Living with the Nexus One

I recently took purchase of my new Google Nexus One, and i've been getting used to it for a while now.

The first thing I often hear about it is the battery life, and I must be honest I harboured my own fears on this as well, as I did when I got my G1, but i'm glad to say my fears were unfounded, the phone easily lasts 2 days with normal use of apps, phone calls and texts. Depending on what features are turned on/off battery life can increase dramatically.

The display is absolutely amazing, compared to the iPhone (It's oft compared rival) it's superb, 800x480 resolution, massively dwarfing the iPhones 480x320 on a 3.7 inch display means it's got awesome clarity, especially for reading etc. Couple that with the multitouch that HTC has been putting onto their new phones recently, and the usability is epic.

The browsing experience is excellent, as one would expect with Googles deep ties in the internet, the standard browser is no slouch, but with alternate browser options such as Dolphin and Opera Mini, it can be taken to a whole new level of speed, with Opera mini being the fastest by a long way, something the iPhone can only dream of keeping up with at this point in time (Until maybe they accept Opera Mini onto the app store). Couple the speed with the dolphin browsers gestures, and it's really onto a winner.

The Android market is absolutely superb, even if it's a great deal smaller than the iPhone app store, but there are still 25000 apps, compared to the app stores 110000 I think, even so, you're not wanting for applications to increase your productivity. Plus there are some really great apps, I personally endorse Zombie, Run! ;)

I love some of the really great built in stuff, such as the integrated voice commands that are everywhere, just say what you want and the phone can do an incredibly good job of figuring out what you said. It just makes life easier.

Recently I also rooted my phone, something which is practically impossible on the iPhone, which for me is a bit of a fail, either way, it was a very simple process, and I will say this, if you own any android phone, root it, it increases the potential of the phone by no small amount. Being able to run google navigation (a GPS app that costs $99 on the iPhone, ouch) outside america, is superb, and that's just the start.

Of course it has its drawbacks, for example on some apps, the phone can be a little bit sluggish, even with the snapdragon processor, but that's very rarely.

Another criticism I have is that the touch buttons on the bottom of the phone don't sometimes detect when they've been pressed.

But those are a couple of small flies in what is otherwise, some very pleasant ointment.