I’ll cover the Motorola Droid in two parts: the device, and the software stack. The device:
Good:
- The screen is amazing
- Feels solid
- Not the bar-of-soap design aesthetic that infects HTC
- only two external ports: USB and headphones
- Did I mention the screen?
- I like the four v buttons and the dpad – I know there isn’t a lot of love for them on the forums, but I find them easy to use
- Haptics
- High DPI displays are nice; high DPI displays on phones are awesome.
Bad:
- The black and gold is a little ghetto fab
- I hate capacitive touch screens (hated it on the iPhone, hate it here).
- Comes with 3″ USB cable. Well, maybe 6″. It doesn’t make it from my machine to my desktop.
- Drivers to charge a phone on a USB port? I know WHY this is done, but it still sucks.
Wash:
- I got used to the lack of a spring assist on opening.
- The keyboard is compromised by the desire for a thin device; I didn’t like it, but I got used to it.
- USB micro? damn, need more cables.
Software stack:
Good:
- Apps can crash without taking out the phone
- Can make phone calls
- Inbound text messages don’t crash the phone
Perhaps the bar was set a little low by WiMo; let me try that again.
Good:
- Have you seen Google Sky Map? So pretty!
- Google Voice integration: awesome
- Facebook, Gmail, and your contact list co-exist. Low bar again; try using Facebook, Windows Live for Windows Mobile, Exchange, and see how well that combination works.
- The phone fucking works. I know, low bar again; still, after 5 years of WiMo, having a phone that just works and makes phone calls and sends SMS without falling over is an E ticket, man.
Bad:
- Google Sky is pretty – when it isn’t crashing; too bad crashing was the P0 functionality they shipped with GSM.
- The default apps (I guess the “carrier deck”) are lame shortcuts to mobile sites. Verizon’s rich account control application is really just a bunch of shortcuts; way to raise the bar on your premiere device.
- I don’t know what service or caching method these apps are using, but Facebook shows days-old data; foursquare is much the same.
- The browser sucks. Much better than pIE; damning, faint praise, etc.
Wash:
- Using the browser with mobile versions of sites is a nice experience.
- The overall UI is different than WiMo; not really better, but different. It doesn’t have that taste-of-1992 look, though.
