My First Weekend With the Moto Droid

At 6:58 A.M. on Friday, I pulled into the parking lot of my local Verizon store. Exactly 30 minutes later, I was back in my car, with a splashy new Motorola Droid in hand. Now, after spending three days with the device, I feel prepared to offer my own take on the latest, and clearly greatest, Android phone.

Design

There's no denying it: The Droid is a heavy phone. Sure, it's only a couple ounces heavier than the iPhone 3GS, but you feel the difference immediately. And if you're moving from a BlackBerry Curve, as I was, the weight difference is significant. However, the Droid's music features mean I no longer have to carry an iPod Touch around, so I've actually made a net reduction in the amount of device weight I shuffle around with each day.

Some critics, such as my friend Dylan Tweney at Wired, have remarked that the Droid's slide-out keypad seems like an afterthought, an unnecessary appendage given that the phone's on-screen keypad is adequate for most tasks. I agreed initially. In fact, I scarcely touched the physical keypad for the first half of the day on Friday, until I found myself in an extended IM session with a colleague. For typing-heavy apps, that physical keypad has proven indispensible, and I now intuitively switch between the on-screen and physical keypads while using the phone, without losing a beat. I suspect I'd be somewhat less satisfied with the Droid at this point if that slide-out keypad weren't there.

The direction pad, on the other hand, has yet to prove its value to me. Because it takes up a fair chunk of real estate to the right of the keys, it increases the learning curve on using the keys for someone who's grown accustomed to BlackBerry keypads. I might feel differently about it if I were a gamer, but I've yet to download any games for this thing, and I doubt I'll get around to doing so anytime soon.

Of course, the Droid's biggest asset, quite literally, is its display. Web sites, pictures, and videos look fantastic on the 3.7-inch, 480x854 touch screen. It's hard to feel disappointed about the phone's boxy carapace when the only thing my eyes take in is this massive, beautiful screen.

Interface

Some critics have rendered sweeping comparisons of the Android interface to that of the iPhone, and found Android wanting. However, I find such comparisons unhelpful, as they generally focus on the look and simplicity of the menus, rather than on functionality.

There is little question than the iPhone has, for a couple of years now, represented the platinum standard in smartphone interface design. It's simple, elegant, and intuitive. However, that simplicity comes at the expense of customizability and control. Apple has deliberately barred developers from tweaking the iPhone interface in an effort to keep the look and feel of the device consistent for all users. There is a certain logic to this policy, and the payoff for iPhone users is unrivaled ease of use.

Contrasted against the iPhone, the Droid's menus are somewhat complex. Fortunately, Verizon stayed its typically heavy hand and spared this device the usual Verizonization of the menus. So what you get with Droid is a standard Android 2.0 interface, for which there is much to be said.

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