I am what you could call an Apple user of Day One.
I've been using Apple products and Mac computers for as long as I can remember, from the Power Macintosh that my parents had in the family room, to my first iBook, to multiple iPod iterations.
When the first iPhone came out in 2007, I was dazzled. I saved my earnings from my summer work at a swimming club and I bought it a few weeks after it arrived in the stores. Like just about everyone who has ever had an iPhone, I loved it.
Over the years, I improved semi-regularly every two years: 3GS, 4S, 5S, 6S. Each time, I had the idea to try the Google Android operating system. I played with high-end Android phones from the AT & T store, read a little about how much the ecosystem was more "open" – and finally stuck with the iPhone.
On this past cycle, however, I held as long as possible. My 6S was still intact after three years, operating at a speed adequate for what I needed. The new bells and whistles of new generations of iPhones have rarely been so amazing – 3D Touch, Face ID, a missing headphone jack – so why bother to upgrade?
Then my battery has stopped holding something that looks like a reasonable charge even after using Apple's battery replacement program. Calls and service began to drop regularly for no apparent reason.
In October, I had to admit: it was time to change phones.
The new Apple phones feel less profitable
Spencer Platt / Getty Images
In reviewing Apple's options, I had the creepy feeling that there was simply not much value to be had. The high end options – the iPhone X and its successor, the XS – seemed of a derisory price, at $ 999.
As I was constantly moving for work, I needed an unlocked phone that works with any operator, which means I would not use the upgrade program immobilized of the latter to pay the phone in pieces. I would pay the total price initially for use with any carrier anywhere in the world.
Although smartphones look more like minicomputers equipped with cameras, $ 900 or $ 1,000 for a phone seemed absurd – especially when you have the impression that they rarely last more than two years. On the other hand, my digital cameras remain relevant for at least five years.
The less expensive option of Apple at $ 599, the iPhone 8, was a more or less marginal improvement over the 6S. The XR, the option just below the XS, costs at least $ 750, which is still a lot of money.
My choice seemed to be to pay an arm and a leg to get a good phone or pay $ 599 for a slightly newer version of the phone I already had.
I felt as if Apple had forced my hand. I can not be the only one.
I first tried a budget Android phone and found that even a $ 300 phone can do just about anything an average person wants
The Moto G6. Antonio Villas-Boas / Business Insider
I started looking at other options of – panting! – Android phone manufacturers.
At first, I took a look at the budget options and I opted for the $ 230 Moto G6, which many consider to be the most economical phone at the moment. I ordered it on Amazon, because of its easy return policy, and I switched when the phone arrived two days later.
It took a few hours for the phone to work as I saw fit, with the required applications and settings changed, but to tell the truth, it was easier than I thought. I've been using Google Photos for backup for about a year, my email was going through Gmail and pretty much every other major application I'd been using in the cloud (Adobe Lightroom, Instagram, WeChat, WhatsApp, Spotify, etc.). All I had to do was to download my apps again and log in.
Even at $ 230, the phone was much faster than my 6S and could handle all the apps I was running. The reality is that unless you try to run games that use a lot of graphics, just about every smartphone you choose nowadays will work perfectly.
Read more: I hardly noticed a difference when I used this $ 250 smartphone after using $ 800 phones for years
While I was using the phone for a week, I was constantly finding little things that I liked in Android.
Double tap the power button to open the camera application really changes the deal for me as a street photographer. It is all the more possible to obtain elusive images.
The launcher of the operating system applications (ie the home screen) is editable in the configuration of your choice, with the possibility of running the launcher. add widgets for weather or multiple time zones, as well as a Google search bar.
No matter which Android user will laugh at it, but for an iPhone user accustomed to infinite grids of applications, it's a huge improvement. Apple has not really updated the appearance of iOS for years. You could say that it's a case of "if it's not broken, do not fix it", but there is something to be said for trying new ideas.
I have noticed other useful modifications.
Notifications seem more customizable and rely on artificial intelligence. If you continue to reject them, Google detects them and gives you the option to no longer display them. This saves me time in my settings and in the individual notification configuration of each application.
I am sure that iOS users can sympathize. At one point in the use of my iPhone, I stopped looking at the notification screen because it was so cluttered with information that I did not need it and that I have never asked for.
And that without going into detail about the usefulness and precision of Google Assistant. Even if it is not quite as precise as Amazon's Alexa, it is much better than the Apple's Siri (although I admit that I'm still getting used to Assistant).
The camera on this discount phone was dull. I therefore decided to try the best kept secret of smartphones: the OnePlus 6T.
A photo taken by the Moto G6 in low light. Antonio Villas-Boas / Business Insider
The Achilles heel of the Moto G6 was the camera. There was no way to get around it.
The phone's camera was not even comparable to that of my 6S camera, 3 years old, not to mention that of a newer Apple phone. It's hard to be crazy about that for a $ 230 phone, but as a passionate photographer, I would not be happy in the long run.
It was at that time that I heard about OnePlus from a colleague of the technical office, Antonio Villas-Boas, who called 6T the Chinese company "the best smartphone that you have never heard of ".
While I had never heard of the company, OnePlus has developed a loyal customer base for its high-end but affordable phones over the past five years. He released the OnePlus 6T, his latest release, in October, for rave reviews, including from my colleague.
At $ 580, it was more expensive than the Moto G6 but still cheaper than almost every iPhone. And critics said that it could compete with flagship smartphones such as the iPhone X or the Google Pixel.
"I have the impression of cheating with a smartphone that costs $ 550 at the base and does everything I want, just as well as the other phones I've tried this year," he said. wrote Villas-Boas in October.
I decided to give him a chance.
The OnePlus works like a $ 900 phone for a fraction of the price.
The OnePlus 6T. Antonio Villas-Boas / Business Insider
After about three weeks of using the phone, I agree with the commentators: the OnePlus 6T is also good. Fast, it has most high-end features like the more expensive phones, such as the iPhone X and the Pixel, and even features new, sophisticated technologies like its built-in fingerprint sensor.
Read more: The OnePlus 6T at $ 550 gives me the impression of cheating in a world where smartphones cost $ 750 or more
Nevertheless, I was worried about how the camera would work.
At the time when I bought the 6T, my girlfriend bought the iPhone XR. As we traveled last month, we compared the catch as we went.
Although I would not say that the 6T's camera is clearly better than the XR's, it's a very competitive race. There are lighting situations in which the XR outperforms the 6T and others where the 6T outperforms the XR.
Most of the time, it's a matter of taste. 6T images tend to be more saturated and have deeper blacks, while XR photos tend to be more detailed.
But then, I discovered one of the joys of using Android: the opening of the platform and its superfan community. On the OnePlus subreddit, I found that some astute developers had imported Google's proprietary GCam application which, on Pixel, was described as the best smartphone camera on the market.
A picture taken at night in Dubai with the OnePlus 6T using GCam. It's the moon in the background.Harrison Jacobs / Business Insider
Although I do not use GCam all the time, nor even most of the time, because the application is not perfectly stable – complications of not being an official version sanctioned by Google – I used it for special situations, like the night. The GCam night mode combined with the OnePlus 6T's camera detonates the XR from the water. It's crazy good.
And the simple fact of adjusting the phone to my needs has seemed fun, which my iPhone has not done for years.
I found a big problem with the move from iOS to Android: abandon iMessage
IMessage of Apple. Apple
IMessage is the main obstacle to swapping an iOS user. Apple has done a sneaky and clever thing by integrating its messaging system stuck in the default SMS application.
Since most of my friends and family are on iOS – and everyone is apparently allergic to "green bubbles" – I suddenly found myself in the unenviable position of trying to persuade my immediate surroundings of 39, use WhatsApp.
The more I use Android, the more I am convinced that iMessage is the only major difference between operating systems. Of course, there are others, ranging from the Apple iCloud service to the generally better security of the Apple operating system, but the most visible barrier for most iOS users is the abandonment of iMessage.
And I'm not going to lie: it's painful. Although I do not mind WhatsApp, iMessage definitely feels like a smoother and cleaner email service. At this point, if something will take me back to iOS in a few years, that will probably be the case.
But for the moment, I do not regret the change. It was delicious.
