DIY Touchscreen Analysis reveals that the iPhone does, while the DROID doesn't?

By on Jan 10, 2010 at 9:55 AM
General January 10, 2010

diytouchscreenanalysis3

The folks over at MOTO Labs (not related to Motorola) demonstrated a DIY yourself technique that allows the average person to easily compare touchscreen performance between multiple handsets. The test is performed by opening a drawing application on the test handset and drawing a diagonal pattern of straight lines very slowly on the screen. A good touchscreen will produce straight linear lines, while a poor touchscreen will produce wavy lines. To demonstrate the technique, MOTO Labs did a comparison test between the Apple iPhone, Google Nexus One, Motorola DROID and HTC DROID Eris. The clear winner in most of the tests was the iPhone which produced straight lines but with curving and sensitivity loss at the edges of the screen. The Nexus One and DROID Eris fall slightly below the iPhone with both handsets performing equally well, producing straight lines with some waviness and good sensitivity at the edge of the screen. At the bottom of the pack was the Motorola DROID which showed significant waviness and “stair-stepping” in all tests. These results might definitely mean something to the average user as a touchscreen that tracks poorly has a higher likelihood of misinterpreting touch input, and apparently imprecision even as small as a millimeter or two can make a significant difference when using a small on-screen keyboard or selecting text for editing. The video demonstrating the test and its results are after the jump. Watch it and let us know what you think. Is the DROID really as bad as the results show or is this test somehow skewed?

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  • Mrwirez

    Wow a Brand New Website with ONE Thought.. Geesh.. Apple is going all out. A hired Business Manager??

    WhoIs:
    Registrant:
    JJ ENTERPRISE
    EAST CHICAGO
    CHICAGO, Indiana 46312
    United States

  • bob a

    bullshit

  • Frawley

    I’m surprised that Luke Wilson didn’t perform the test….

  • JakeyBoy

    its not like it was a photo…there is video proof…

  • http://YourNexusOne.com Donna

    > The test is performed by opening a
    > drawing application

    ANY drawing application?

    Even the ones written very poorly… that don’t read the screen correctly… and don’t draw on the screen correctly… and are written in different languages?

    That tests “the screen quality” equally in all apps… and all cell phones?

  • Patrick

    is there any word on weather or not this phone will be available for US CDMA networks??

  • Henry

    unless they use the same drawing app from the same developer then the test would be more accurate but still would never be precise due to the OS differences. I call a BS on the video. another apple fanboy smh

  • Ryan

    no one cares

    • http://www.smallfish-bigpond.com Kerensky97

      Yeah me and all the other stylus users out there are laughing that this is even an issue on “advanced” phones. Not only are our lines straight with a finger but when we have something pointy to use we can get enough accuracy to write words.

  • Magnious

    Yeah, I agree. For this to be accurate, you need to use the same drawing app. I call fail on this test, since it isn’t the same app.

  • Antonio

    OK my buddy did it on his iPhone and I did this on my Droid. The lines look the same, pretty straight and NOTHING like they show in the video. So WTF were they using besides purposely fudging the results

  • Electro

    Sorry, but there are really too many factors that can change from test to test for this to be an accurate test.

    Finger pressure, movement speed, line angle, drawing application (and more imporantly, how often touch coordinates are sampled, either by the OS or the application), finger tremor (likely exacerbated after several concurrent tests), and likely several other factors that myself, not being a mobile electronics engineer, would not know about.

    The long and the short of it is, unless you have robots doing this test with capacitive styluses on drawing apps that all are fed touch coordinates at the same rate.

    While these DIY tests are good in concept, and probably do shed some light on the quality of touch accuracy on these devices, I would not go so far to say that a test like this, subject to so much room for error and inconsistency between tests, can be used as a reliable method of comparing the devices.

  • Ribbz

    lmao i did the same test and it looked just as good as the iphone’s…i am very happy with the touch input of the droid. thanks for the mis-information!

  • http://www.applebythehour.com jarrett

    ALERT!!! ALERT!!!

    A story all “smartphone” users should see. Especially Android users and especially WebOS users. I made mention of the 77% of phones sold through Orange Telecom in December carried on one OS. I couldn’t believe the actual number myself. After all, this is only one carrier, in one not so large country…..

    http://web.me.com/u1019/applebythehour/AppleByTheHour.html

  • 2shoes

    What a joke of a test, and a better joke is purporting it to be scientific evidence of actual capabilities.

    This test, has no value what so ever, no linear tracking, its a school yard show down ploy.

    Can’t trust anything once it get big, greed an biasism creep in an distort reality which is evident of BGR an Engadget, Fan boy blog sites.

    I can say both are more entertaining then educational/factual about any electronic piece of equipment they have reviewed.

    I look ahead smiling thinking of some idiot quoting one of BGR’s review tests to prove superiority about, anything, ever.

    Its a Joke of a site, is good for laughs at least.

  • Jon

    Anybody that has used the onscreen keyboard on the Droid can confirm these findings. It’s a horrendous typing experience.

    • tullster

      I have no trouble typing on my on-screen Droid keyboard…same pleasant experience as my iTouch.

    • Durango Jim

      better take your Parkinson’s meds

  • Droid Lover

    HA – my lines are straighter than your lines – nanny nanny BOO BOO!

  • Dark Cobra

    Even the suggestion that anything coming from BGR is “scientific” doesn’t even pass the laugh test. Get a clue BGR.

  • http://www.icanhasbottle.com Jeff

    Retarded test. I was all worried so I downloaded a drawing app on my droid and my lines look just like those on the iphone.

  • diavlo

    There has been a lot of hype and tension erupted after the unveiling of the nexus one. Today, we are seeing some of the errors and glitches that a future user may want to look before buying the N1 phone. As they said, 530 USD has never became cheap. Details:: http://bit.ly/nexus-one-disadvantages-compiled-details

  • Dennis

    Yah, I only use the onscreen kb on the DROID & I have no issues what so ever.

  • Michael

    Droid owner here who also failed to believe this was true. So I tested it.

    It does indeed draw “wavy” lines when you SLOWLY go at an angle across the screen.

    Just test yourself.
    1) Slowly draw a line HORIZONTALLY across your screen, you can get a straight line.
    2) Slowly draw a line AT AN ANGLE across your screen, you will get the wavy line.

  • Jamal Zayyad

    HMM INTERESTING!, NEXUS ONE IS STILL GREAT PHONE #1 IN MY BOOKS, ERIS IS REAL NICE TOO

  • Mario

    Imagine my score on Poke a Mole on an Iphone! I could care less I still love my Droid.

  • Jarrod Brittain

    I’m wondering if the density of the glass that the moto droid uses has something to do with the waviness. I heard it’s pretty strong.

  • cmos_master

    Guys…don’t be fooled. I’m sure those results are accurate for the particular phone they were testing. The reality is, these capacitive touch screens are all barely usable. Its a new technology that is extremely noise sensitive. My coworker did development on the multitouch screen for the ZuneHD. The ZuneHD actually has a much better touchscreen than anything out there on the market. The science behind the magic curtain is actually quite simple. There is a huge amount of noise, and the engineers are playing games to keep the voltage on the sense lines low(read conserve power) but keep it high enough so that a touch is above the noise floor. Keep in mind they are dealing with minute changes in capacitance. If you really want to understand and you have an electrical engineering background or think you might be able to understand check out this e-learning course

    http://www.techonline.com/learning/course/218600097?site_id=TechOnline&queryText=capacitive+touch

    I’m sure not all droids(or iphones or anything else) are created equal. Some might have worse power noise built in than others(we’re talking about nanovolts here). Test your own phone and if it sucks try to return it as bad hardware.

  • betchplz

    Actually, if you look in the video the buttons are black and not chrome.

  • http://www.applebythehour.com jarrett

    @ LaToya,

    And yet you keep coming back. I am sure BGR appreciates the added hits though.

  • betchplz

    The iPhone 3G was an almost complete redesign. The screen is cheaper, and the digitizer was changed/revised/fixed because the 2G has serious problems with it going dead in complete strips. I have a 3G and sensitivity at the edges is better than it looks in these pics.

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