- Symbian S60: These version again contains 2 editions. The ‘3rd edition’ is great for handling email communication and multi-tasking. Nokia E-Series devices use this version of the OS. The ‘5th edition’ of the OS is meant for touch screen devices, but is still buggy at time.
- Symbian ˆ3: This is the most latest version of the OS and is great for touch screen phones. It is far better then the pervious S60 and offers features like multi-tasking, mails and a good battery life.
Devices which use Symbian OS:
Nokia E7 (Symbian ˆ3), Nokia X6 (Symbian S60 – 5th Edition) & Nokia E72 (Symbian S60 – 3rd Edition)
Android
It was launched in late 2007. Since then Android has taken the smartphones market by storm. Today, Andriod outsells Symbian. The reason for this OS being so successful is the ease of use it offers to the users. It is internet friendly and has thousands of applications. This OS is not only available for the mobile platform but also for Tablet PC. There are 3 major versions of the OS in the market, which are
- Eclair (2.0/2.1): This is considered as the first user friendly version of the OS. Android Eclair, released on October 26th 2009, introduced many new and exciting features for users and developers. It offered a great user interface with support for live wallpapers. It also supported for Exchange ActiveSync to synchronize email, contacts and calender. The browser supported double-tap zoom and HTML5.
- Froyo (2.2): The name Froyo is derived from the words Frozen Yoghurt. This version is faster then Eclair and has support for Adobe Flash.
- Gingerbread (2.3): With the introduction of this version the UI was improved a lot and was more power-efficient. It is still finding its way on to most mobile handsets. The keyboard is redesigned which helps in faster and more intuitive text input.
The only drawback with Andriod OS is that the user has to depend on the manufacturer ti get their version updated.
Devices which use Android OS:
Motorola Charm (2.1), HTC Incredible S (2.2), OliveSmart (2.3)
BadaOS
This one is from Samsung. Samsung too joined the OS wagon last year with is own operating system. This OS, much like Android, offers multi-tasking ability and is web friendly. Samsung Wave series feature this OS and are very successful. The reason Bada is not so popular is because of lack of apps. As compared to Smybian and Android, Bada lacks a good apps library. But unlike other OS Bada has an icon driven user interface which is simple and easy to use.
There are only a limited number of devices available today in the market which has this OS viz., Samsung Wave and Samsung Wave 2
In my next post we will be discussing on other mobile OS viz., iOS by Apple, Blackberry OS and Windows Phone. If you have any comments, suggestions or queries please leave a comment below.
