Motorola Droid ??

[asphaltgambler]

Anyone here switch from a BB or standard phone to this? I am a verizon customer and they owe me a new phone. I have a family plan and purchased the new BB for my wife a few months ago and included for mewaqs the otpion of a new phone. I didn't see anything I liked a the time and decided to wait.

Features on the Droid I dig are: 5-meg camera with pic /video quality that looks way better than any phone I yet seen. IE browsing that to me looks most like an actual pc screen. Screen clarity and size. Word /document processing. Verizon network.

What say you??

[Hugh R]

I quit reading the review when I saw that it won't work internationally.

[red-beard]

Yeah, Verizon and Sprint pretty much won't work for me...

[masraum]

I love my G1 which runs the same OS. I think someone on the board just got a Droid.

[Overpaid Slacker]

Picked one up on the Friday they came out (my Voyager was about dead).

It is one of the coolest devices I've ever used; it has a few bugs, which I expected, but none of them are material to me. I've read they're going to do an OTA firmware update in a month or so. I'm not wild about early-adopting, but I needed a new phone, and this one does everything I could ask.

Only downside to Android 2.0 is that it won't support Flash for a few months.

Keep your screen timer on 2 minutes, and the brightness at 50% or less and the battery life is fine. The GPS/Google map/navigation is great.

Gripes: the vibration is not very strong; the notify tone for texts and all other non-phone call notifications has to be the same (you can't use one tone for text and another for gmail update, e.g.) and the keypad takes a little getting used to (the upper keys are a bit close to the screen bezel, so you've got to practice a bit). Lastly, the GPS cradle and the docking station (which is great) require that you remove the hardcase. Not a big deal, but a bit of a PITA.

EDIT -- I have the 2 piece plastic hardcase -- a part that goes on the perimeter of the "slider" and a piece that goes on (and covers) the back (except the camera aperture). The rear piece is the part that needs to be removed for the cradles.

I would highly recommend it.

JP

[lowyder993s]

I got one in SoDak last week cuz nextel/sprint doesn't work in the middle of the country Can't even begin to figure it out. Everybody likes it, but my calls just go to VM. I'm giving it to the kids to figure out and let them tell me how to use it.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by Overpaid Slacker

Gripes: the vibration is not very strong; the notify tone for texts and all other non-phone call notifications has to be the same (you can't use one tone for text and another for gmail update, e.g.)
JP

Download "Handcent". It's an SMS/texting app, and it allows you to set notifications for all texts and for individual people as well. So you could then set the default notification tone, then set a tone in Handcent, and then if you have certain people that you'd like to make even more special....

If you install Handcent, go into the stock messaging app and turn off notifications otherwise you'll get 2 for every text.

All of this info is assuming Handcent works on the Droid (it should).

[Overpaid Slacker]

Sweet.

Thanks, Steve. It says it's Droid supported, so I'm loading it.

... and it supports a "remind" notification, which I missed as well.

Every "issue" I've had with the phone I've found an app to address!

JP

[gtc]

+1 to basically everything JP said.
Also:
-For some reason the still camera is mediocre, but the video is really nice.
-Because the screen is so high res, text in the web browser can be really tiny. But there is a zoom function.

[Overpaid Slacker]

Graham -- I think you can set the "default zoom" of the browser, so when you load a page, it's not tiny (though the entire page may not be viewable at that zoom).

I think the camera is pretty good; but I never expected to use my phone for "photography"; I have a camera for that. It's good for snapshots, esp in a bar ... flash is key!

Oh, and Handcent rocks. Thanks again Steve.

JP

[Joeaksa]

Until they make it work worldwide, it will have limited sales. Not just that people cannot use it overseas, but Motorola cannot sell it overseas, and thats real limiting. That will change after a bit I hope.

[Paul_Heery]

To answer the OP's question. Yes, I switched from a BB to a Motorola Droid. I've had mine for a few weeks now. We got some early from Verizon. The biggest thing that you need to get used to is that the Droid is not a BB. It does some things quite differently. There is a learning curve, but it takes just a few days.

There are also quite a few things that it does that I have never done with a smartphone before. Here is something that happened to me yesterday. I was driving around with the Droid in the car dock. I was listening to Pandora while at the same time getting step-by-step spoken navigation directions. Then, the phone rings and I tap the screen to answer a call from my wife. She is at a bowling alley with her friends and she asks my if I can pick up a pizza from Rocco's and bring it to the bowling alley for her. I saw sure and hang up. Now I don't know where Rocco's is located, but I simply hit the screen and say to my Droid, "Navigate to Rocco's Pizza". It then starts to give me new directions to Rocco's. Plus, my music resumes streaming only to be occasionally interrupted when I have a turn coming up.

Right now, I'm digging the Droid.

[gtc]

Originally Posted by Joeaksa

Until they make it work worldwide, it will have limited sales. Not just that people cannot use it overseas, but Motorola cannot sell it overseas, and thats real limiting. That will change after a bit I hope.

The GSM Droid already exists in Vietnam and Germany. Who knows if Verizon will let Motorola sell the droid to other carriers in the US, but I suspect we'll begin seeing GSM devices running android 2 within 6-12 months.

[Joeaksa]

Yep, just found them.

Motorola Milestone is GSM Droid | Android Atlas - CNET Blogs

$600 for an unlocked GSM Droid.

[red-beard]

Originally Posted by Joeaksa

Yep, just found them.

Motorola Milestone is GSM Droid | Android Atlas - CNET Blogs

$600 for an unlocked GSM Droid.

Not bad. Unlocked/non-subsidized phones are fairly expensive. $600 is pretty good. Treo Pro was $549 list, but I picked it up on Ebay for around $300.

[holtjv]

Great phone / device.

the most unusual technical achievement? you can hear yourself talk, like an old wired phone. So, unlike a regular cellphone in which you shout b/c you can't hear yourself, you don't shout.

Lightning fast, trim o/s (unlike bb, with tons of legacy bs), true multi-tasking available.

Have to claim ultimate embarrassment that I didn't know it wasn't international. Good thing I'm not going to Australia for 3 weeks in Jan. Wait a minute...

[RNajarian]

I've had a TMobile G1 since April. Overall I like it. I needed warranty exchange 4 months into using it.

One big problem is that you cannot delete email from a non Google email account. It just keeps all messages despite deleting from trash. The boards report "this is a known problem".

Hopefully they will fix it soon