14 DAY TRIAL // The United States Army's Special Operations Command has been using Samsung Android devices for some time now, but it seems that it will soon switch to iPhone 6s. Previously, the Army gave its soldiers an Android Tactical Assault Kit that contained a variant of the Samsung Galaxy Note. Now, the new kit is said to come with the iPhone 6s.
The information appeared on Military.com, which reports that a source from the Army has declared that the iPhone 6s is “faster; smoother [while] Android freezes up” and must be restarted too often. The issue with the Android rose when soldiers viewed live feed from an unmanned aerial system.
When they tried to run a split screen to show the route and UAS feed, the Android smartphone would just freeze up and require a reboot. This caused the Army to lose valuable minutes during operations. Besides that, the source also mentioned that “the graphics are clear” on the iPhone.
The Army currently uses Samsung Android smartphones
The Nett Warrior system that the Army uses requires a smartphone connected to a networked radio in order to keep track of soldiers on a digital map. The handset also allows leaders to view intelligence and surveillance. Currently, the system uses a Samsung phone, but the Army intends to switch to an iPhone 6s to work with information in a more seamless way.
This isn't the first time that the US Army uses Apple products. In 2010, it handed out iPod Touch devices to soldiers deployed in various countries. The iPods were equipped with language modules depending on the country they were shipped to.
There's no information on which Galaxy Note model the Army wants to switch from, but there are some hints that it could, in fact, be the Galaxy Note II, released quite a few years ago. Therefore, it wouldn't be surprising that the Note II can't handle such complex operations and needs to be swapped with another device.