A little over a year ago, I did a rundown/review of Google Sync VS SaiSuke for iPhoneinCanada.ca, which was when the ability to sync wirelessly your Google Calendars to your iOS device was still relatively new. If you could imagine a time when you physically had to sync your calendar within iTunes, it seems so long ago!

This was when I started to use my Google Calendar pretty hardcore. Like, every day pretty much. While I eventually got out of the habit of using it on my iPhone all together, once I got my iPad I knew that I’d get right back into the saddle, needing to have my updated calendar with me at all times, and most importantly, being able to update my Calendar on the go.

So, I started to use the built-in Calendar App. While it worked just fine, I really found the interaction with the software to be… almost annoying. I know that it seems like a bit anal to say, but not having the ability to swipe from month to month was the straw that broke my back into seeking out and trying SaiSuke for the iPad. I needed to see if there was a better way! I’d been so impressed with SaiSuke for iPhone I was overjoyed (and not too surprised) that they made SaiSuke for iPad.

I’m going to try to be fair in my review here, but this might just end up being a post explaining why SaiSuke is better at everything.

A few things I should mention first. One. SaiSuke is only for Google Calendar Users, so you need to be using Google Calendars (if you use iCal or Outlook or whatever, you can sync with Google Calendar and then use SaiSuke this way, see the Google Calendar Help for more info on Syncing.).

Secondly, this is a very detailed review, and I’m trying to cover nearly all aspects of using the Apps, however if I miss something, or if you have a question about a specific feature I didn’t detail or procedure I failed to mention, please feel free to comment. I’ll reply with as many details as I can muster.

Here goes:

Syncing your Calendars

Well, first thing is always first, right, you want to get your Google Calendars up into the Apps.

To import your Google Calendar into the Calendar App, you’ll have to run Google CalDAV set up within your device As Outlined Here. Now, keep in mind that because of this I had to change the way that my eMail was imported, too. No biggie. ***However after setting this up you’ll actually also have to activate Google Sync for each additional Calendars, other than your default, on your Google Account to have them show up, too. (Pay close attention to the bottom text of the link above, otherwise you’ll get lost.) There are other methods to import your Calendar, but this is the most reliable and efficient.

The benefit of this over SaiSuke is Push notifications for new events. They literally show up like, instantly.

For SaiSuke, you simply fill out your Google Login information in the settings and configure from within the App which calendars you want to show. Done and Done. You won’t get push notifications, but you can sync whenever you want. (There are specific settings in regards to this I’ll cover later).

A Note About Apps Accounts
Both Calendar and SaiSuke worth with Google Apps accounts (if you don’t know what this is, don’t worry you don’t have one). However, Calendar allows you to import several calendars from several accounts, including Apps Accounts (as long as Google Sync CalDAV is enabled via the admin). SaiSuke allows you to only log in to one Google Account at a time.

Viewing Your Calendars

(Click on the screenshots in this review to see them Full-Sized.)

Lets start with Month View. In the Calendar App, you see your events. In SaiSuke you see your events. Not much difference here. Except wait – in Saisuke you get to see an overview of whats going on Today – or any day that you select. Also, you can see that SaiSuke has a Memo Pad built-in, which is specific to each day, but available on all of the view pages. Surprisingly helpful.

There is one drawback to SaiSuke on this view. It doesn’t show the start time of each of your events on the Month-Calendar. Instead you need to select a day to see the full schedule for that day. This doesn’t bother me personally, but would like to see that changed in future.

However, what it does do that Calendar doesn’t is show overlap-day events on both days. You’ll see above that my “work” schedule on Calendar only shows up 8pm Mon-Wed. On Saisuke it shows it’s actual time 8pm-6:30am on two dates Mon-Thurs. I prefer this. Some might not.

To get details about specific events on this page you need to click on the items, in both Apps. Calendars shows you the time of the event only, while Saisuke gives you full details. See below:

Day View

This is the second most common way I view my events. I’ll simply show you the difference between the two and you can judge which you prefer (keep in mind I did click on the event for more details – so minus the pop-up on both Apps for the regular Day View).

I am going to say this one thing: SaiSuke automatically provides a link for any address that’s included in the details of the event. Super. Helpful.

List View

Again, just have a look at the difference here.. you let me know which you prefer.

This is the view without the “edit/details” popup for both.
Can someone explain to me the benefit of having my events show up twice with the Calendar App?
For both the Day and List view, they think I need to have them show me the information twice on the same page?

Finally, and I cannot stress this enough. On each view in SaiSuke you can swipe sideways to go to the next month, week, day, whatever. A feature that is lacking on Calendar, and one that makes navigating this App a dream compared to Calendar. This feature alone is worth the extra money for me, but of course there is more:

Adding/Editing Events

You can add events from any view within both Apps. I mostly use my calendars in Month View, so I’ll proceed with the rest of this review that way, probably.

Calendar is stupid, because you cannot tell which day you have selected unless you have a particular EVENT selected. It should highlight whatever day you’ve selected, this is basic stuff. In any case, adding an event in Calendar looks like this:

SaiSuke has a sort of Quick-Add feature where you can choose the date/time and event info without having to type anything. However if you want to add details, you can, here’s how that looks:

Have a previous event that you want to copy? SaiSuke has you covered. You may have noticed on the Details PopUp when you view an event in Month/Day view hat there is a ‘Copy’ button. Simply choose this with any event, and choose your new date, hit ‘Paste’ and all the same details will be used again. This is of course different than the Repeat option, which is also available on both.

Pretty simple stuff, both do what they should – while SaiSuke has event ‘Types’, and the Copy feature, it’s the only real benefit over Calendar. Other than the fact that on Calendar you can only set events on the fives of the hours (9:05, 9:10, 9:15, etc), whereas in SaiSuke you can simply choose any ol’ time you want (9:01, 9:27, etc).

Notifications

While this might not be a feature that everyone uses, I still need to mention it. Calendar has the option to add an alert for events. Its a popup and alert beep on your iPad to let you know your event is coming up.

Within Saisuke you can choose alerts too, but you can select the Popup, an Email or Text Message. Which is obviously because Google Calendars offers this. Still, far superior, don’t you think?

What SaiSuke’s got the Calendar Doesn’t.

This is where SaiSuke Shines. Settings Galore. Instead of walking you through each of them I’ll just give you a preview of the Menus:

And that last one being most important. Sync Settings. This is where it is OK that SaiSuke doesn’t have push. Not only can you sync manually from every page within the App, but you can set up your own details for auto-sync – and you can do so for Each Calendar Separately. If you only want to have one-way (Google>iPad) Sync on one of your calendars, you can do that, or the other way around. If you only want to sync your work calendar once a week – you can do that. It’s completely customizable.

So, while it was obvious going into it that I prefer SaiSuke, I hope this gives you an insight into the benefits, at least, of buying a Google Calendar App. The interaction alone with the App is worth some dollars, and all the additional superior layout, design, features and customization is what makes SaiSuke one of the best iPad Apps for productivity, and totally worth the $9.99.

The only feature I wish that were on both, or any calendar App for that matter, is the ability to sync in my Google Tasks. For the meantime however, I feel like the Memo section pretty much takes care of this on SaiSuke and I’ll be singing its praises for a while to come.

If you’ve come across a great Google Calendar App, or if you have any questions about SaiSuke, drop me a line here! I’m always on the prowl for suggestions!