Which Mobile OS Is Best for You?

Symbian OS

Symbian is owned by a consortium of cell phone manufacturers that has specifically targeted the platform for smart phones. Products running on the Symbian OS include the upcoming Motorola MOTORIZR Z8, Nokia E- and N-series products, and the Sony Ericsson P800 and P900 series devices. Interestingly, Symbian is, by far, the most widely used platform for smart phones worldwide, although it has yet to catch on in the U.S. despite the availability of some nice devices like the Nokia E62.

Like Windows Mobile devices, a Symbian-based device is ready for action as soon as it comes out of the box. Telephone, messaging and Internet access features are the key virtues in most Symbian OS devices. Typically, these features have been tightly integrated with relevant applications in the user interface software.

Symbian OS provides three alternative user interfaces while Windows Mobile keeps the choices to one. The user interface -- UIQ, S60 or MOAP -- is customized by the device manufacturer. The user can modify the system graphics, colors and sounds but can't touch the underlying software.

Contacts, calendar, notes, calculator and other applications for managing personal information are included with the user interface software. As with Windows Mobile devices, synchronizing personal information with a PC via cable or Bluetooth is also possible.

The integration of multimedia capabilities in Symbian OS/S60, however, has room for improvement. There's nothing wrong with individual components that let you view videos or listen to music, but the lack of integration between the media player and other applications can be painful when trying to stream video or music from the Internet.

Which Platform to Choose

Symbian OS and Windows Mobile have their competitive advantages. The former has strong telephone, messaging and browser integration, while the latter comes with stronger sync and media streaming capabilities. Both operating systems allow enhancing the functionality by downloading additional software, typically at a price. However, the underlying premise is the same: What you see is what you get. By contrast, Linux devices tend to be more bare-bones out of the box, but you can customize and upgrade easily and, typically, for free.

It all comes down to user needs and skills. If you are a tech-savvy person who enjoys spending extra time with new electronic devices, examining their options, looking for support from the Internet and customizing features, you are a strong candidate for a Linux device. If you would rather walk the dog in a freezing rain than configure software for a new device, a ready-to-run product built on an established operating system software is your choice.

However, while that's the scorecard today, the technology communities aren't sitting still. Palm has announced its intention to migrate its Palm OS-based software assets to Linux. Apple is about to launch iPhone, which will run on OS X, a Unix-based software. Both companies have a track record of delighting customers with easy-to-use products that work out of the box without any extra work.

If vendors such as those can leverage the ability to customize Linux devices with the ease of setup found with Symbian OS and Windows Mobile devices, Linux could easily catch on -- big time -- as a mainstream mobile platform.

A more than 20-year consulting and marketing career has taken Ari Hakkarainen across the world in high-tech business. In addition to having authored a book about smart phones, he is the mobile expert at Avec Mobile.