Motorola Droid
- Created on Sunday, 06 December 2009 22:32
I've had my Motorola Droid from Verizon for about one month - since the phone was first released. I've used the phone every day and explored the features and apps extensively. First, let me make an important distinction: Android 2.0 is the software, Droid is the phone. Yes, it's confusing, but it's important to note the difference. The Droid phone is manufactured by Motorola. The Android operating system was created by the Open Handset Alliance led by Google.
On-Screen Keyboard
After using both the iPhone and Android keyboards, the only major difference is the text prediction. The Android prediction is incredibly accurate and intelligent. The phone has picked up some of my vocabulary and now suggests it as I type. This makes using the on-screen keyboard very handy.
Physical Keyboard
On-screen keyboards can be a little touchy (no pun intended) so the hardware keyboard is a nice feature. I wish the keys were a little more distinct, but after a few weeks of everyday use, I am having no problems and can type quite fast even with my large fingers. The Pre and Blackberry keyboards are very challenging for my. I really prefer the larger Droid keyboard.
I love the navigation buttons. They function like arrow keys and a left mouse button. I used this constantly on my Palm TX, and was thrilled to see it on the Droid. When typing an email, texting, or updating Twitter, these buttons are incredibly helpful.
Music
The music player for Android is very good, if basic. All of the options I want are in there. Syncing music to your phone is fairly easy and, more importantly, open. You can sync with virtually any music library software including iTunes, Media Player, and Winamp. When the phone is connected to the computer, a notification appears on the phone to let you enable the USB connection. Once you do, your phone is a 16GB flash drive. Transfer any files including music or video or setup your music player to sync for you.
The sound output to ear buds is incredibly good. Last night I connected my Droid to a surround sound system and streamed Pandora for a few hours at a party of about 80 people. The sound quality was superb and the phone never hiccupped once.
Speaker
The speaker on the Droid is loud and clear. I still use ear buds for music but this speaker is great for listening to podcasts or watching YouTube videos.
GPS Navigation
The Google Maps Navigation system is the best I have seen. Amazingly fast and accurate, this navigator lets you find locations using Google's incredible speech recognition software. You can also navigate to locations found online, in emails, or in text messages. I've found the integrated nature of the phone to be very helpful and intuitive. Other features include live traffic, satellite view, and Google Street View - which looks amazing.
The one downside to Google's navigation is that an internet connection is needed to establish the route. Once the route is in the phone, however, you are all set - even if you lose internet along the way. GPS keeps working and updating your location based on the route in the phone. I recently tested the navigation on a round trip 26 hour drive. Google navigation was near flawless even when I didn't have a data connection in West Virginia. Its only flaw was directing me off the expressway and back on once. That looked like a result of recent construction.
Network
The Verizon network is fantastic. Everyone I know is on Verizon or wishes they were. I got full bars almost everywhere I go. On my recent road trip, I lost signal a couple of times in the mountains - but that was it.
Notification Bar
The Android developer's idea for handling alerts is pure genius. When something new happens, I get a preview of that event on the notification bar. That lets me know if it needs immediate attention or can wait a while. After the preview, I see icons from my most recent notifications so I know what kind of alerts are waiting for me. When I pull down the bar I see a list of everything needing my attention. I can jump to that area or clear everything.
This is one of those ideas that could have been annoying if poorly implemented. After using for a month, I can truly say this is one of my favorite features of Android. I love being able to leave alerts alone until I'm ready to deal with them.
Screen
This screen is a gorgeous 854 pixels wide by 480 pixels high. Video looks incredible on the better than DVD quality resolution. Streaming TV shows or You Tube videos in high quality is as good as watching on TV. Even better is the readability. Text is crisp and clear making news, web pages, and books easy to read. As of this article, no other phone comes close to the Droid's screen.
Lock Screen
When the Droid is locked, you see two buttons on a curved track. To unlock, simply press and drag the lock button along the track. To mute or un-mute the phone, do the same with the audio button. The curve matches the natural motion of the fingers, so the movement is natural and easy with one hand operation.
Battery Life
Battery life has been excellent thanks to a task killing app. Without it, many apps run in the background and drain the battery. Regular closing of applications keeps the phone running fast for two days without a charge o normal use. I consider normal use to be checking email every hour, twittering a few times a day, and about 30 total minutes of web browsing. Most people will plug the phone in every night, so even heavy use is not a problem.
Apps
The iPhone apps store just announced over 100,000 apps in their store. The Android Market has over 12,000. While that difference is huge, everything I've ever thought of already exists in the Android Apps Market - and I'm a power user. I should also note that the iPhone store has benefited from a longer period of development. I think the Android counterpart will catch up quickly - especially with the openness of the store. In the last two weeks I've heard of several companies dropping iPhone support and developing exclusively for Android from now on.
Google Services
The integration with Google's Gmail, Calendar, Voice, Maps, Navigation, Reader, Listen, Search, and probably more I'm forgetting, is simply astounding. Everything is finally centralized and always available. The system even supports multiple Google accounts. I love having integrated Google Voice support because I get the advantages of a central number that can forward to any phone I want, and free transcribed voicemail.
Phone
The calling quality is the best of any cell phone I've used. Calls are crisp and the voice quality on the other end of the line is nice and clear. The speakerphone is superb. When using ear buds, music and apps pause on incoming calls and the phone app is displayed. If you accept the call, you hear the caller through the ear buds, but your voice is picked up by the phone's mic as if you were on speakerphone. In my tests this functioned flawlessly and the difference between a mic close to the mouth and far away were barely noticeable. Of course, Bluetooth is built in if you need it.
Browser
The Android 2.0 browser is incredible. iPhone users may lament the lack of pinch zooming, but I've found that very gimmicky. I very much prefer the Android's double tap to zoom feature. I also appreciate the browser's method of reflowing text on web pages to perfectly fit the size of the screen. Think of an imaginary bounding box that wraps text within the screen. You can turn this off, but it makes reading web pages very easy. I haven't found a website yet that displayed incorrectly, even with the text wrapping turned on. (One exception is flash websites but that is to be expected.)
Camera
The 5MP camera is not as good as I hoped. The pictures are decent and the resolution is better than the iPhone or the Pre, but the color quality needs tweaking. Fortunately, the free Photoshop Android app can make some nice custom adjustments.
Video quality is amazing for a phone. For some reason the video looks much better than the still images. You can even stream live to the web using Ustream or Qik.
Multi Tasking
I am a power user. I'm the kind of person that has dozens of windows open on my machine at once. I like getting things done and I don't like having to close down a program until I'm done. The Android operating system does a great job of handling my many apps and windows. The Droid hardware holds up amazingly well for the amount of things I do at once! I might download a podcast and an app while listening to Pandora and browsing the web. It doesn't seem to mind at all.
Android 2.0 boasts support for multiple Gmail accounts and multiple Exchange accounts. The Exchange support is a little weak but the inexpensive Touchdown app adds great full featured Exchange support to Android including calendars, tasks, and multiple accounts.
Bottom Line
Is it an iPhone killer? Yes and no. Yes because it's hardware and software are vastly superior in almost every way. There are precious few things the iPhone does better than the Droid - so few, in fact, that I can't actually think of any at the moment. Maybe the music player, but even that's a bit of a toss-up.
The Droid, however, will not kill the iPhone for one simple reason: demographics. I don't think anyone at Google, Motorola, or Verizon actually expected the Droid to kill the iPhone. The two phones hit two different demographics. The Droid seems geared toward power users and geeks. I think this phone is perfect for Blackberry and Treo users who want a more progressive phone with better multimedia, web browsing, and multi-tasking but like their physical keyboard. One look at the robotic ads for the Droid and it's clear that the Droid will not appeal to everyone. The iPhone's ads are all about having fun, playing games, and hanging out with friends. While the features of these rival overlap in many ways, I think they are geared towards very different audiences.
There will always be hard core Mac fan boys who will want an Apple phone regardless of the options. The iPhone is even making a run on the portable gaming market. But when I'm on the go I don't have time for games and time wasters. I want to organize my tasks and get things done even if it means having two apps and half-a-dozen browser windows open at once. Right now, the Droid is by far the best phone to make that happen.