Nexus One Review (week one)

The introduction of the Nexus One cell phone by Google is a big deal. Not just because it features bleeding edge technology, or even because it is an offering by Google that is way outside their core competency. The Nexus One represents the first shot of a battle that will rage between consumers of cellular service and the carriers.

Locked vs. unlocked
You may have heard that the Nexus One is an unlocked cell phone. Let me explain what that means and why it is such a big deal.

When a Cell phone manufacturer develops a new phone, the first place they go to sell it is to the carriers. The carriers are the companies such as AT&T and Verizon, that actually provide the radio towers and service that cell phone operate on. Carrier's typically buy millions of phones to resell to their customers so, they have exclusive influence over the manufacturers. Sometimes, there are exclusivity deals between carriers and manufacturers. This is the case with the Apple iphone. In all cases the carriers specifyy certain configurations that benefit themselves. You probably don't even know that your phone has capabilities that the carriers specified would not be available to their subscribers. In most cases you won't even find a menu or settings item for these options. This is called a locked phone.

The Wholesale cost of each phone is in most cases more than the retail price. Carrier's compensate for this loss by requiring the consumer (you) to sign a lengthly contract for monthly service. In recent months the price of these contracts has fallen somewhat, but, if you signed at a higher price, you will most likely be held to that price.

When a carrier sells a phone, it is almost always "locked" to their service Even if you were to weasel your way out of a contract, (usually at great expense) and keep the phone, it is most likely "crippled" . This means it may not work on any other carrier AND Will not have the features available that another carrier may offer, even for the same phone.

Companies have sprung up on the internet that will unlock your phone, or send you programs and directions to unlock your phone for a price. This is not an illegal practice yet, though their are efforts afloat to make it illegal. In most cases, an unlocked phone is subject to other crippling problems or security issues. For instance, a jailbroken (unlocked)  iphone can not be updated through the usual channels because the update will re-lock the phone rendering it useless until you go through the process of unlocking again. which will also remove any important updates that may have happened.

Carriers do offer service packages that are not under contract. In most cases the price/service packages are the same as they would be under contact. They should be a little cheaper, because the carriers are not trying to re-coup the cost of the phone. One of the potential price advantages is that you can, with an unlocked phone, sign up for services ala-cart.

Quick Qualification.
I have used PDA's Cell phones, and Smart phones since they were invented. I have owned many, but Ihave been a BlakBerry user for at least 5 years. The BlackBerry, like the early Palms was all about getting things done in the least amount of clicks, My lifestyle demands that kind of UI engineering. The BlackBerry extended my working life into my everyday non work activities. and it i did it in such a way that it was not frustrating. Customers don't even know that I am fishing instead of working when I return their emails promptly, and have my Knowledgebase at my fingertips no matter where I am or what I am doing. It all makes me feel efficient. My last cellular bill was for the typically slow month of January and showed 8735 voice minutes. and about 1500 texts.

One of my fears at this time was about the touchscreen keyboard. I didn't like the iphone keyboard, and I hate the BlackBerry storm keyboard. The thumb pad on my 8700 lets me type about 70 words a minute. i expect a long learning curve on the touchscreen but I hop it is way better than my previous experiences.

I have also tried the iphone, but got so lost in all the fun stuff that I did not feel very efficient. The iphone, though beautiful in its implementation was no where near as efficient and hassle free as my beloved Blackberry. I am hard of most everything in my life, even the nearly indestructible Blackberry's would only last about 6 months with me. The iphone lasted about 2 weeks.

My requirements for a phone are easy. It has to work every time I need it. and provide all of the services that I need to function in business with as little hassle as possible.

The review
It all starts with the buying experience. I researched the product and similar android phones. I read reviews, watched and read all the marketing material, and even downloaded and ran some emulators. Reviews generally don't touch on the things that are super important to me. The Nexus One being new, does not enjoy the same diversity of reviews as some other phones. One of the things I paid attention to is that I am very happy with other Google products. I use all the apps (docs, presentations, sites, calendar, gmail etc) extensively and they fit my way of working very well. This was a major contributer to my decision.

I was a little dismayed that the nexus one Website, though very rich in media, did not emphasize much real world experience, probably because their isn't much. I did watch a few of the videos and took the 3d tour which answered many of my questions.

I then installed the SDK and the android emulator This was in a way a waste of time because it is generic android, not Nexus One. But, it did give me some insight to the UI which would be very different than the excellent UI on my BlackBerry. I decided it would suffice, and the learning curve would not be to steep to be productive right off the bat.

I finally ordered my Nexus One late on a Friday afternoon. The ordering process was almost too easy. i used Google Checkout, and the only hitch was that they tried to run my debit card as debit instead of credit. The transaction was denied because of limits imposed by my bank. A quick call to my bank and they raised the daily debit limit. For security reasons,I think I like this feature of my bank. Except, I wish Google checkout would give me the choice.

I was surprised to find an email early Saturday morning indicating that my product had shipped. I was even more surprised to find that is shipped from Indianapolis.

Like an expectant father I tracked the shipment all weekend. Google paid for next day shipping to Alaska, which impressed me, and I received the Phone Monday afternoon.

Alas, I opened the outer box to find a very Apple-like white box bearing the Google simple logo of Google and nexus one. (no, it is not capitalized) Included in the white bax was a simple getting started card, A book marked important, and a warranty statement almost as thick as the book marked important. Also included is an AC charger, and USB to Micro USB cable, a pair of headphones the Phone, and the battery. I glanced only at the first 2 steps of the getting started card to see if they wanted me to charge the battery before use. It says to charge the battery until the notification light turns green.

The phone turned on as soon as I inserted the battery. I had not installed my SIM card yet because my cell phone is my only phone, and I wanted to make sure the Nexus would light up before I disabled my BlackBerry. I quickly plugged the phone in to charge while I did the initial set up.

Initial set up included signing into my Google account and that was about it. Since the SIM card was not installed, I had to connect the phone to my WiFi network. It was simple, and connected the first time, even though the password is quite complex, I was able to type it right the first time. What a pleasant surprise.
Once I was sure it would work, I put the SIM card in and received a call even before I know how to answer it.

When I received the call, I was amazed that my Google contacts had already synced. (over WiFi no less) I checked, and sue enough, so had my calendar and Gmail. I have used Google Sync on my BB for years and have always enjoyed the security of knowing hat my very important contacts accurately and seamlessly follow me from phone to phone. it took some fanagling on the iphone but in most cases My contacts sync to whatever new phone I am on before I even leave the phone. I love cloud computing and this is its most basic and utilitarian application.

I also downloaded some essential free applications such as Google Earth, Shazam, and Pandora. I must say that on WiFi the browser is every bit as fast as my laptop. The BB always seemed sluggish, probably because of the proxy browsing schema used by BB. Not a problem now, This is not an extended portable device that can be used for browsing in an emergency. This is a fully functional internet window. I assume it uses a form of Google Chrome, which I have used as my default browser exclusively for over a year. I expect about the same level of compatibility.

Within minutes I pared my Jabbra Bluetooth, and was off tho the races. I had some actual work to do that afternoon, so I just treated the phone like my old friend. It did not slow me down. The first couple of texts were a bit awkward. I had read someplace that typing on the touchscreen required "not thinking about it" after a little practice at this, I was able to type fairly quickly. Not as quick as the BlackBerry but better than I expected, and way better than the Iphone

The call interface is nicely laid out and contains big buttons to turn on the speaker phone, and switch to Bluetooth. Both of those operations are multiple clicks on the Blackberry. So I was suitably impressed right off the bat. I noticed right away the complaints about the speaker phone are valid. However, the Bluetooth is instant and reliable so I  won't be using the speaker phone nearly as much as I did on the BB.

I discovered that the notification bar at the top of any screen could be dragged open like a windowshade. This gives instant access to anything that is going on such as incoming emails. texts, now playing music, and my c=missed call log. Though I didn't discover it right away (I am sure it is in the directions) It is a great UI implementation that is the primary way to navigate the data portal.

After charging the phone, and playing with the settings, I was interested in seing if I could force the phone to roam off the abysmally week  home signal to the "extended area" signal that is very strong at my house. a little poking around found a place where I could scan for for all active networks. The scan took a little while but revealed both networks, and let me choose which one to use. I chose the extended area and have no dropped a call since. At some point a notification splashed on the screen that said something like "Your SIM card is not authorized for data on this system" The notification came and went so fast that I did not have a chance to figure out what it was trying to tell me. But, I did not have data. Having experience with my carriers technical support staff, I decided I would visit the office the next day instead of trying to get help over the phone. Besides, I was really wanting to show off my new nexus to a phone geek.

The next day, I hucked my but into town to visit the carrier tech support. The guy at the front counter had a Hero, and was familiar with Android.  He was also a gadget guy and very interested in seeing my phone work. He was able to poke around and fins the right places to set the right settings. It appears that the data settings do not stay with the SIM card so some manual set up was required. He called his tech supervisor who has a Nexus and receive the technical documentation about setting it up on their system. Within minutes, I was up and running and happily enjoying crisp data speeds.

Navigation
I have always kind of chuckled at using a GPS on the road system in Alaska, Rivers, trails, lakes, and the ocean, yes, but the road system? come on, If you dont know your way arround the roads in Alaska in a week, even a GPS wont help you. Determined to put the little bugger through the paces. i did a voice search for my next destination. I know the place had moved within the last year and I wanted to see if the database was up-to-date. Well, the database is a Google search, so it is as up-to-date as anything on the web. The Voice recognition system actually recognized the work "cache", promptly displayed the google search list with the map as the first listing, and offered me a button to "get directions" C;licking this button gave me the choice of displaying or navigating. I hit navigate and within seconds heard my first turn in my Bluetooth. 


Just to be difficult, I turned the opposite direction that it was telling me to turn, it instantly recalculated, and took me down the route I had planned in my head. I set the display layer to show the sat view which appeared almost instantly.  I received an incoming call,during the nav process, and the system continued to give me directions in my ear. That was nice. After the call however, the screen had turned off. But I was still getting the directions. 


It is now Friday afternoon. I have been using the Nexus One for 5 days, without a hitch. so far i like it. I am quickly getting used to typing on the touch pad and even using the predictive text feature. I have found that the voice input works well in super quiet environments. I still feel funy when I talk to myself but it works best when i am alone anyway, so I will probably get over it.  


I love the screen! and the way the home page(s) work. I can add shortcuts to just about everything and gadgets right to the main screen. I haven't gotten the built in stock ticker app to work yet, but so far I have not encountered any bugs. The phone did do a system update within a day of putting in on the network. Not sure what that fixed because I hadn't discovered anything broken. The update did render the phone useless for about 5 minutes but it gave me warning that it would, and gave me the choice of doing it now or later. 


 I have figured out how to use all the Google apps such a gmail, voice, and buzz. and even facebook without having to think to hard about any of them. Last night I streamed Pandora over the data network and fed it to my whole house stereo system. No drop outs or dead spots. The only problem, is that shaking the phone seems to skip songs. I had this problem on my iphone when I was at the gym one day and it drove me nutts but. I figured out how to turn it off., 


The one little perplexity is that I have not found a way outside of the browser to interact with my google docs. Their are some applications available but the first (free) one I tried didn't work so well. them because the browser implementation is working well for me so far. I write business logic and UI's for interaction with my Google apps, and so far all the forms, spreadsheets, embedded docs, etc, have performed and displayed a expected. Maybe, I just need to start writing them for the android platform and make lots of money off them?

In the coming weeks I will put this baby to the test over and over again. You can expect me to highlight what I like, and what I don't like in usability, applications, survivability, etc.
Thank you for your time and please comment on your experiences below.