Episode VII - Return of the Droid
By Karl Susman | November 13, 2009
I have been salivating over the Verizon Droid as much as the next geek. Really, I have. I’ve been following Droid on Twitter, asking questions, reading reviews and just plain old obsessing in general. I also was in line Friday morning. The Verizon Droid is an incredible device and I loved having it. So why, do you ask did I return it yesterday? Read on.
The device looked and felt great. It was sturdy, solid and truly felt like a well put together piece of hardware. After getting back to my car with Droid in hand, I immediately went to work customizing. I was pleased to see that many of my iPhone applications were in the Android Marketplace and ready to download. Sweet! I happily downloaded them and tested them out. All worked fine! I needed to setup my company’s Exchange support for email, calendar and the like, and it didn’t take more than a few minutes to do that either. I was ecstatic!
On the drive home, I had Pandora playing, and was again so thrilled that I was able to keep listening to music and check email at the same time. Um, I mean, I pulled over and stuff, of course, never would dream of doing that while driving. My wife called me and I was able to answer the phone (unlike with my AT&T iPhone) and have a conversation without dropping the call or having to ask 'WHAT?' repeatedly. It was great! Soon, I was at my desk and ready to really get busy testing out this phone.
I immediately was a bit taken back when I picked up the phone from my car seat, man it was warm. I’d go out on a limb and call it hot, not even warm. Well, who cares, my iPhone gets plenty hot too. Onward. I grabbed a cup of java and plopped myself down at my desk. Hmm. That’s strange. Only 30% of the battery was left. Well, it wasn’t fully charged when I picked it up, so I’m sure that is no problem. I plugged it into the wall to charge and figured I would keep working with the phone while it charged.
After about 15 minutes I realized that the phone wasn’t cooling down. Man, this baby was hot. But alas, fine. I was used to that by now with Smartphones. They are just little computers, and they have no fan inside to dissipate the heat, so move on, nothing to see here. Hmm. Problem. The Email application showed my corporate Inbox, but it wasn’t showing me my folders within my inbox. I have a ton of folders in there. I poked around and finally found where those folders are listed, however they were empty. Not good. I need folder support with Exchange, not just inbox Exchange support. I jumped online to the Android Market and fetched a program that claimed to handle Exchange. To my disappointment, it too did not have folder support.
By now the phone had fully charged, and it was as hot as my Apple TV, and you know that thing can practically pop a bag of Jiffy Pop from start to finish. I decided to take a drive and think this through. I went back to my car and realized that the Droid did not have any video OUT jacks. Hmm. I’m used to watching TV in my car from the output on my iPhone. This device didn’t have any video out, period. No video out on my multi-media device. Another big pain spot. Then I started thinking, never a good thing, I have a boatload of i 'devices' that this Droid can’t work with. Video out, portable speakers, chargers, docks and the like. Speaking of docs, it then dawned on me that you don’t sync this device. All of my information is kept up in the cloud. As a matter of fact, there was no way to back this phone up period. I could spend days customizing it, and lose it and have no way to recover that data or programs. Hey, no sync is good; only if with it I have the option to back everything up on my own.
I won’t torment you or me any longer. At the end of the day, as much as I loved the Verizon Droid, it was not 'good enough' to make me part with my iPhone. I needed robust exchange support, which I couldn’t get. I wanted my video OUT, and couldn’t. I wanted to be able to back up my data and again, no option for that was available. I loved making calls with this phone. I swear it felt like the first time I used a cell phone, call quality was crystal clear and I actually enjoyed talking on it. It just wasn’t enough of a draw for me to break away from what I was used to.
Tail between my legs, I headed back to the Verizon store to return my Droid. I actually thought about getting a small flip phone, just to make calls on, because the call quality was so darn good! Love you Verizon Wireless! If I had to bet, I would bet that give it 12-24 months, the Android platform, and devices like the Droid will overtake the iPhone. Ok, if not overtake, really be a contender. Unfortunately, as of now, it just wasn’t ready for me.
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Comments to date: 7. Page 1 of 1. Average Rating:  Scott G Lake Forest, CA | 9:58am on Wednesday, November 11th, 2009  | As an iPhone user, I was curious to read this author's review. I know I am not alone in loving my iPhone, but hating AT&T. It was well written, honest and concise.
One can only hope Apple will come to their senses and bring out an iPhone for Veriz... read more » |
Clay VA | 5:07am on Wednesday, November 11th, 2009 | Good writing! As someone else said, an app called NitroDesk TouchDown is a great app for corporate Exchange e-mail. It supports folders and it resolves a whole long list of weaknesses in Android 2 in that regard. My device hasn't gotten hot at all ye... read more » |
Jerry NJ | 4:33am on Wednesday, November 11th, 2009  | As for heat buildup, you need to adjust the amount of sync'ing that happens. the more the phone uses 3G, the hotter it gets...When on wi-fi, the phone is cool as a cucumber. Also, the default time period that sync'ning occurs kills the battery faster... read more » |
DroidDoes Location unknown | 11:38pm on Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 | No device is perfect not even the iphone...correct me if I'm wrong but we buy phones to make phone calls right? The Droid is great at that and so much more... |
da mich | 10:01pm on Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 | you watch tv while driving? surley not. oh you meant to say while your a passenger. |
ari-free Location unknown | 8:40pm on Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 | did you use Touchdown for Exchange?
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Jeff Brentwood | 5:57pm on Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 | This guy is a clever and engaging writer. I like reading his stuff. The line about "it was as hot as my Apple TV, and you know that thing can practically pop a bag of Jiffy Pop from start to finish" cracked me up. No Droid for me -- at least not y... read more » |
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