Here's a twist for you... I've got an i8000 (Omnia II) which I'm more than happy with...
OK, some background:
1) The main reason I got it was because it was about the 'best' handset I could get, while still receiving a free Samsung 40" 1080P telly (yes, I know nothing's ever free etc. etc. - but I got a pretty decent telly when I needed one, without spending a penny, the bonus was I got a better deal on my phone service and still made a saving on the line-rental (saving about £20/month)).
2) Yup, it's a Windows Mobile 6.5 powered device. That means it's not got anything like the application support (certainly in terms of toys/games etc.) of an iPhone, or an Android based device (don't worry, I'm more than aware of the issues with WinMo, and how Microsoft have just about one chance left to grab some meaningful share of a market which they pretty much created ~10 years ago with WinCE devices - so much so that I've written a draft white paper on it).
However...
I've just been hacking the hell out of the little fella. I've had a number of WinMo handsets over the years, and yes (as indicated in my little report for MS) they've all never quite been as good as they could've been - until making use of some of the amazing work done by the folks on the hacking/development circuit.
So now it runs a very much stripped-out WM 6.5.3 build, with only the MS/Samsung 'extras' which I like installed - this makes it a much quicker/lighter base environment. I've got SPB Mobile Shell on it as the front end, which is very tidy looking, very customisable, and really quick. I've got SPB Weather on there, which gives me decent weather forecasting (inc animated satellite/RADAR imaging etc.); SPB Radio for streaming internet radio - which plays more or less any common type of stream, and perfectly over 3G too. For web browsing I'm using Opera 10, and I've got Flash Lite 7 installed (which might not be quite as good as Mozilla on a PC, but as far as mobile internet goes, it's impressively fully featured). I've got Core Player for media playback, which will play a boat load of audio and video formats very nicely. Google Maps is there too, with satellite imaging, driving directions and searching by voice. I've got my Sky application on there, which while it doesn't allow live streaming video, gives me access to their news and sport pages; plus full remote recording for Sky+. There's a very capable YouTube client, and a nicely tweaked (so it's happy to play over 3G on any provider) BBC iPlayer client too. An RDP/Windows Remote Desktop client, Live messenger and Pocket Outlook with Exchange (inc. Push) support are all cute too. There
may be Swype installed for text-input too (it was cheekily ripped from a Verizon (US) ROM). WMWiFiRouter is cool too (share 3G or WiFi over USB/Bluetooth/WiFi). I've not installed TomTom Navigator as yet, but it won't be long (and is wholly possible - and folks are working on a driver to use the built-in FM radio as a TMC traffic receiver
)
It's not for everyone, and there's a bit of hacking and flashing involved to get it to this stage; but actually (imho) it takes WinMo (even before WP7) out of the bin, and brings it very much back to the table.
As I say, there aren't all the toys and games available which are found on the iPhone and increasingly Android, but there are a few cute little things to play with out there. I honestly can't come up with anything that'd be
really useful to me which I can't do with it now.
...And there we get back to that white paper. It's all about where MS have given the market away to Apple and Google, because it's only ever been about 75% as good as it should be out-of-the-box; which despite how much fun it is to do some MS-bashing, genuinely is a bit of a shame. Still, if you're brave/stupid/know what you're doing tinkering with ROMs, you might not have an iPhone killer on your hands, but you can 'create' something which competes pretty damn well.
I'm also keeping an eye on a project which is progressing reasonably to port Android to the handset, just in case I fancy a change
The telly's not bad either :thumbsup:
All the best,
Rob.