Seven Months with A Droid: What Could Have Been Improved
What sucks, in bulleted form, to get to the point:
- It’s heavy
- It’s slow. The 550MHZ processor is pretty awful when loading javascript intensive webpages. It’s almost painful to browse the web on the Droid, even on WiFi (forget about Verizon’s 3G ). Half the time, my menus lag and the UI can be pretty jerky at times. I am blaming the sluggishness on Android 2.1 which is pretty slow. When 2.2 comes out with an improved Dalvik VM and V8 as the javascript engine, it will be much faster.
- The keyboard slider thing gets loose over time, so it flops around like an asshole.
- The back of the keyboard slider has plastic wrap on it, which bubbles up over time
- The keyboard is cramped
- Sometimes the GPS doesn’t connect unless you reboot the phone. I returned mine and got a new one and the GPS worked better, so it might have been a hardware problem, but it still happens at times.
- Battery life is eh, but aren’t all smartphones? So no negative points here.
I still love it because it’s the only Verizon phone that does raw Android these days. And I don’t like the Droid X, Droid 2 or HTC Incredible, so I’m happy for now. I’m still jealous of the Nexus One because it’s sleek, but Google botched the launch of that phone. I would have done it differently (and better).
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waspito says:
Yea i used the keyboard for everything now i purposely neer do cause the slider got loose and i dont want it to get worse. The verizon store guy noticed it too. You didnt take your plastic wrap off?
Portfolioso says:
My Droid is a month old. I replaced it because the GPS was being an asshole and the backlight wasn’t working on the keyboard. But the slider is floppy and gets worse over time. Yes the plastic bubbles up after time, and no I didn;t take it off. Also, if you tap on the screen, you hear it click against the second part, which annoys the shit out of me.
Honestly, I’m going to keep sending these back to Verizon until my warranty is up because they wear out like motherfuckers.