Do G1 Android Dream of a Electic Sheep?

October 6, 2008 7:51 AM

Should I get the T-mobile G1 with Google Android? Is there some cooler second generation Android phone coming out in the next 3-4 months that I should be holding out for?

I'm currently on T-mobile with their lowest family plan and I've got the cheap upgrade with a 2-year contract. I work on the edge of t-mobiles growing 3G network, but live well outside the 3G coverage. My current phone is the MDA (HTC Wizard). I like the slide out keyboard, but the phone is a bit bulky, and the Windows Mobile 5 OS is still pretty painful, but I do make good use of the reason I switched from palm: multitasking. I like having 2-3 apps running at once, and when it works on WM5, it works well, but regularly this house of cards falls down around my head, often when I try to use the phone portion. A call will come in, but some busy app will hang the interface and I can't get to answer the call, sometimes requiring a soft reset to get the interface back to check my voicemail.

I currently use a 3.5 mm to 2.5 mm adapter to listen to music on my phone, so having to use a USBext to 3.5 mm adapter doesn't seem like such a pain, and perhaps an improvement as I seem to go through a lot of headphone jacks as it is. I wore out the jack on my old palm, and I've started to lose the left channel on my current MDA phone.

Android will have to be better, right?

I'm also a huge linux dork, so the thought of an open OS on the phone really intrigues me. I'd consider an unlocked, jailbroken iPhone, but the lack of a keyboard, and being constantly at war with my OS provider over jailbreaking the phone versus having the new cool software updates seems like a worse headache than sticking with my pretty sucky windows mobile experience.

If you recommend the G1, I do have one other piggyback question: I currently use Google Apps For Your Domain, can I use that account with the Android's login, or will I be forced to resurrect my old @gmail.com login?

posted by jrishel to technology (9 comments total)

this doesn't directly answer your question, but I'm in the same boat, waiting to see if I should get one of these. But I don't think you'll get a very good answer until the phone is actually released. So far I don't even think there's reviews of the phone, they've just shown it off and released a list of features and related PR.
Until regular people have one, you won't really know if its worth getting.
posted by alkupe at 7:56 AM on October 6

I pre-ordered the G1 a few weeks ago, and aside from being slightly more committed at this point I am more or less in the same situation as you guys.

My reasoning is this:

Hardware wise, I dont think anything is going to come out on the android platform in the near future that is remarkably better then the G1, as this is the flagship for t-mobile I would say that this is especially true for our carrier. I am sure better phones will make it out in the course of 2009, but for t-mo this is the only option until next year, and I think Sprint is next up on the docket anyways.

Regardless, the G1 has all of the major features I would consider important in a phone in GPS, 3G, Bluetooth (but not the super awesome kind?), WiFi, touchscreen (supports multitouch from hardware, but does not as a final product, thanks Steve Jobs), expandible storage (you can give it as much room as an Iphone for much less, and soon you will be able to double that as the 32gb microSD cards come out), and a keyboard. It is unlikely that a phone will come out in the near future that will render these obsolete.

I think that as a huge linux dork, you should try and download whatever you can of the android sdk and anything else you can find now and play with it, the platform has been getting pretty solid reviews, and who knows, maybe you will come up with something awesome to add to the platform that I will be grateful for later on.
posted by BobbyDigital at 8:38 AM on October 6

Any other phone released in the next 2-3 months is still going to be a first generation android phone. It won't be built to correct the mistakes of the G1; the development cycle on phones is longer than that. There may be some minor software tweaks, and the hardware might be quite different, but it's not going to be significantly more advanced.

My advice is wait for some reviews of the G1, and if they're on the whole good, go ahead and buy it.
posted by aubilenon at 8:44 AM on October 6

According to my corporate rep from T-Mobile, if you're a BB user, you don't want to go with the G1 just yet, as it doesn't yet support corporate mail (i.e. Exchange) integration. He suspects that something will be coming down the pike by this Spring.
posted by thanotopsis at 11:40 AM on October 6

I am a reformed BB user. Now I keep work at work, unless someone pages me specifically. Anyone have a clue about the google apps for your domain working with Android?
posted by jrishel at 12:23 PM on October 6

It appears that it will support Google Apps for Domains but I am not sure I would trust those details until someone gets their hands on a production shipping phone.
posted by mmascolino at 12:45 PM on October 6

Per my bff tmobile manager buddy, "you're okay waiting until spring." He can't legally tell me anything more than that.
posted by damnjezebel at 1:00 PM on October 6

I couldn't stand it and ordered one, thanks everyone.
posted by jrishel at 9:15 PM on October 6

I've had my G1 for about a week, and to answer some of my own questions, it works great with Google Apps For You Domain.

Bluetooth support is greatly lacking and I can't seem to get it to pair with the bluetooth handfree in my Prius, but others online aren't reporting problems. I hope the Nov 11th update will correct some of that.

I've yet to be in an area with 3G service, so I don't know what that's like, but since I don't know what I'm missing, I'm happy with it :)
posted by jrishel at 4:33 AM on November 6