3 week Android Road Test
Jan.05, 2010 in Business, Business Solutions, Efficient Technologies, Green Business, Social Networking, Tools, Virtual Office
Just a few weeks ago, I was convinced that I was getting an Android phone. It just looked too cool. I was having a dilemma of which carrier and which phone. The HTC Hero with Sprint’s Everything Data package won out. After a few weeks of having this device, I am raving. Excellent piece of technology. A few years back, I had a Windows Mobile (version 5) device. I loved it at the time… this Android phone leaves it in the dust. Why you ask? The experience is so much better.
via Phandroid.com
First, truly having a phone that is “always on” is truly amazing. The phone is constantly connected and always updating information (you control what information). Mine is setup to receive pushed email messages from GMail, so I constantly know when I have new email. You can also add other email accounts (they are using polling) which also work quite well. Also many of the applications constantly receive data.
The apps market for Google is still smaller than that of the iPhone but Android’s market is growing faster than any other right now. Many of the apps are free, although others are available for a nominal fee. I have found that even the paid apps are relatively inexpensive. The apps are so varied that it’s hard to even outline them. Everything from Social Media apps (FaceBook, Twitter, etc), to web browsers, audio apps (like Pandora), shopping apps (Amazon.com), payment apps (PayPal), weather apps (Weather Channel, Accuweather), maps (Google Maps), etc, etc, etc.
One of the advantages that the HTC Hero has over the others is the “Sense” interface. It’s a customization of the Android system. It provides for quite a few customizations and better user experience. It is really an addition to the base Android setup. One of the big features it has that many Androids don’t currently have is multi-touch. This allows for many features but primarily (right now in my opinion) resizing of images, web pages, etc simply by dragging your fingers apart from one another.
Another thing that I have been impressed by is the integration with other Google tools. The integration with Google Voice is amazing. Google Maps is awesome. Gmail is second to none. That said Reader and Docs were apparently ignored so far. Have yet to try Wave… probably won’t in the near future. I think with a little more time the team at Google will offer much better integration with other Google tools and it will be truly amazing.
photo credit: William HookThe $25,000 question: iPhone Killer? I would say no. Not that the iPhone is or isn’t better… I just believe that there is way too huge of a market for these phones for everyone to be so worried about which one will dominate. Is the Ford Taurus better than the Chevy Impala or the Toyota Camry? I guess you’d have to ask the owners of each. Amazingly each of the cars is extremely successful, yet each has their evangelists. I believe that the smartphone market is the same. Androids are awesome. The Blackberry that I played with was very cool. Haven’t messed with an iPhone yet but I have played with the iPod Touch and it is awesome. I would say that each player will do quite well in this market and having so many will push innovation. I hope that they all keep having to compete to be the best… we’ll be the winners.
photo credit: h.koppdelaney
After working with the Hero for a few weeks I can truly see where I think the future is headed and the smartphone is DEFINITELY in that path. When you can be connected to all your email, social media, databases, web sites, applications, etc at any point in time and anywhere… business is really redefined. With the refinements of the iPhone, Android, Pre, and Blackberries it is truly amazing right now and we are only at the very beginning. The apps are just now being defined. We are sitting at the beginning of yet another technology revolution that will change the landscape yet again. You will no longer be tethered by the desktop or even the laptop… now only your mobile network will be the limitation and with some of the new technologies even that becomes a very gray area.
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January 5th, 2010 at 7:31 am
Glad you’re enjoying the Android platform, Jeremy. I’m going to make the switch at some point as well. I think the Hero is supposedly much the same as the Droid Eris on Verizon’s network, so this will be a review I reference when considering the upgrade. How’s the actual media player on this device, i.e. how simple is it to load a bunch of songs onto the device and listen to them? I gotta have my tunes.
January 5th, 2010 at 7:32 pm
Dave, I think that the Eris and the Hero are very similar. As you know the Droid is the big dog for VZW. The Droid seems pretty cool and if you really want a keyboard seems like a good option but I must say the Hero is amazing.
As for the media player, I haven’t played with it much yet. It appears to be pretty cool and easy to use (it’s widgetized for simple play). You would probably want to upgrade the micro SD card to hold more if you are wanting audio. I must say the video works pretty cool streaming YouTube, etc.
I would say stick with your existing camera though. The Hero has a 5 MP camera that is actually nothing to write home about. Not very spectacular. Haven’t played much with camcorder feature but it seems to work better than the camera. But with your Zi8, who cares??
Best of luck with finding your phone (remember that Google’s Android phone is supposed to release sometime this year).
January 6th, 2010 at 6:23 am
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