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

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.