G1 Personal Review, Google Phone, First Android Phone

November 15th, 2008 | Technology

Google G1 phone, the first mobile phone to be launched using the Android open source OS which is designed by HTC the #1 PDA designer and manufacturer in the world. With more than 1.5 million pre orders in the US market 2 weeks before the product is officially available at T-Mobile sales center.

I got physical access on that handset “the first in the middle east and north Africa”, I was able to test it and give my personal review.

The handset design for the first look is simple, full black, a wide large screen, menu, home, back, dial and hang-up buttons with an amazing scroller similar to the new Blackberry devices scroller. The large screen is mobile, will go up where there is a full QWERTY keyboard below, once opened you can feel like you are holding a mini-laptop between your hands, full keyboard with TOUCH screen and a scroller is all what you need in a mobile phone to feel like if you are using your Mac Book or Notebook PC. In the back there is a camera that is not what you can find in the Nokia N95 and other devices but it is fine for somebody like me who never uses a mobile built-in camera.

Back to the Android, clicking the menu button the main screen is there, scroll your finger on the touch screen to the right or left you have another window. To get access to the full menu simply scroll the arrow at the bottom of your screen or at the right side if you are in full keyboard mode. Nothing special in the standard applications as you will find dialer with both access touch screen and keyboard, messaging system with nice log for previous conversations with a contact name, contacts “address book” are simple you can add more field to reach the standard ones you can see on your Blackberry or Nokia by adding them from the option, Alarm clock is an alarm clock, calculator is a calculator but with a touch screen, Gmail application a special application for the Android OS which makes it easier for us to use our GMAIL account, which we need in order to access our phone, you can have IM yahoo, Google Talk, MSN and AOL installed, Maps for the use of GPS, Google Mail system to configure your e-mail accounts and be able to use personal or corporate email service through your G1, what you can find also is a nice YouTube application which gives you access to your YouTube account and daily updates, as for other applications it is normal like any other phone, now we have to wait and see the bunch of applications that will be available soon for the Android OS which makes out of this OS the future of the industry and which will give it another new feel.