

Engadget reviews the Motorola Droid - unalone
http://www.engadget.com/2009/10/30/motorola-droid-review/

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rauljara
It seems like a really fair review. People who want to believe their iPhones
are better than everything else will find ammunition to support that claim.
People who want an alternative to the iPhone will also find cause to rejoice.
I like my iPhone, and I'm not really tempted to switch, but I'm glad to see
some serious competition. Here's hoping for continued innovation from every
quarter.

~~~
maximilian
Given the amount of money to be made doing this stuff, it was inevitable that
other good smart phones would arise. Props to google for realizing that its
the OS that really makes a phone, not the hardware. Obviously, the Droid is a
nice piece of hardware, but any other Andriod 2.0 phone will be very close to
the same.

I wish Nokia would get their shit together and really make a good OS.

~~~
nailer
Nokia has had a great OS for years, but the Maemo engineers haven't been
allowed to put a radio in their devices until the N900. Now they can.

~~~
fpgeek
Unfortunately, Nokia paid the price for dancing with the carriers for too
long. I do wonder if Apple is headed down the similar road with the iPhone
(i.e. dramatic success that is eventually overtaken because of the
entanglements of their required partners - carriers and media companies).

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ComputerGuru
There's a fine line to walk. Nokia went over it a long time ago, and now
they're on the opposite side of the line.

Keeping phone and provider separate is great for the consumer, but not in the
long run since the phone companies don't get the market they need.

i.e. it would be great if I could use the iPhone on any network I wanted, but
without an exclusive deal with AT&T, Apple wouldn't have made the kind of cash
it needs to be truly profitable and stay at the top of the market.

Nokia pandered to cell companies for too long, but then went in the exact
opposite direction and lost a huge chunk of the US market with them....

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johng
I agree, I'm planning on picking one up as soon as the local Verizon store
opens up.

For those of also interested in the Droid, check out
<http://www.droidforums.net>

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gbookman
If the Droid didn't have a physical keyboard, I would strongly consider
getting one.

To me, the physical keyboard is just a burden that adds thickness and weight.

Aside from that, the Droid looks fantastic and is the first iPhone alternative
to make me think about switching.

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jsz0
This review doesn't touch on the lack of good desktop syncing software. I
think people underestimate how big of a selling point this is for the iPhone
just as it was for the original iPod. iTunes might not be the most fantastic
app but for power users but it solves a lot of everyday problems for people
who don't know any better. This phone, and basically all of the iPhone
competitors, are lacking. They seem to be pitching this phone towards a more
technically literate audience based on the advertising campaign so perhaps it
won't matter much. I think the true "iPhone killer" is going to need to match
or exceed iTunes and have a conduit to a market place for buying content to
really catch on with a mainstream audience.

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scottjackson
I'm excited about the Droid. It looks good and it seems like it runs pretty
well. It's the first non-iPhone that I've looked at and kinda thought "I would
_not_ mind one of those."

However, not to bring the mood down or anything, but do you guys remember the
hype around the Pre at CES in January?

Yeah. I _really_ hope the Droid doesn't pull a Pre. Because I _really_ want
this phone to succeed.

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enjo
One key difference: The hype around the Pre was all about pre-production
hardware. It was folks looking at what they had at CES and going "in a few
months this is sooo going to be awesome." In typical Palm fashion, they very
conservatively didn't really improve it from CES to launch.

It clearly needed some improvement (does everyone at Palm have the worlds
smallest hands?)

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scorpioxy
I recently bought an HTC Hero(still waiting for it to arrive), and I didn't
want to wait for the Droid because i generally don't like moving parts in a
phone. I find that they tend to break or malfunction quickly.

But i still have buyer's remorse because the Droid has the faster processor.
Oh well, i guess you'll never buy anything if you keep on waiting for the
newer and better.

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jasonlbaptiste
I personally don't think it's better than an iPhone, but I don't know if it
needs to be. It's the first viable alternative out there. It's good for the
market, which is in turn good for everyone else. I hope they don't rely on the
whole "iDont" thing too much in the future, since Apple can make all those
claims obsolete if they feel like it.

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human_v2
I was an early adopter, I pre-ordered a G1 and have had it for about a year
now. I really love hardware keyboards, so +1 for the G1 and for the Moto
Droid. However, the article talks about a bit of lag here and there, which is
quite irritating, probably the thing I hate most about android phones. Though,
I do feel like the G1 was a competitor to the iPhone off the bat because it
could do everything the iphone did, just a little slower =/

The iPhone is very well done, without lag from what I can tell. I suppose
that's easier to do though when you make the hardware and software in the same
place.

For now, I say the iPhone is still the best phone out there, but only because
of the stuttering issues that Android phones seem to have. In a year or so,
phone hardware will catch up with the Android platform and will run smooth as
silk.

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Andys
Its the price we pay to be able to listen to mp3s whilst GPS navigating in the
car!

Or leaving my SSH session open while replying to a tweet and checking a
website.

My point: until a super-fast android is released, would you rather have things
slow but the ability to multitask, or fast but no multitasking at all?

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hyperbovine
The iPhone can play MP3s while doing anything else, there are GPS Nav apps for
the iPhone, and nobody wants to ssh from a phone anyways.

~~~
gloob
Actually, being able to ssh from a phone would be about the only thing that
would convince me to get one. But I suspect I'm not exactly representative of
the potential customer base.

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Andys
It was the exact reason I chose the G1, its generous 5 row qwerty keyboard
makes daily use of SSH possible. You can type numbers and symbols in your
password easily and quickly, and you get a full 80x25 display.

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tumult
Does anyone know if you can get a data-only plan? I'm planning on picking one
up for dev. Normally I'd just buy an unlocked one and swap a SIM card in for
when I needed to use the data/cell features, but obviously I can't do that in
this case.

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w1ntermute
I would like to know if the data-only plan is an option as well.

 _Normally I'd just buy an unlocked one and swap a SIM card in for when I
needed to use the data/cell features, but obviously I can't do that in this
case._

Why not? It would just be a CSIM
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CDMA_Subscriber_Identify_Module>) card instead
of a SIM card, right?

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peregrine
Probably not, you'd need to sign a contract. You could pay full price(600+)
for one...

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w1ntermute
I thought that's what you meant when you said "unlocked".

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matthall28
Do want. Hopefully we get it up here in Canada :|

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codedivine
I won't hold my breadth.

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brianobush
Wondering if I should have waited since it has android 2.0 - I bought the cliq
from motorola and it shipped with 1.5 (cupcake), without a published plan for
updates.

Very nice device, sturdy, but too much of the social sw had to be removed :)

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GavinB
I'm planning to get one as soon as it comes out--I'll report back.

