Complete Review About HTC Dream
Android is the newest cell phones operating system. It is based on Linux and first developed by Google, but today it is belong to an open software alliance (OHA = Open Handset Alliance) where HTC, Google and T-Mobile are being the members.
There’re so many new cell phones entering Indonesia recently, some of them brought Android OS. We could fin them easily in the capital city. One of them is HTC Dream G1.
This is a colaboration among HTC, Google and T-Mobile. But unfortunately, in our country, some features from T-Mobile couldn’t be provided such as Amazon MP3, a special portal for downloading MP3 via online.
Design
G1 has a unique design. It brings slide mechanism on the sreen, not on the keyboard. It means that, if other cellphones such as Nokia E75 or Sony Ericsson X1 locate the keyboard on the moving position, G1 is different. The screen move/ rotate leave the keyboard by a unique hinges. On the top is dominated by glossy material which is made from hard plastic. Anyway it looks strong and elegant. On the battery cover, there is a Google logo in the middle.
QWERTY keyboard on G1 is pretty good. The arrangement is exactly right. The button placement is very easy for the user to do some typing assignments. As a comparation, let’s take a look at Blackberry Bold. Although the button and placement are great, but some characters such as number, point , and comma are placed in alternative button. So, we have to press alt button to reach them. Actually this is very annoying!
But there is one disturbing thing in G1. just a simple thing, keyboard lamp. Thus, bright lamp under keyboard make the keyboard characters are difficult to saw. The button coloura are silver and white. And LED lamp on the keyboard is white. We have to really being concentration to see the button when the light is on.
In control panel, where is located under the screen in close position, we could find call and end button, home, back, menu, and a trackball for navigating. This small ball could round everywhere, so the menu searching could be done easily. It is remind us to Blackberry products.
Except trackball, all buttons on control panel always appear in all Android cell phones. It because of character and interface on this OS.
Well, anyway there’s no many holes on G1. there are only one mini USB port as main data canal, audio , and power supply. The second port is for MicroSD as external memmory card.
Interface
G1 has two different interfaces. Just similar with previous HTC product, G1 has a touchscreen and interface by using button. The touchscreen has 3.2 inch display, with 320 x 480 pixel resolution. The appearances is similar with iPhone, wide enough to show many things with a solid pictures.
Android as an operating system give unique appearances where in stand by mode, we could find 3 pages. The first page is showing clock and 4 important widget applications. We could slide the page to the left or right to see another pages. In default position, the right side is filled by Google search bar. And the left side is empty.
If we often use symbian OS, we don’t have to be worry to use Android. Although both are different, menu in Symbian are replaced by application icons and widgets which is hidden on dropdown screen. We could open this hidden screen by drag or press arrow symbol under the screen.
Menu in Android cell phone consist of setting, notification, wallpapers and shortcut to Google. To make us easy, we could move the icons and widgets to another empty pages on the left or the right. Just do it by menu button, very simple right ?
But Android is an open OS. So, in the next time, it’s very possible for us to find the improvement version of the system. The newest one is called Cupcake.
All about Google
First activating the cell phone, you would be asked to entering username and your Google password. Once we are registered, we could access all about Google such as Gmail, Gtalk, iGoogle, Google Maps and You Tube.
All Gmail accounts such as contact list, email list, etc would be synchronized as soon as possible. Actually we could manage the setting in realtime like Blackberry without subscribe first. Even we could do it in “unlock” condition.
In IM menu, beside Gtalk we also could find MSN, AIM and Yahoo Messenger.
Android Market
Android is called as the most open OS. Although it’s still young, about 2 years far from Microsoft Windows Mobile, Blackberry, Symbian even iPhone. We could find hundreds of applications free or paid.
Then could we get them easily ? Not really. Android has a savety system just like in iPhone especially in application supply by a monitored portal.
If iPhone have iTunes Store and Apps Store, then Android has Android market. We could download many free or paid applications here. Google account is needed for registering paid system via credit card.
But Google blocked paid application for “unlocked” cell phone users. So, in another word, Android market is limited. But there’s no problem for you who only need games, simple applications and wallpapers.
Browser and Data Transfer
G1 has HSPA system which has maximum speed for downloading process with 7.2 mbps, then 2 mbps for upload. It’s more than enough for receiving and sending attachment emails.
Android Browser is better than Blackberry with their strange zooming mechanism. But it’s still under iPhone quality.
Sometimes There’s some problemms when we open the page by a high savety system. A few moments after we entering email and password, browser would appear key sign then stopped. The same thing would be happen when we try to access other pages which need password or email. But it’s just happen to “unlock” or unoriginal cellphones.
Multimedia
G1 has 3.2 megapixel camera. But the perform doesn’t satisfy. The results are blur and unfocus. It because it didn’t has professional camera setting. This condition is completed by there’s no video recording function here.
But, G1 has a great music player. The system supported ID3Tags information and also file sorting mecahnism based on the information. So G1 would find easily music files based on the certain cathegories.
The internal spaeker quality is not powerfull enough. It has only one shaft near camera lens. Then the earphone is also the same. It’s not quite satisfy for listening the music. The port use mini USB. It is used for charger and data cable. So it doesn’t use separated port just like music lovers hope.
Other minus point is G1 didn’t have video player too. Actually this is dissapointing because G1 has a high quality screen.
Connectivity
G1 has complete connectivities media. There are data cable, WIFI receiver, bluetooth version 2. at least we could connect the cellphone with PC or other gadgets without any serious problem. More over, Card Reader profile on USB would make us easy in data synchronization. But there is no A2DP in the Bluetooth connectivity. But G1’s bluetooth characteristic is similar with iPhone.
Battery
This cell phone has a tight power management. Some network settings, bluetooth and GPS could give alert about power consumption. Unfortunately, G1’s battery is pretty easy turn to hot condition especially when we use it in long time or when it being charged. But, however, in once charge it could stand for 1.5 days.
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