mobil phone: Motorola Droid: impressive features, Sublime Hardware

The first time you pick up the Motorola Droid ($ 200 with a two-year contract from Verizon, the prices as of 10/28/09), you'll notice its solid feel and Heft - there are many things behind the crisp, touch screen of 3.7 inches. Make good use of Android 2.0 's new features, the Droid is a powerful Web surfing and communication tool that has a chance of living to its reputation. The biggest flaw Droid, however, is in its hardware design: The keyboard is shallow and flat, which can make typing uncomfortable.

At 0.54 inch thick, the Droid is a little bigger than the 0.48-inch thick iPhone 3G, but it still has room for 40 slides key QWERTY keyboard output. At just under 6 ounces, is about an ounce heftier than the iPhone 3G. Once closed, the 4.56-by 2.36-inch-Droid is almost the same size as the 4.5 by 2.4 inches 3GS iPhone.

Motorola is quick to emphasize that the Droid's 480-by-854-pixel display offers 409,920 pixels, more than double the 153,600 pixels 480 by 320 pixels, 3.5 inch screen on the iPhone 3GS offers. The resolution of Droid also compares against that of 1.6-based Android phones such as T-Mobile myTouch 3G, which has a 3.2-inch, 480 x 320 pixels display.

The keyboard of the Droid does not occupy the entire length of the phone, a four-way directional pad with a select button is on the right side. The keys are backlit, but since they are mostly flat, you will need to keep an eye on what you type until you get a feel for the phone. A small lip protruding from the bottom when the phone is closed, indicating only the Verizon logo and microphone. Like other Android phones, the Droid has an accelerometer and reorients quickly when you hold the screen side.

Unfortunately, the phone has a few quirks hardware design. The keyboard is so shallow - and the keys themselves are so flat - our testers (with different hand sizes) were difficult to use. In addition, the keys on top are very close to the edge of the screen, so your fingers hit constantly against it. The Droid is also absent Discuss physical and End keys, which are almost standard on all other phones ever made. You access these controls from the appeal.

The Droid, which supports the 1900 MHz and 800 MHz band CDMA EvDO network of Verizon Wireless, comes with a 1400 mAh battery rated at 270 hours of standby and 385 minutes of talk time. It also has a pre-installed 16GB memory card and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 2.1, which includes the use of stereo headphones and a Wi-Fi adapter.

The phone provided excellent call quality even in a lobby of New York hotel full of noisy Phillies fans headed to Yankee Stadium for the World Series. Parties to the other end of my calls have not reported any problems.

Above is the punch Droid Web browser, which loads images quickly with the powerful 550MHz processor and speedy hardware-accelerated graphics. Even if you are thank you for your 3G high speed data network coverage, once you're there, Web browsing is airy and smooth. Video sites such as YouTube seems equally impressive, playing a comic high definition YouTube ( "Sita Sings the Blues") was excellent, with no dropout or audio dropouts. Audio also sounded great atmosphere thanks to a pair of high quality headphones. The music player supports simple building playlist, album art, and ways to shuffle and loop. You can buy music without DRM on Amazon MP3 store using the application preloaded on the device.

Preinstalled on one of three home screens are icons flagged mail, Phone, Contacts, Browser, Maps, and markets. Notably absent are Droid Verizon V Cast service, which includes live streaming video and entertainment offerings. A new widget Power Control allows one touch control on the power of more demanding features such as Bluetooth adapters and Wi-Fi, GPS, and backlight. You can disable the synchronization of data to save the extra energy, too.

As in Android 1.6, in 2.0 a universal longing for home phone plunges into the list of contacts, browser history, and other content into the phone and on the Internet. And as with all Android devices, you will need a free Google account to take advantage of key phone features, including a list of contacts and calendar are synchronized with your web account.

You will also find the familiar notification bar at the top, you can enlarge it by touching and dragging down. At the bottom (or side in landscape mode) is a slide-open shooting window with icons for all installed applications and links to the settings menu and other phone features.

Android 2.0 is based on the Google Maps features introduced in Android 1.6 by adding an optional layer that allows you to put location-enable the extra features on top of the map you see. A layer of Wikipedia, for example, generates icons for locations on your map that have Wikipedia entries.

Since Google Maps is the voice navigation is enabled, you can say the name of your destination to get turn-by-step. A pleasing aspect of the new navigation features is the nifty use of Google Street View: As you approach your destination, an interactive photo of the actual location appears with an arrow to point you in the right direction. Instead of having to find a building number, for example, the Street View provides a visual confirmation that you are exactly right - or at least close to powerful for him.

The dedicated button provides quick access to the snapshot and video taken. The Droid's 5-megapixel camera includes a dual LED flash and supports DVD-quality video recording and playback at 720 by 480 pixels. As in Android 1.6, in 2.0 you manipulate the camera and video capabilities in a single window. The camera has a respectable number of advanced features such as scene modes, color effects and white balance. In pictures I took at the exterior was magnificent, especially on the Droid's beautiful screen. Indoor photos, however, suffered a large amount of grain. The dual LED flash tend to blow out the colors and details for interior scenes, as well.

Another key is the Nice way to interact with Droid accessories. When you place it in his car window mount (sold separately, price not yet announced), the Droid automatically enters "For Home" mode, in which she looks more like a standalone GPS device. Large icons labeled View map Navigation, Voice Search, contacts, research, and fill the home screen and the screen rotates as needed.

When you insert the dock in Droid table option (sold separately, price not yet announced), he sits at a good angle for watching videos or just bitten by e-mail. He immediately goes to a sort of alarm clock mode and displays the time in large numbers while providing other information such as temperature, in small type below.

The challenge for Android app developers is to take advantage of 2.0 's new features, including its ability to bind more closely the applications to the list of contacts. When you view a contact, you will see a series of floating icons for personal services is connected, such as Facebook. Note that although most existing applications should work fine on 2.0 Android, some that have been optimized for Android 1.5 and 1.6 may need to be adjusted to the new version.

The Droid Motorola is certainly among the growing army Android because of its superior equipment and improved 2.0. But the Android Marketplace App Store overtake the iPhone? Therein lies the key to success for the Droid. The Droid certainly lives up to its promises and a lot of things the iPhone does not work. The iPhone will probably retain his throne smartphone yet, but he will face a new strong competitor