Motorola Droid - my first impressions

I've had my Droid for almost 24 hours now. There are some things I love about it and a few things I don't!

My wife bought the first Android phone (T-mobile G1) in November 2008. As a geek I was really impressed with the way the OS holds together. Using it is a pleasure, unlike the frustrating experience of using a Windows Mobile device, which I've been burdened with for several years now.

The only reason I hadn't moved away from WinMo earlier is that I really need Exchange support for our corporate e-mail. Whilst I could have used IMAP, it just doesn't work as nicely as native Exchange support.

Well, Android 2.0 came out with Exchange sync support so I could resist no longer.

Here are my notes on the Droid so far:

Pros:

• The screen - it is gorgeous. Big, bright and crisp. Makes web browsing on a portable device enjoyable again.
• Android OS - whereas WinMo seems to have been developed for functionality not form, and the iPhone for form not functionality, Android has got the perfect mix of both for me. It looks good where it needs to but without distracting from the actual use of the device. Plus it's open source, and I can develop on Windows in a standard language without paying a penny to The Man.
• It just works - all of it. Without any exceoption (so far). I found myself continually making excuses for WinMo phones.
• Notifications bar - any notifications (email, chat, low battery, missed calls etc) show in a single bar at the top of the app. To view, you drag the bar down. This is so much better than the typical nasty user interface of popup dialog boxes.
• Google - integration with many of Google's services is excellent. When you first activate the Droid you login to Google. From there you instantly have access to Gmail and Gtalk. Installing further services such as Google Finance, Voice etc picks up your account straight away without more logging in.
• The apps - OK so the iPhone has ten time as many apps as Android. But seeing as 99% of iPhone apps are useless anyway, who cares. Nearly all WinMo apps are expensive. Android has a good amount of free useful apps, and those that you have to pay for are cheap enough.
• Google Navigation - free turn-by-turn navigation has been lacking from all small devices for too long. Google's offering is superb, despite a few niggles (see below). Voice search for places and addresses is excellent.
• Design - this looks like a serious phone. Not a bubbly, fluffy stupid basic phone, and not a pretentious "you're too dumb to use more than one button" iPhone. The case is metal and strong, and whilst a little heavier than I would like, it's substantial enough to know it's in your pocket.
• One-button search and voice search - searches contacts, web, applications, facebook contacts etc. Superb! Strangely though it doesn't search your MP3 libraries.
• Price - costs $199 after $100 mail-in rebate, which is a great price for a phone of this caliber. Even better, I persuaded Verizon to give me one for $50!
• USB drive mount - plug the Droid into your PC, choose "mount" and you're navigating through the SD card (comes with 16GB) making it really easy to copy music, videos etc around. I've read reviews saying that most people find this cumbersome and hate the lack of a proper media sync application. Personally I hate iTunes and similar apps, I much prefer this method.
• Verizon 3G - with a network this fast, I find myself not even bothering with Wifi connections. The speed test apps (by http://speedtest.net) shows me 2Mb down, 1Mb up.
• Verizon have kept their hands off it - the only dirty dealing I can see that Verizon have had with the Droid is in the Market application - there's a Verizon tab in there. My previous phone (HTC Touch Pro) was so messed up by Verizon's software it was totally unusable until I flashed it with a 3rd party ROM.
• 3.5mm headphone jack - Yeah!

Cons:

• Pullout keyboard - the movement feels a bit rough, and the keys themselves are small for my fat fingers. Plus the layout is weird (Enter key is too small, shift keys too small and no dedicated number keys, plus the D-pad is in an annoying place) The keyboard on my Touch Pro was the only great thing about that device, it's a shame Motorola couldn't do better. However, the on-screen keyboard works really well so I find myself using that most of the time.
• Google Nav robot voice - whilst I love that Google Nav reads out the names of the streets you need to turn onto, the voice can be hard to understand with road noise and the car radio playing.
• Corporate Calendar - visually this isn't great and you have to look longer at it to understand what you're seeing. Plus controls aren't very intuitive. ie if you're in month view then click on a specific day, subsequently clicking the BACK button takes you back to the home screen. Why doesn't it take me back to month view?
• Camera - quality isn't great for a 5MP camera. Not really a huge issue as I have dedicated cameras (Canon SD630, Nikon D40). I've uploaded some pictures here: http://blog.preinvent.com/droid_gallery
• Media apps - the music app does the job but is pretty basic and ugly. There is no dedicated built-in video app (except the Youtube player). With such a fantastic screen and powerful processor, this is a travesty!
• Non-standard USB charger - the USB connection on the phone isn't the standard mini-USB jack, so you're restricted to using the bundled cable.

Overall, I'm incredibly happy with the phone. The pros outweigh the cons by far and I wouldn't have any other phone right now.