How do I “feel” about Android after one week of usage?

I’m really looking forward to reading my one-month, three-month, six-month, and one-year posts on this same subject. For you to understand more about my perspective on these posts, let me tell you a little about myself. To say that I am a gadget guru would be an understatement. My addiction and fascination with technology knows no bounds. When I was in the 3rd grade way back in 1983, I sat down in front of an Apple IIe and got hooked on the technology drug.

I did not get the very first iPhone, but I did sit in line for 14 hours to purchase the iPhone 3G. I live-blogged the event and was even featured on Leo Laporte’s 24-hours of worldwide iPhone coverage. The iPhone 3G is an awesome device. When the iPhone 3GS was announced, I blocked out my calendar for launch day and went and bought two, one for me and one for my wife. The iPhone 3GS is an amazing piece of hardware with a phenomenal underlying operating system and a plethora of applications for the vast majority of my needs. My one and ONLY complaint is that here in the United States, it is exclusively tied to AT&T. The video below accurately sums up my opinion of AT&T.

Now that I have paid my $175 contract cancellation fee with AT&T, I have moved on to the T-Mobile MyTouch 3G (a.k.a. HTC Magic). This device has an awful lot of potential. The MyTouch 3G itself is no iPhone-killer… yet. It definitely has the potential to be. The Android OS will soon (next 12-18 months) grossly outsell the iPhone OS. Yes, that is my prediction. Write down the date. That crazy @jsnyng said Android is going to outsell iPhone. It is. Why? There will be over 20 Android powered handsets built by various different manufacturers in the next year on all of the major cellular carriers by around the world.

There will still be just one iPhone. There will still be the “walled-garden” known as the App Store for iPhone. Those restrictions do not apply to Android devices. That alone is huge, but also being an operating system tightly integrated and developed by Google are huge positives as well. Below are my initial random thoughts about Android and the MyTouch 3G.

1. The MyTouch keyboard is not nearly as nice as the iPhone. The HTC add-on keyboard is very close, but it’s not quite there yet.
2. The screen on the MyTouch is not in the same league as the iPhone. The capacitive touch screen is good, but it really doesn’t compare to the super-sensitive, well-spaced capacitive touch screen of the iPhone.
3. The phone works. The phone works. The phone works. Call clarity is very good whether on 3G or EDGE. Call quality with 2 bars of service on T-Mobile has been better than 4 bars of service on AT&T.
4. Background apps absolutely rocks. Notifications in the background without having to use a hokey, piss-poorly designed push system is nice.
5. Android Market is not nearly as mature as the iPhone App Store… yet.
6. Google Voice integration directly into the handset replacing the dialer and SMS functions is the best thing since sliced bread.
7. Android really needs a GREAT Twitter client. The best clients I have tried (twidroid – free, iTweet – $2.99) don’t even come close to the 5th or 6th best iPhone Twitter clients.
8. The MyTouch 3G really needs a firmware update soon. I am on the very first revision of a week one phone. There is a little bugginess here and there and some very annoying lag time when switching between applications on occasion.
9. Widgets are cool. I really love my WeatherBug, QuickTweet, and Music widgets.
10. The processor is a 528Mhz snappy little rascal (when it’s not bogged down with something wonky going on in the background). I’m ready for a 480×800 screen with a dual core 1Ghz+ processor, 1GB RAM, and a multi-core GPU (Don’t be surprised to see something like that before Christmas 2010).

So those are my “feelings” on the subject just 7 days in. Let’s see how they progress or digress over the next few weeks as I prepare to write my one-month findings.

Tagged as: Android, AT&T, iPhone, MyTouch 3G