Disappointed with the iPhone 5? Here are four alternatives

So, Apple sold five million iPhone 5s in the first weekend, a million more than the four million iPhone 4S devices last year. Apparently, that was below par for stock market punters, who dumped Apple stock just days after pushing it past the US$700 level.

The iPhone 5 is a well-made competitor. In the hand, it feels more solid than Samsung’s Galaxy phones and their plastic finish, and it has a great camera, as the iPhone 4S had. Yet, as we said before, Apple’s new phone just lags in several areas, like having a smaller screen and an operating system that has been playing catch-up (don’t believe me, hear the Apple gurus here).

The most apparent problem that has even the diehards at the Cult of Mac site complaining is the Maps app that is such a poor rival of Google Maps, which Apple junked in spite in iOS 6.

Still convinced you should buy yet another Apple gadget? Well, here are four other phones worth spending your precious dollars on.

HTC Windows Phone 8X
Okay, it has a rather modest 4.3-inch screen, but that’s still bigger than the iPhone 5’s stingy 4-inch display. Better yet, it runs arguably the most “different” and, dare we say, innovative, OS out there.

The tile system in Windows Phone has always made things really simple for users and the software has never been anything but zippy. With Windows Phone 8, the latest version, HTC has made a phone that also looks great with a curved finish, and has an 8-meg camera that we came away quite happy with.

Oh, and it has the faster LTE (Long Term Evolution) or 4G connectivity built in as well as near-field communications (NFC) to have the phone run as an e-wallet, among other uses. Read the hands-on here.

HTC One X
The Taiwanese firm’s flagship Android phone is a favourite of many tech journalists here but somehow that hasn’t translated to better sales, at least going by anecdotal reports from the market. What does the One X offer? Essentially a lot of great stuff inside that sturdy and quite unique polycarbonate body (read our hands-on here).

You’ll find the 4.7-inch screen large enough for surfing the Web, and some might say, to find Liverpool in the league table without scrolling down! Jokes aside, the One X comes with a quad-core CPU and Android 4 OS, which we’d argue betters what Apple puts out in its latest iOS 6.

Frankly, we only need to fire up the Maps app, which trumps Apple Maps hands down. Yeah, we know Google will release a new maps app for Apple users, but Google’s obviously not in a hurry there.

Instead of buying an iPhone 5 and getting it worse than an iPhone 4S, just get an Android phone. Log in to Google once and you’d see how well the system works out of the box to sync everything from your e-mails to contacts. Your apps are also easily restored if you choose to. iCloud? Good luck.

Nokia Lumia 920
We’ve always felt that the Lumia 800 was well-designed and a great experience for new users, despite coming to the game a little late.

The new Lumia 920 is probably the Finnish company’s final throw of the dice, together with Microsoft, before a steep fall into Blackberry territory. The all-guns-blazing effort shows.

There’s wireless charging – a gimmick, sure, but cool (imagine if Apple had that). There’s a great camera with PureView thrown in, which shoots great pictures. And the 4.5-inch screen, with Nokia’s well-known deep contrasts, finally brings Nokia in the game against the big Android phones (read more about the Lumia 920 here).

Samsung Galaxy S III
Of course, we can’t forget the phone that Apple absolutely hates – the one which many an iPhone user switched over to and never looked back from. It’s slim, has a sharp, bright, high-contrast 4.8-inch screen, runs on a fast quad-core CPU and weighs as much as a feather.

The main thing that will mark it down is its build, which Apple fans will say is cheap plastic and poorly made compared to their California-designed gizmo. But the performance here is zippy, the colours it comes in, now with even brown, are funky and it’s generally a very likeable phone (read our hands-on here). Oh, and there’s an LTE version as well.

More to come
Thing is, these four phones were unveiled before the iPhone 5, some months ago. There are a number of even newer phones out soon, from Samsung’s Galaxy Note II to a rumoured Nexus phone to be unveiled in the next few months.

In the end, the buying decision is not about the specs, we know. It’s how you connect with the phone, the touch and feel, the interface and the apps. In all aspects, these qualities are very subjective to judge.

Yet, how do you know you already have the best phone when you haven’t seen the rest? When many users switch to a new device, it’s always “hard to use” – that’s because you’ve only used one OS!

It’s telling that Android has the biggest market share still and Samsung is the biggest phone maker despite being held back by Apple’s tactics in courtrooms worldwide (outside of the US, Apple has failed to ban many Samsung devices in South Korea, Japan and Britain).

It’s also telling that Windows Phone has got such great reviews, despite the tech media’s traditional panning of Microsoft-based products as far from cool.

Bottomline: always check out the alternatives before spending some hard-earned moolah on a gizmo – even if it’s hyped to the heavens!