Been watching the coverage of the G1 this morning, and I have to say I'm somewhat impressed by some specific features of the device and OS, but the whole package doesn't have me even tempted to consider it a replacement for my iPhone. The web browser looks clunky to use compared to Mobile Safari due to the lack of multitouch, and there are some really odd UI decisions like the pullout drawer for extra apps. On the plus side, the street view looks slick on the phone, and having the Amazon DRM free music store integrated was a great idea.

Engadget has a ton of coverage of it, including videos.

If only T-Mobile were available here.

(Well, I still wouldn't get one, but I have to register my disgust on the internet.)

They are. Looks like on September 8th they finished the conversion of SunCom's network that they bought in February 2008.

Ah. Good to know.

Still not getting one.

First gen phone with first gen untested OS. Pass! At least Apple had their stuff mostly tested from being OSX components.

Any word on whether it supports T-Mobile's GSM-over-WiFi tunneling? Pogue wrote a loving piece about it last year, and there's no reason this phone couldn't support it. That would make for an interesting differentiating feature over the iPhone.

If I weren't already an iPhone owner, I'd be considering it.

No multi-touch is a shame. Part of the reason I like the iPhone so much is the multi-touch screen.

Dealbreaker.

Wake me when the next hardware rev comes out.

My POS Kaiser work phone has the same connector. I bought an adaptor off ebay for about 2 quid.

HTC been taking ideas from Nintendo? Apparently that connector is on quite a few of their other phones. The recessed headphone socket on the original iPhone is annoying enough but you could always shave the plug slightly.

Well, the argument is that that's an additional piece of hardware you have to carry around with it.

On the other hand, how many different pairs of headphones are you going to be using with it? Probably just one. Leave it attached to them.

On the other other hand, how many audio sources are you going to be using those headphones with? Probably more than one, so you have to take it off and set it somewhere to be lost.

In all fairness, Apple had, essentially, the same restriction at first. It took Apple until version 2 of their own iPhone before they allowed you to use someone else's headphones without an adapter dongle.

My biggest problem with those dongles is not losing them, but having them break off the connector they connect to. This can happen with regular 3.5mm headphone connectors, but can be mostly alleviated with low-profile/right angle connectors. Add a dongle to this and suddenly the overall length of the device in your pocket is that much more, and you put pressure on the connector. I've broken two 2.5mm Treo audio jacks this way, and both times, I was sure that if it was a regular 3.5mm jack, it would have been fine.

The recessed socket is to support the headphone plug so you don't have the issues that tonyc had with his Treo. I guess too many people complained and Apple went with the flush mounted socket this time around. I wonder if they fixed the broken socket issue or just hoped it wouldn't be too bad...

Someone else doing it wrong first is not exculpating, it's inculpating. People should learn from mistakes.

Sorry, that's a pretty weak argument. Are you saying Apple did that to protect us? Then wouldn't all portable music devices have this same weakness, like other iPods?

Don't get me wrong, I agree that this was a stupid hardware design. My last phone was the Sony Ericsson W580i, and I had to buy a 99 cent adapter to use regular headphones with it. Over time (less than four months), the adapter became lose and would cut out every once and a while.


If we're going to have a debate here, though, can we separate the phone and OS? Example: Tony C: the next hardware rev? Do you mean the next Android-based phone? The next hardware rev implies the next version of the G1, and we don't have to wait nearly that long. Hopefully the rumors are true and we'll see some more before the end of the year.


My complaints about the G1:

- no headphone jack AND no A2DP? my Curve has both...
- scrolling on the web is a little clunky when compared to the iPhone browser (as seen in one of the Engadget videos)
- the desktop environment looks a little ugly; one of their videos shows how you can put a picture on your "desktop," and it looks terrible
- T-Mobile? Seriously? Does HTC or Google know how crappy a company they are? They have the worst coverage area of any carrier, and apparently you can't buy the G1 at any T-Mobile store outside of their 3G network (that leaves what, 30 stores? )

Things I'm excited about:

- the Google environment: even with all my complaints, it's everything I can do to keep from buying the $399 unlocked phone. I don't care what any of the iPhone fanboys have to say, the iPhone (and all other smartphones) CAN NOT interact with Google's services like this phone can. Hell, they can't even interact decently. This phone gives you push GMail and instant Google Calendar and contact syncing. The best my Curve can do is give me unsynchronized push GMail or synchronized every 20 minutes with the GMail app.
- I like the open environment of the apps. From everything I've heard, the iPhone app store approval process is a nightmare, yet crap like I Am Rich still gets through anyway (they still never explained that one)

There are some other things that I think are neat, but the whole Google environment has me sold by its self. I'm extremely excited to see what other phones come out in the future.

Nope. I'm wrong. "The jack is recessed in order to maintain the integrity of that design". Specifically the shape of the iPhone. It isn't anything to do with whether it supports the plug or not. They couldn't make it flush mounted without having a small lump there so they recessed it.

In that interview, the guy says "the most popular headphones in the world" are iPod headphones. That means there are a lot of people out there using headphones which don't sound very good and are also a huge mugging target...


There is a headphone jack. You just need that weird adapter thing for it and its a HTC thing, nothing to do with Google. The iPhone doesn't have A2DP either.


T-Mobile got an exclusive on Android handsets? If not then its just that T-Mobile contracted with HTC to buy the G1.

Apple use O2 in the UK and they're terrible. From what I hear of AT&T in the US, they're not much better.


The approval process seems to be on the whim of whoever is reviewing your app. Quite a few possibly good things have been shot down because they're deemed to not be useful and then as you said, that I Am Rich thing gets through.


Do Google reserve the right to use whatever you do on the phone for research and marketing purposes tho?

Where as on the flip side, the G1 cannot interact decently with any other environment outside of Google. No desktop syncing, so this excludes anyone not wanting to hand over all their data to Google (and there are a lot of people/corporations in this boat), and no Exchange support (and I somehow don't see this happening with how much MS hates Google right now).

My biggest issues with the direction Google is going in is that they don't have any type of hardware specs as standard at all. So initially, a ton of apps are going to be released around the G1. And then some other Android phone will come out with a completely different form factor and possibly break a lot of apps. And as more phones come out, developers will be back in a lowest common denominator situation when designing their programs. I just don't see the Android market ever doing much better then the fragmented Windows Mobile market. Is the iPhone form factor right for everyone? No. But it does provide one target for developers to aim at, and allow them to even catch people in the non phone market with the iPod Touch.

I also think not having a marketplace ready that allows developers to charge for apps will be a bad idea as well. Not every developer is going to be eager to release a bunch of full featured and rich apps for nothing. Google seems to expect third parties to help fill the gaps on the device, but I don't see the marketplace attracting much beyond a bunch of free games and flashlight apps.

Competition in the marketplace is good, but I just don't see Android becoming much of a force in the market towards Nokia, Apple, Palm, RIM and Microsoft.

And as for the environments people put their data in, I'd really like to see a bigger push towards standards. There are standards for calendar, contact, and e-mail push/syncing out there, but yet all of the smartphones out support only proprietary solutions. With an iPhone I have to use Yahoo, MobileMe or Exchange for push e-mail. With the G1 it's only Google. So much of the new things coming out in the internet space seem to be all in their own little bubbles, where as the internet core is built on standards agreed upon by many companies (TCP/IP, DNS, HTTP, IMAP, etc).

You're right, Tom. I agree with almost all of that. I guess this is a case where I'm the target market, so I don't see some of the faults. Still, I'm happy in that market, so I don't have any complaints.

But I want to address two things you mentioned. First, I agree that there is going to be far too much crap on the Android app market. But right now I have a Blackberry, and I have been shocked at the poor selection of free apps for the most basic of things. Even paid apps are pretty poor. And this is for the number one smartphone in the country. So far I've read up on twice as many Android apps that appeal to me as I've seen for my RIM device, and that's just the free ones.

Second, I'm a fan of standards as well, but like you said, I don't see any developing in these online data services. I'm sorry, but paying $100 a year for MobileMe seems like a complete ripoff to me. Android will do that for free. Sure, you have to be in the Google environment, but maybe that's worth $100 a year to some people.


Can someone explain the seeming refusal of so many companies to support IMAP? What the hell? In the past week I've found out that Yahoo doesn't, and neither does one of the biggest cable companies in my area, Cox. I've had two people ask me why they can't set up their Blackberrys to work with their Cox and/or Yahoo addresses so that they're synchronized.


I shouldn't have implied that Google had anything to do with T-Mobile being first to market. They do seem to be supporting them quite a bit, but I'm sure that's just what they have to do to support themselves. You're probably right, they got an exclusive from HTC.

And no, AT&T is in no way as bad as T-Mobile, both from reports I've heard and personal experience. I live just outside a metropolitan area, and in the last 6 years I've had contracts on each of the major cell providers. If I had to rank them in combined coverage and quality (from best to worst) it would probably go: Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile.

It must be pointed out that Verizon and AT&T are both complicit in the warrantless wiretapping program, though. As such, I'll never intentionally do business with them again.

My local sysadmin claims it's not secure. I don't know where that statement comes from and haven't pressed him on it. Anyone else know why he might say that?

IMAP is not inherently insecure. Particular implementations may be however. I guess some old security issues with some implementations may have made your sysadmin wary.

The main reason most admins don't like IMAP is having to deal with the extra storage necessary.

Because he doesn't want to deal with it. It's no less secure than POP3 or SMTP, which is to say entirely insecure in its original form. They've all had secure versions available for years.

I figured that might be the reason. If everyone started storing all their emails on the servers they'd never be able to keep up.

And I'm guessing Yahoo doesn't support IMAP because it would cut down on ad revenue from people using the webmail version. I just checked, and they only let you use POP3 with their "premium" mail service. You've got to admit, it's pretty cool that GMail offers POP3 and IMAP for no additional charge.

And possibly the best thing ever.. I don't like the home screen either.. Guess what.. it's just an application like any other, you can buy/download/write one and replace it. I'm hoping someone will come out with a palm-ish one. I still think the grouped icon pages is the best UI for a small handheld touchscreen device out there. If one doesn't show up, I suppose I could try writing one.

The pull down window-shade notification area is amazing.

A lot of the missing features didn't make it for the 1.0 release. It's a real shame, but that's the way product releases work. Even the empeg wasn't perfect in 1.0. Although 2.0 is close to perfect, considering I still use mine. (3.0alpha never proved to be stable enough for me)

I can't say much more about the G1 until my NDA stuff is over, but I can try and answer some questions about it.

Ignorance, or just as an excuse. IMAP supports both direct SSL, and even better STARTTLS. Just about every IMAP server, including Exchange supports this easily.

I don't understand why people cling to POP3.. I consider it LESS secure than IMAP, not from a network security standpoint, but from the standpoint of "Oh god, my laptop crashed, all my mail is gone" point of view.

It took me years to convince my friend to switch from POP3 to IMAP. The thing that finally got him was having email in webmail and Eudora at the same time. Of course a year or so later, laptop crashed and he didn't have to worry about his mail. Finally got what I had been saying for a long time.

HTC really likes their ExtUSB thing. The G1 is a first device, and everyone had their share of "We want this feature".

AFAIK, Apple left out A2DP because most of the A2DP headphones out there sound like crap. I'd have to agree, I've tried several and have been disappointed, including the kind that are just A2DP to normal headphone adapters.



That's a question for EULA lawyers, not engineers. ;-) I haven't see what the T-Mobile EULA is yet.

I keep reading that A2DP headphones sound terrible, but I've never found this to be the case. I don't claim to have audiophile ears (far from it), but I'd like to think I'm a little more discerning that average, being a musician who values good audio. I'll admit that I've had limited experience with bluetooth audio, but what I've heard was decent.

At the moment, I have an A2DP receiver in my car that I use with my Blackberry Curve. I think it sounds just fine. The high end doesn't sound muddled, and I get sufficient bass as far as I can tell. I haven't done a side by side comparison, but it sounds fine with me.

Besides, I don't think Apple's standard earbuds are anything to write home about. I'd be very surprised if they even sounded as good as something like the Jaybird.

My guess was that Apple didn't include A2DP because it might drain the battery too much. I wouldn't be surprised if audio quality was an issue too, though. I just don't hear it

Maybe Apple was concerned that A2DP could be used as a digital music extraction mechanism.

Surely it is much easier and better to just strip the DRM from the source files ?

I think it is mainly the battery life issues that stopped Apple from doing A2DP. Enabling the Bluetooth headset for regular phone calls already eats a large amount of the available power.

Hey guys, it's been a long time! Reading up on phones, I just KNEW you guys would be having an intelligent conversation over here!

I have read that Android can support multi-touch, but hardware developers will need to come up with their own drivers first.

I too was a little unimpressed with the G1. Maybe my hopes were too high? I'd like to see what it looks like by January however once the 3rd party stuff starts catching up.

I can't comment on multi-touch, I really don't know the design/business issues there.

The G1 is a first of the type, and there's a lot of hype around it.

The thing I see with the Android stuff is this.. It's not going to convert iPhone users, there is too much bling and brand loyalty there. Android will do much more than the iPhone simply because it's not going to be tied to one company.

Or one phone, of course.

Again, I'd make a distinction between phone and platform. The G1 will probably do absolutely nothing to iPhone sales, but I think that in the long run, Android might be able to.

Overall, I'm disappointed with the first hardware, but the software would be so absolutely helpful to me I'm very nearly tempted to buy the $400 unlocked phone if/when it comes out. If the hardware were slightly better (mostly the issue of ports), it would be enough to get my money.

I cannot wait until we see the first batch of Android phones...

A2DP quality is just not high enough for that to be realistic.

In theory, it can be high-quality if both ends negotiate direct MP3 or AAC streaming. It's only if that negotiation fails (or if it can't make the bitrate) that it falls back to the lower-quality SBC codec. I don't know whether anything in the real world actually implements that part of the spec, though.

Peter

Oops... link.

Seems spyware/adware/trojans are a problem with the G1 marketplace, so be careful what you download:

http://i.gizmodo.com/5138822/rogue-android-app-allegedly-destroying-g1-memory-installing-adware

Thanks for the heads up. I'd actually downloaded that app weeks ago. It's been there for a long time. Nothing happened to my phone, though... *knock on wood*