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Drooling all over the Nexus One
Jan 13th
Google's Nexus One
FINALLY! Sitting here in my hands, I happen to have one shiny new Nexus One. Does it live up to all the hype? Is it everything I’d hope it would be?! In a word, yes. And in another word, no. Haha, this is one seriously sweet piece of hardware but the experience as a whole has been a bit of a disappointment. Now, I had originally intended to write a lengthy three-part article to discuss the hardware, software, and carrier performance I’ve experienced since my Nexus One was delivered. I even had a good chunk of it written last night before bed but today I came across this article which does an excellent job of saying everything I’d wanted to say and it even has benchmark info to boot!
For those not wanting to read through all of that though, let me summarize my first impressions of the Nexus One:
- Wow!
- Excellent build quality. The outer casing has a wonderful textured finish which helps keep the device from slipping out of your sweaty, greasy, Dorito-stained hand. It’s a little heavy but not obnoxious. Overall it feels like an expensive, well designed piece of gear. It’s also thinner than a bulimic super model addicted to meth.
- The trackball is nicer than the one on the Hero and it’s more “crisp” and responsive in those rare times when you actually need to use it.
- The screen – holy crap it’s nice. This is my first AMOLED device and I can see what all the fuss has been about. There’s no comparing it to the LCD on my Hero or other recent phones. Touch input works great on the Nexus One and two handed typing is a cinch. Speaking of typing, the onscreen keyboard works like a charm. Text prediction is surprising accurate and they virtual keys are very responsive.
- Speech-to-text does a great job of transcription. It’s not always spot on but being able to dictate text messages is such a cool feature!
- Google Navigation RULES! It’s far better than the Hero’s Sprint Navigation app. Don’t get me wrong though; I love Sprint Navigation but Google Nav is just sooooo much more refined. Thankfully Google Nav will be coming to the Hero soon once the Android 2.1 update is pushed out.
- The live wallpapers are a neat feature. True, they serve no purpose and probably do wonders for draining your battery, but they look sweet! My favorite is the black and white cloud.
- The beefy Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and 512 MB of RAM (to my knowledge, this is more than any other phone on the market) enable Android 2.1 to cruise on the Nexus One. You can have several programs open simultaneously with literally no decrease in performance. Menus and transitions are as silky smooth as the iPhone 3GS, or possibly even smoother.
- Great camera! The speed reminds me of the Palm Pre (one of that phone’s few strong points) and photos come out pretty darn clear. Likewise, video is nice and smooth even at the highest resolution. Playback is flawless via the Android album app.
- Did I mention how fricken smooth everything runs?!
So, by now it should be fairly easy to see that I’m very impressed with both the Nexus One and Android 2.1. Neither are perfect but the phone is definitely a wonderful device. Android 2.1 has lots of potential too – I can’t wait to get it on my Hero along with an updated Sense UI. The phone and its OS are only part of the equation though. The other part of the experience is the carrier the phone is paired to and unfortunately, T-Mobile’s service around here turned out to be a major letdown. I knew going into this that their coverage is laughable (especially their 3G) but I’m experiencing call distortion even when I have three or four bars of 3G signal. That’s not the worst of it though; for some odd reason, right out of the box I was able to receive calls, send and receive text messages, and browse via EDGE but I wasn’t able to make outbound calls! No matter what I tried, I constantly got “Network busy” on the phone’s display and an earful of fast busy signal. I knew it had to be a network or provisioning problem so first I spoke with T-Mobile. The tech was friendly and tried to be helpful but in the end she didn’t know what she was talking about and referred me to HTC for further troubleshooting. I decided to play along though and called them via the number the T-Mo tech gave me. The gentleman who answered wasn’t at all shocked to hear that T-Mo sent me his way but said exactly what I’d been saying all along – that this was a network or provisioning problem. He got me through to T-Mo again and I proceeded to work with a gentleman in their tech support department. Let me just say, it’s highly frustrating when you know more about the device and network than the person that’s supposed to be helping you does, but again, I played along. He went through his checklist of things to try and after roughly 20 minutes he gave up and got me through to T-Mo’s Tier III troubleshooting department. The Tier III tech was noticeably more knowledgeable but it still took him half an hour of investigation before he resolved the problem (a provisioning issue in their system – go figure). The stories I’ve read about T-Mo, HTC, and Google all referring customers to one another during troubleshooting seem to be true. I honestly don’t know how the average person is going to put up with it if they should ever need assistance. The most annoying thing is that each of the three companies should have a very clearly defined role in the customer service process; Google should provide all assistance with Android OS related issues, HTC should provide help for hardware problems, and T-Mo should be responsible for network troubleshooting. The three companies really need to get this worked out or they’re going to be in big trouble. Someone who just spent $500+ on a phone is not going to want to be told repeatedly that they need to call another company for help.
Sigh.
You know, I hate to keep harping on T-Mobile because I think they’re generally a good company, but several things about the cell service irritate me. First, my voice calls just don’t sound very good. Other reviews extol the Nexus One’s great audio quality which makes me reluctant to blame the phone for the distortion I get while on a call. It seems purely network related to me. Aside from that, T-Mo’s visual voicemail kinda sucks compared to Sprint’s. It’s definitely a nice feature but it just doesn’t seem to measure up (a minor annoyance but one I felt worth mentioning nonetheless). Then there’s T-Mobile’s pricing. The cheapest you can get away with on the Nexus One is $60 a month plus tax (500 anytime minutes, nights and weekends starting at 9pm, unlimited everything else). That’s not terrible next to the outrageous amount you have to pay for an iPhone plan but you have to realize that right now I’m paying $65 a month including tax through Sprint. For that $65 I’m getting 500 anytime minutes to landlines, unlimited minutes to and from any mobile number in the US, nights and weekends that start at 7pm, unlimited everything else – AND – vastly superior coverage and performance. It’s not really a tough decision folks, even if it means I have to live without the Nexus One.
Yes I sound like a broken record, but I’d like to say one last time just how impressed I am with the hardware and software on the Nexus One. It’s a shame that your only real option for a carrier is T-Mobile because their service is just woefully inadequate around here. The unacceptable alternative would be AT&T and they’ve consistently proven that they’re crooked and inept, so I don’t really consider them much of an alternative at all.
I anxiously await the arrival of the Nexus One (or something comparable) on Sprint’s excellent network but in the meantime, my T-Mo Nexus One is getting boxed up and shipped back to Google.
Say, is it just me or is my Sprint Hero doing a happy dance?
Android apps you should check out!
Jan 10th
My last few posts have all been related to the HTC Hero, so I guess I might as well keep the Android-related stuff coming. Today I’d like to talk about a few of the Android apps I use regularly. Don’t worry, this list will be short for now (I haven’t been too adventurous in the Android Market just yet)… however, I reserve the right to post my opinion on other apps in the future!
Pandora
Pandora - This was the very first app I installed when my Hero arrived. I had it on my Palm Pre and for whatever reason it bogged that phone down horribly (it was bad but still usable). Luckily Pandora performs far better on the Hero! So, for the three of you out there who aren’t familiar with it, Pandora is a free music streaming service that will automatically queue up songs it thinks you might like to hear based on some initial information you give it. As each song plays, you have the option to rate it with a thumbs up, a thumbs down, or skip it and come back later. Giving it a thumbs up tells the service that you like what you’re hearing and that you’d like to sample other music that they deem similar. For example, I started mine out with O.A.R. and after serving up some O.A.R. songs, they shifted to Dave Matthews and other artists they thought I’d like. Giving a song a thumbs down stops and removes it from your playlist forever, causing the next suggested song to queue up and start playing. If you’re not sure whether you like or hate a song and think you’d like to listen to it again sometime, just skip it and move on to the next. Overall, Pandora has done a great job of exposing me to bands that I probably would have never discovered otherwise. I do hit thumbs down now and then, but overall the service is a good judge of what I like (or maybe I’m just a sadly predictable person).
Price: Free
Pros: It’s a great way to discover new music or listen to stuff you already like without having to load your phone up with MP3’s. No commercial interruptions!
Cons: Ads! You can close them manually but they pop up again down at the bottom of the screen after every new song begins. The program is somewhat data intensive (I believe the “high quality” setting has your audio streaming at 96 Kbps, which comes out to around 40 MB per hour of music). As you probably already know, any time you’re downloading data, you’re using your phone’s radio – that means that it’s a battery killer. Best to use this app when you have AC or USB power nearby or when you’re in your car with a mobile charger. Still, even on battery power you should get several hours of streaming.
Dolphin
Dolphin Browser – The stock web browser that ships with the Hero is not bad at all but Dolphin has more features and (in my opinion) runs faster than the stock app. Some of Dolphin’s perks include pinch zoom, the ability to save photos and YouTube videos, and tabbed browsing. Definitely worth checking out.
Price: Free
Pros: Tabbed browsing, better download / file save features, seemingly faster operation than the stock browser, pinch zoom, skinnable interface, optional hand gesture interface, RSS capabilities, cool URL sharing features.
Cons: Ads! To be fair, you only see ads if you use the default homepage, when you do a search, and when you’re in the menu system. No biggie. A paid version which does away with the ads may already be in the works.
NetSentry
NetSentry - This program lets you keep track of how much data you burn through on your phone every month. If you somehow don’t have “unlimited” data from your carrier (which would be awfully foolish with a phone like the Hero), this app would be extra useful since you can set your limits in NetSentry and have it alert you when you’re getting close to them. Even with an “unlimited” data plan though, I still love being able to compare NetSentry’s numbers to what Sprint claims I’ve consumed. So far both have been within about 5 MB of each other. In addition to allowing you to keep track of your 3G usage, NetSentry can keep track of your WiFi too. I don’t really know why you’d want to do that but hey, it’s there if you need it.
Price: Free
Pros: With this app you no longer have to rely on your carrier’s potentially inflated consumption numbers. User definable alert thresholds for both 3G and WiFi, very accurate!
Cons: None to speak of; if you want to get really nitpicky, it’s always running in the background and consumes a minor amount of CPU and battery.
Facebook - It’s Facebook on your phone. What more can I say? When I first got my Hero and tried out this app, it was pretty lame. Not quite as bad as the one for the Palm Pre (which is a TOTAL joke), but still lacking a lot of basic functionality. Since then, the app has improved by leaps and bounds. The latest version has 90% of the features that the full blown website has but presents it all in a much more streamlined way. In my opinion, the Android Facebook app is on par or possibly even better than its admittedly awesome iPhone counterpart.
Price: Free
Pros: Shake to update (on the main page), almost the same level of functionality you get directly from the Facebook website.
Cons: None, other than being a little slow sometimes. It remains to be seen if that’s due to the app, the network I’m accessing it over, or slowdowns on Facebook’s end (or a combo of all three).
Speed Test
Speed Test – You’ve been to Speedtest.net before, right? Well, this app from Ookla gives you the ability to determine how well your cell connection is performing. Lots of factors will affect how fast you’re able to download or upload to the Internet; there’s radio interference issues, tower congestion (lots of other users competing for limited bandwidth), and cheapskate backhaul links (carriers love to use lame 1.5 Mbps T1 circuits to connect their towers back to the the rest of their network rather than put in more efficient ethernet connections whenever they can). This is one of the apps that I always envied on the iPhone. It’s simple, but works beautifully.
Price: Free
Pros: Works like a charm! Tons of options too. Just like Speedtest.net, you can choose which city and ISP you want to test with, you’re given a little screenshot of the results that you can share with other people online, and the app even keeps a record of all the tests you’ve ran over WiFi or 3G.
Cons: None; I have yet to experience anything negative about this app. Ookla really outdid themselves with this one.
PdaNet
PdaNet - Wow, this app could end up being the most important app you download for your phone depending on what kind of user you are. In a nutshell, PdaNet lets you tether your PC to your phone via USB or bluetooth. You can then use the phone as a modem, which can be extremely useful if you travel a lot and don’t want to pay for WiFi, and it can also come in handy when your electricity or home Internet connection goes down. The free version lets you tether via USB with no restrictions for 30 days, then after that it stops letting you use port 443. For the less technically inclined, this means you cannot access pages that use the https protocol like banks or other secure websites. If you’re a cheapskate you should be able to get around this limitation by setting up a home VPN, or you could just pony up the one time fee and get the full featured app. Just be careful though because your cell carrier thinks you should pay them even more for the privilege of using the bandwidth you’re already paying them for on your laptop instead of on your phone. In other words, don’t get their attention by torrenting stuff. Note, you don’t need PdaNet if you root your phone and install the MoDaCo ROM, which has Wifi-to-EVDO tethering built in.
Cost: Free (with some limits) or $29 for the full version.
Pros: Lets you use your laptop anywhere you have a cell connection without having to pony up extra fees to your cell carrier just to use the bandwidth you’ve already paid them for. Extremely handy when WiFi isn’t available. I’ve gotten as much as 1.5 Mbps down and 950 Kbps up, which as far as the upstream goes, is actually on par with the highest tier that my ISP at home will give me via cable modem. As an added bonus, your phone recharges itself when you tether via USB.
Cons: Can suck up lots of battery if you’re tethering via bluetooth, has the potential to get your cell carrier upset with you if you use the connection constantly, especially if you do obvious stuff like run torrents.
Seesmic
Seesmic - Twitter clients are one thing that the Android platform has plenty of. I’ve tried out my fair share of them and in my opinion, it really comes down to two apps – Seesmic or Twidroid. Both have some really nice features and honestly I’d recommend Twidroid over Seesmic if its alert system weren’t all goofed up. I’ll probably switch back to Twidroid after that gets sorted out. Anyway, Seesmic is a great app with lots of nice features. It has support for lists, tweet searches, and just a really nicely polished interface. You can do just about anything in Seesmic that you can on the Twitter website. I haven’t used the desktop version but it looks really nice too.
Cost: Free
Pros: Excellent feature set, allows you to do all your Twitter stuff on your phone instead of having to use the website or Desktop apps.
Cons: Unlike Twidroid, lacks the option to automatically start the app when the phone boots up.
Of course, with over 20,000 apps in the Android Market, there is a mind boggling amount of other stuff out there that you should check out. Even the paid apps are typically only a dollar or two, so get out there and download away! If you find something you think is especially cool, please let me know in this article’s comments section.
Got a Hero? Root that sucker!
Jan 4th
One of the things that attracted me to the Android mobile OS platform is its ability to be customized by those willing to do a little tinkering. In stock form the Hero is vastly more customizable than the Palm Pre and it goes without saying that the system is far more flexible than a pre-jailbreak iPhone, but if you want complete control over your Android device then you’ll need root access to it. What is root access? The easiest way that I can think to explain it is that root access is “God Mode” for your phone, or for that matter, any other computing platform which employs a tiered method of user permissions. But what can you do with this God Mode? Well, for starters, you can erase those lame apps that the Hero ships with (like the NFL, TrashCAR / NASCAR and Sprint TV apps) or even move your apps onto your SD card. Of course, there’s lots of other stuff you can do when you have the freedom to access any part of the system you wish but what it really all boils down to is either being content with your phone as Sprint sold it to you, or taking the reins and customizing it with your own touch.
So why all the talk about rooting today? Well, my friend William Ruckman is also a Hero owner / fanatic and he saw fit to send in the following steps to take if you’d like to gain root access to your Sprint Hero. It should be noted that rooting your phone can be potentially dangerous (worst case scenario, you screw up and brick your phone). Also, I’m not 100% clear on whether William wrote this procedure completely on his own, borrowed heavily from other resources on the web, or some combination thereof. Bill, if you’d care to clarify that for me, I’ll be happy to update this post.
Presumably this would work on a non-Sprint Hero but since we’re both Sprint users, we can’t really verify that with complete certainty.
In case you want root, do this:
Download the Android SDK to your desktop.
http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html
Open CMD.exe (Windows) and change directory to the tools directory in the Android SDK.
Make sure your phone is set to development mode under applications, and make sure you have the Android SDK and drivers installed.
Download asroot2 to the tools directory from here:
http://code.google.com/p/flashrec/source/browse/trunk/assets/raw/asroot2
In CMD.exe type:
———————–
adb push asroot2 /data/local/adb shell
cd /data/local
chmod 0755 asroot2
./asroot2 /system/bin/sh
mount -o remount,rw /dev/block/mtdblock3 /system
cd /system/bin
cat sh > su
chmod 0755 su
chown root.shell su
exit
exit
———————–ROOTED!
Just copy a file and run the commands above! No installing, no flashing custom ROMs, no worries about bricking your phone!
Give it a restart and enjoy.
Seems pretty cut and dry to me, but again, proceed with caution. I know he says “no worries about bricking your phone” but don’t complain to me if you goof something up and your phone stops working, your boss fires you, your daughter becomes pregnant, the bank repossesses your farm, aliens invade, or the Mona Lisa disappears.
For those of you that would like to give Bill a shout to thank him or shoot him a question about this procedure, you can do so by stopping by his website.
Thanks again for the heads up, amigo!
Update: Bill wrote in to update me on the genesis of this procedure:
About 70% of the procedure I came up with. The rest I got from various forums. However, I found the exact same procedure after the fact in the XDA forum. The asroot2 binary is the key, the rest is just Linux basics.
So there you have it – proof that great minds think alike!