Those who switched to an Android phone, how is it getting along with the iPad?

[gdourado]

Hello, how are you?
I currently have an iPhone 5. I have had it since November 2012 and for the most part, I have enjoyed it.
However, recently I have been reading quite a lot about the new android phones, namely the HTC One, Galaxy S4, LG G2. They have gotten me interested.
I have became kind of bored by the lack of hardware innovations on the iPhone and the fact that it seems the next iPhone to be released will use the same 4 inch display with the same resolution... Also, I haven't seen anything pretty exciting about IOS 7...

All this leaves me with the will to try out an Android flagship. I have a few doubts holding me back...

I use iCloud and Gmail for my email and have both on the mail app. They also sync great with my iPad and MacBook Pro.
I also use iCloud for my calendar and contacts.

I know I can migrate my calendar and contacts to the equivalent google apps and then sync them over to the iPad and MacBook.

I also use iTunes as a music manager with many gigs of mp3s.

So, if you had an iPhone and moved to android, how is your android getting along with the apple tablets and computers?
Any words of advice or recommendations?

Thank you for taking the time.
Regards!

 

[bwhinnen]

I've recently done this. My current ownership works like this:

iPad with Retina
MacBook Air 11"
Mac Pro (Hack)
HTC One

My primary email account is a personal one on my own domain so that was no problem as I use z-push and that works for both iOS and Android. But I also have a gmail and iCloud account and both work equally as well.

My contacts and calendar are both in the iCloud and I use two apps to sync these with Android (seamlessly).

SmoothSync for Cloud Contacts
SmoothSync for Cloud Calendar

I also use another app from the same author for tasks from iCloud.

Tasks

This means that I have full two-way access to my iCloud data I can use any custom calendar I had previously or newly create and can also choose not to sync some if I want to. Contacts also work perfectly, just note that SmoothSync will give you another app for creating and editing contacts but on Jelly Bean this is not needed so just use the in-built contacts editor.

Of course you can use any CalDAV or CardDAV sync program, but these two work with just inputting your iCloud account name and password, no extra configuration.

Music on the other hand is a little different but I double up on mine. My iTunes library is around 5,000 items and 40GB in size all in iTunes Match. What I did was also use the Google Play Music service (the free one) that allows me to match my songs in the Google cloud, then I use the Google Play Music app. When I installed the application on OS X it gave me the option to monitor my iTunes library location and automatically upload / match songs to Google. This also includes playlists. I then (through the app on the phone) get to decide what I want to keep locally, I use a playlist to do this and it automatically keeps the music on the phone (do this over WiFi ).

Google Play Music webpage
Google Play Music app
Google Play Music OS X app

I also switched to Evernote for notes and such and WhatsApp Messenger for messaging, but the latter requires all your friends do too as there is no replacement for iMessages

Hope this helps you out some.

Brett

 

[jamojamo]

I've recently done this. My current ownership works like this:

iPad with Retina
MacBook Air 11"
Mac Pro (Hack)
HTC One

My primary email account is a personal one on my own domain so that was no problem as I use z-push and that works for both iOS and Android. But I also have a gmail and iCloud account and both work equally as well.

My contacts and calendar are both in the iCloud and I use two apps to sync these with Android (seamlessly).

SmoothSync for Cloud Contacts
SmoothSync for Cloud Calendar

I also use another app from the same author for tasks from iCloud.

Tasks

This means that I have full two-way access to my iCloud data I can use any custom calendar I had previously or newly create and can also choose not to sync some if I want to. Contacts also work perfectly, just note that SmoothSync will give you another app for creating and editing contacts but on Jelly Bean this is not needed so just use the in-built contacts editor.

Of course you can use any CalDAV or CardDAV sync program, but these two work with just inputting your iCloud account name and password, no extra configuration.

Music on the other hand is a little different but I double up on mine. My iTunes library is around 5,000 items and 40GB in size all in iTunes Match. What I did was also use the Google Play Music service (the free one) that allows me to match my songs in the Google cloud, then I use the Google Play Music app. When I installed the application on OS X it gave me the option to monitor my iTunes library location and automatically upload / match songs to Google. This also includes playlists. I then (through the app on the phone) get to decide what I want to keep locally, I use a playlist to do this and it automatically keeps the music on the phone (do this over WiFi ).

Google Play Music webpage
Google Play Music app
Google Play Music OS X app

I also switched to Evernote for notes and such and WhatsApp Messenger for messaging, but the latter requires all your friends do too as there is no replacement for iMessages

Hope this helps you out some.

Brett

Very helpful post, thank you. I do have one question.

I have been manually maintaining my Contacts and Calendar on iCloud and Google so they are currently in synch but I am tired of the double entry. If I use Smoothsync will it duplicate existing entries or will it just start with anything "new" I add after I install? Basically if it will just synch from "today onwards" I would be great.

Thanks

 

[bwhinnen]

Very helpful post, thank you. I do have one question.

I have been manually maintaining my Contacts and Calendar on iCloud and Google so they are currently in synch but I am tired of the double entry. If I use Smoothsync will it duplicate existing entries or will it just start with anything "new" I add after I install? Basically if it will just synch from "today onwards" I would be great.

Thanks

That is a good question. I don't have any contacts on my Google account. In theory you can join the contacts together as one contact, but personally I'd take a backup of the Google ones and then delete and just use iCloud from then on.

Let us know how you get on

 

[AppleCruncher]

Very helpful post, thank you. I do have one question.

I have been manually maintaining my Contacts and Calendar on iCloud and Google so they are currently in synch but I am tired of the double entry. If I use Smoothsync will it duplicate existing entries or will it just start with anything "new" I add after I install? Basically if it will just synch from "today onwards" I would be great.

Thanks

Just get rid of iCloud and use google. Everything stays in sync across all devices. I have a mini, a macbook pro, iPad2 and a Galaxy S3 and everything is in google and stays in sync. Calendar, contacts, email......all that. I also use dropbox on the S3 and it takes all my pictures and syncs them much like photostream.

 

[TacticalDesire]

I've got an Android phone and an iPad and I couldn't be happier with the combination. Everything plays nice with Google apps on both platforms. I don't use much icloud. Skydrive, Google Drive, Chrome, Gmail and Dropbox. Plus whatever apps I have on each device. Works great. Best of both worlds.

 

[Technarchy]

So far so good.

With the following, I can approximate 90% of what iOS does, with a couple of niggles here and there, and my iPad and Macbook Air are perfectly in sync.


Google+
Google Drive
Google Hangouts
Google Now
Google Calendar
Chrome
Skype

 

[JackieInCo]

Just get rid of iCloud and use google. Everything stays in sync across all devices. I have a mini, a macbook pro, iPad2 and a Galaxy S3 and everything is in google and stays in sync. Calendar, contacts, email......all that. I also use dropbox on the S3 and it takes all my pictures and syncs them much like photostream.

I tried using my Google account to keep contacts and calendar in sync between a Nexus 4, Nexus 7, iPad, 4S and 3GS. If added an event in the calendar on the Nexus 7, it never seemed to make it the iPhones/iPad. I just gave up and use iCloud for the Apple side and Google for the Android side and just copy stuff back and forth.

 

[strausd]

Hello, how are you?
I currently have an iPhone 5. I have had it since November 2012 and for the most part, I have enjoyed it.
However, recently I have been reading quite a lot about the new android phones, namely the HTC One, Galaxy S4, LG G2. They have gotten me interested.
I have became kind of bored by the lack of hardware innovations on the iPhone and the fact that it seems the next iPhone to be released will use the same 4 inch display with the same resolution... Also, I haven't seen anything pretty exciting about IOS 7...

All this leaves me with the will to try out an Android flagship. I have a few doubts holding me back...

I use iCloud and Gmail for my email and have both on the mail app. They also sync great with my iPad and MacBook Pro.
I also use iCloud for my calendar and contacts.

I know I can migrate my calendar and contacts to the equivalent google apps and then sync them over to the iPad and MacBook.

I also use iTunes as a music manager with many gigs of mp3s.

So, if you had an iPhone and moved to android, how is your android getting along with the apple tablets and computers?
Any words of advice or recommendations?

Thank you for taking the time.
Regards!

For email, get the K9 email app for Android. It is one of the best.

For contacts and calendars, just straight up stop using iCloud. Because using it will wall you in and keep you from future devices. Move everything to Google now and you will have much more freedom. Why use a proprietary service that locks you into one ecosystem when you can use a service that works on every ecosystem? It is extremely easy to do, especially if you are on a Mac.
http://lifehacker.com/5944188/get-google-and-ios-living-together-in-perfect-harmony

Get the Google Music Manager. It is basically iTunes Match, except you don't have to pay $25 a year.

 

[THE JUICEMAN]

I am thinking about going this route too. For those who have, is it the best of both worlds?

I'm thinking my setup could be the Nexus 4(2013) and the iPad 5th generation. All of my email, contacts and calendars are already contained in Google services. What would I be missing out on by not having my iPhone 5 paired with my iPad??

 

[tbayrgs]

I also recommend moving all services entirely to Google. I previously maintained contacts and calendar using iCloud and used the aforementioned SmoothSync apps to stay synced on Google. The worked well enough but didn't want to rely on a third party developer to make sure this worked going forward. I also tend to swap/upgrade devices somewhat frequently and using Google services is generally far easier across multiple platforms.

I use Macs, an iPad Mini, an HTC One, and a Chromebook and everything stays perfectly synced with my Google account.

I also keep my photos synced from my phone to my iPhoto library via Dropbox and an Automator script to import new photos from my HTC One whenever I'm on wifi. It also still allows me to use Photostream if I wish to view/share those same photos on my Apple devices.

I tried using my Google account to keep contacts and calendar in sync between a Nexus 4, Nexus 7, iPad, 4S and 3GS. If added an event in the calendar on the Nexus 7, it never seemed to make it the iPhones/iPad. I just gave up and use iCloud for the Apple side and Google for the Android side and just copy stuff back and forth.

Sorry to hear you were having problems but my guess is there was most likely something wrong with the setup on the iOS devices. In the past I believe syncing of on iOS devices was done with Google Sync as an Exchange account but don't think Google isn't supporting this any longer. I was having a few hiccups keeping contact current on my iPad and realized I still had it set up using this method. Since I have set up syncing contacts/calendar using CardDAV and CalDAV, no further problems.