marksf
10-23-2008, 01:24 PM
Hey Peeps,
Well, I waited in line at the SF G1 launch picked up a pair of these bad boys. The launch we pretty cool. They were handing out prizes, had magicians, a unicyclis, guy on stilts, etc to keep us entertain while we waited. I waited about an hour. Now on to my thought on the phone.
Hardware
I'm a first gen iPhone user, but I have to say that the G1 is a very nice piece of hardware. It doesn't have that sleek design of the iPhone or it's tank like build, but it is very sturdy. It's thicker, but still fits nicely in your hand and pocket. I like the rubbery back cover and the sliding action of the screen is great and somewhat adictive. The screen is gourgous! I think it's on par with the iPhone but a tad smaller. It is very bright, sharp and great for handheld web browsing. Being used to the virtual keyboard, it was weird going back to actual buttons. But it was very refreshing. The buttons press nicely and are big enough not to accidently press the wrong button. The home keys are nice and the trackball is actually very handy. The chin takes some time to get used to when typing, but after a while I don't notice it. I actually like that the chin is angled because it keeps the screen from getting scratched and keeps the trackball from getting smashed when you lay it on its face. The touch screen is great, but I think it needs to be dialed in just a tad. It's just a bit less responsive then the iPhone. I find that I have to press a tad harder than when using the iPhone. The lack of the headphone jack is lame, but I have to use an adapter to use my headphone with my iPhone, so I'm used to it. The included case works just fine, but its texture makes it hard to pull out of my pocket. Overall I think the phone itself is great! It's prefect for those that just can't deal with virtual keyboards and the various control options are confusing at first, but eventually come in handy. I like the G1 just as much as I like my iPhone. If I had to pick one I couldn't. It's like asking me whether I like my mom or my dad more. They different, but I like them both!
Software
Here's where I think the G1 starts to pull ahead. The OS on this thing is awesome. It doesn't have the iPhone's sleek looks, but I think it's functionally better and will probably just get better and better with each update. Much like Gmail it's the prettiest webmail service, but it's probably the most functional. At first I didn't like the web browsing because it lacked the iPhone's multitouch feature, but after 15 minutes, I prefered the zoom buttons to multitouch. My technique is that I flick the page around and press the zoom button while the page is still moving and I find it works awesome! You don't even really notice the zoom buttons are visible after a while. The drop down menu is a really hand feature and keep you up to date with emails, chats, etc. The three available desktops is also a nice touch and keeps the screen from being cluttered with icon. The icon menu is also very nice. Overall I really love the way you can custmize the phone. Email and chat work awesome and I prefer them over the iPhone. But what really makes the OS some much better than the iPhone is the Market! Tons of free apps to customize your phone and not to mention pacman! Open source rules and the open source community building programs that the people actually want is one of the reasons that makes this OS so special. Overall, I love the OS more than the iPhone's OS and I think I'll get even better with time.
Battery
I made a whole section for this because of so many posts regardsing battery life. I wasn't too busy at the office, so I logged my G1 use by activity and battery level. You can review it below. Overall I found it to be just fine, but a bit behind my 1st gen iPhone because of 3G. So I can't compare the two. But I think the battery capacity is acceptable and very usable. I am a casual user of my cell phone. I take calls on it, surf the web when I need something or am bored and chat and email. I don't think I can consider myself an extreme power user, but I think I use it the way an average user uses their phone. 3G eats up battery like a fat boy eats cake. Use it frequently to web surf and watch youtube videos and you probably drain the battery pretty quickly. I think one should turn 3G off when you're not browsing detailed pages or youtube videos, because that's the only reason you'd really need the bandwidth. I love pandora.com and found the Imeem to be a perfect substitute. I thought I need the 3G to stream the music, but I found that running on Edge worked just fine, therefore saving battery. Throughout the day, I used the phone and found it lasted me the whole workday without a charge. I say bring a usb cord to work and keep the G1 plugged in via computer when you're not really using it and the phone will more than meet your needs. Last night I did the whole drain battery and then fully recharge technique and will be testing the phone again today. I'll update my results later. But overall the battery works just fine and I don't think it's an issue.
Settings:
-screen brightness all the way down. (I have my iPhone set like that so I'm used to it)
-screen time out, 15 secs
Activity . .. Battery Level Start End Time
Full Overnight Charge 9:21 AM
download weather channel app 9:30 AM 9:31 AM 1
web surfing 3g 9:39 AM 10:09 AM 30
chat 9:42 AM 10:00 AM 18
83% 10:08 AM
web surfing 3g 10:13 AM 10:30 AM 17
web surfing edge 10:52 AM 11:00 AM 8
67% 11:00 AM
10 min call 11:30 AM 11:40 AM 10
51% 12:19 PM
imeem music 3g 12:21 PM 12:38 PM 17
imeem music 3g 48% 12:30 PM
imeem music 3g 44% 12:38 PM
imeem music edge 41% 12:51 PM 1:25 PM 34
imeem music edge 41% 1:05 PM
imeem music edge 37% 1:15 PM
imeem music edge 36% 1:25 PM
imeem music 3g 29% 1:30 PM 1:44 PM 11
web surfing 3g 1:33 PM 1:44 PM 8
27% 1:34 PM
download 2 apps 3g/imeem 23% 1:44 PM 1:25 PM 40
3g standby 1:45 PM
15% 4:15 PM
chat 4:46 PM 5:00 PM 14
12 min call 5:10 PM 5:22 PM 12
websurfing 5:20 PM 5:49 PM 29
battery dead 5:50 PM
Well, I waited in line at the SF G1 launch picked up a pair of these bad boys. The launch we pretty cool. They were handing out prizes, had magicians, a unicyclis, guy on stilts, etc to keep us entertain while we waited. I waited about an hour. Now on to my thought on the phone.
Hardware
I'm a first gen iPhone user, but I have to say that the G1 is a very nice piece of hardware. It doesn't have that sleek design of the iPhone or it's tank like build, but it is very sturdy. It's thicker, but still fits nicely in your hand and pocket. I like the rubbery back cover and the sliding action of the screen is great and somewhat adictive. The screen is gourgous! I think it's on par with the iPhone but a tad smaller. It is very bright, sharp and great for handheld web browsing. Being used to the virtual keyboard, it was weird going back to actual buttons. But it was very refreshing. The buttons press nicely and are big enough not to accidently press the wrong button. The home keys are nice and the trackball is actually very handy. The chin takes some time to get used to when typing, but after a while I don't notice it. I actually like that the chin is angled because it keeps the screen from getting scratched and keeps the trackball from getting smashed when you lay it on its face. The touch screen is great, but I think it needs to be dialed in just a tad. It's just a bit less responsive then the iPhone. I find that I have to press a tad harder than when using the iPhone. The lack of the headphone jack is lame, but I have to use an adapter to use my headphone with my iPhone, so I'm used to it. The included case works just fine, but its texture makes it hard to pull out of my pocket. Overall I think the phone itself is great! It's prefect for those that just can't deal with virtual keyboards and the various control options are confusing at first, but eventually come in handy. I like the G1 just as much as I like my iPhone. If I had to pick one I couldn't. It's like asking me whether I like my mom or my dad more. They different, but I like them both!
Software
Here's where I think the G1 starts to pull ahead. The OS on this thing is awesome. It doesn't have the iPhone's sleek looks, but I think it's functionally better and will probably just get better and better with each update. Much like Gmail it's the prettiest webmail service, but it's probably the most functional. At first I didn't like the web browsing because it lacked the iPhone's multitouch feature, but after 15 minutes, I prefered the zoom buttons to multitouch. My technique is that I flick the page around and press the zoom button while the page is still moving and I find it works awesome! You don't even really notice the zoom buttons are visible after a while. The drop down menu is a really hand feature and keep you up to date with emails, chats, etc. The three available desktops is also a nice touch and keeps the screen from being cluttered with icon. The icon menu is also very nice. Overall I really love the way you can custmize the phone. Email and chat work awesome and I prefer them over the iPhone. But what really makes the OS some much better than the iPhone is the Market! Tons of free apps to customize your phone and not to mention pacman! Open source rules and the open source community building programs that the people actually want is one of the reasons that makes this OS so special. Overall, I love the OS more than the iPhone's OS and I think I'll get even better with time.
Battery
I made a whole section for this because of so many posts regardsing battery life. I wasn't too busy at the office, so I logged my G1 use by activity and battery level. You can review it below. Overall I found it to be just fine, but a bit behind my 1st gen iPhone because of 3G. So I can't compare the two. But I think the battery capacity is acceptable and very usable. I am a casual user of my cell phone. I take calls on it, surf the web when I need something or am bored and chat and email. I don't think I can consider myself an extreme power user, but I think I use it the way an average user uses their phone. 3G eats up battery like a fat boy eats cake. Use it frequently to web surf and watch youtube videos and you probably drain the battery pretty quickly. I think one should turn 3G off when you're not browsing detailed pages or youtube videos, because that's the only reason you'd really need the bandwidth. I love pandora.com and found the Imeem to be a perfect substitute. I thought I need the 3G to stream the music, but I found that running on Edge worked just fine, therefore saving battery. Throughout the day, I used the phone and found it lasted me the whole workday without a charge. I say bring a usb cord to work and keep the G1 plugged in via computer when you're not really using it and the phone will more than meet your needs. Last night I did the whole drain battery and then fully recharge technique and will be testing the phone again today. I'll update my results later. But overall the battery works just fine and I don't think it's an issue.
Settings:
-screen brightness all the way down. (I have my iPhone set like that so I'm used to it)
-screen time out, 15 secs
Activity . .. Battery Level Start End Time
Full Overnight Charge 9:21 AM
download weather channel app 9:30 AM 9:31 AM 1
web surfing 3g 9:39 AM 10:09 AM 30
chat 9:42 AM 10:00 AM 18
83% 10:08 AM
web surfing 3g 10:13 AM 10:30 AM 17
web surfing edge 10:52 AM 11:00 AM 8
67% 11:00 AM
10 min call 11:30 AM 11:40 AM 10
51% 12:19 PM
imeem music 3g 12:21 PM 12:38 PM 17
imeem music 3g 48% 12:30 PM
imeem music 3g 44% 12:38 PM
imeem music edge 41% 12:51 PM 1:25 PM 34
imeem music edge 41% 1:05 PM
imeem music edge 37% 1:15 PM
imeem music edge 36% 1:25 PM
imeem music 3g 29% 1:30 PM 1:44 PM 11
web surfing 3g 1:33 PM 1:44 PM 8
27% 1:34 PM
download 2 apps 3g/imeem 23% 1:44 PM 1:25 PM 40
3g standby 1:45 PM
15% 4:15 PM
chat 4:46 PM 5:00 PM 14
12 min call 5:10 PM 5:22 PM 12
websurfing 5:20 PM 5:49 PM 29
battery dead 5:50 PM