It’s T Mobile’s first phone with a touch screen and app store and that android OS from Google. I’m Brian Tong from CNET.com. And today’s product spotlight, we’re fixed and focused on the T Mobile G1.
The G1’s design looks pretty good in pictures but in reality, it’s not that hot. It’s just plain chunky and the curved base makes it awkward to pocket. Now, this phone won’t win any beauty queen awards but there are plenty of things to like about it. It features a great looking 3.2 inch touch screen that’s very responsive and you’ll have other navigation options like the Blackberryish track ball and with a quick flip, there’s a full QWERTY keyboard.
Now moving to the interface, it’s intuitive and easy but it’s still not as sleek as the iPhone. The G1 is loaded with 3G connectivity, Wi-Fi, GPS and Bluetooth plus you’ll get a full email client, a 3.2 megapixel camera, access to the Amazon Music Store for DM free tracks which I love, and YouTube.
Other nice features are multimedia messaging, copy and paste even if it’s a little generic and a micro SD card slot for expansion. For all you iPhone users can be jealous about that. The Android Market App store is a great addition and it may not be loaded with apps right now, but the potential for growth is ridiculous.
So what about the things that this phone really needs to work on? First of, design. Now, we talked about its bulky body but its off center design makes using the keyboard uncomfortable and at the moment, there’s no touch screen keypad. So if you want to enter in any URLs or write emails, you have to use the keyboard. Now, this phone has multimedia and access to the Amazon music store. So including the 3.5 mm headphone jack is a must. There’s just no excuse to use a USB Dongle. And with a screen this big, you’d expect it to play video but there’s no native video application and you have to download one from the store to even get a video playback.
Okay. Another drawback is that you can’t synch the G1 to your computer so you’ll have to live in the Google world to get your email, contacts and calendar synched up. currently, there’s no exchange email support so business users, you got to be aware for now. Now you know, I’m not trying to rip this thing apart but I’m just being honest.
Now on the performance side, this is a quadband GSM phone, call phoning was solid with slight background noise and I had a small audio hiccup or two during the call but that’s kind of normal with my T Mobile experience. 3G connectivity is super snappy and that might be due to the low volume of 3G users on T Mobile’s network. But either way, it’s very good in real world use.
Now, the T Mobile G1 has a rated talk time of 5 hours and up to 5 days of standby time. Now all in all, the G1 comes packed with all the connectivity you want but it has many short come ins. The bottom line, the openness of the platform makes this something to look forward to but the phone is just not there yet.
I’m Brian Tong for CNET.com and there’s your product spotlight. Keep shining.
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