Tue 23 Sep 2008
Google & T-Mobile: G1 Phone
Today Google announced the first phone running on the Android platform. It’s the G1, made by HTC (makers of many popular Windows Mobile devices). The G1 will be available exclusively from T-Mobile stores in U.S. cities where they’ve depolyed their 3G data network. You’ll be able to order the phone online and it will work in the non-3G areas, but at slower speeds (or you can switch to the built-in WiFi).
The phone has drawn many comparisons to Apple’s iPhone. At first glance, it’s pretty similar, with large and bright touch screen (full features, and more detailed features from Fortune). But unlike the iPhone, the G1 features a full QWERTY keyboard beneath the screen. It will also have a cheaper data plan than AT&T’s iPhone plan. The phone itself can be had for $179 which is $20 less than the cheapest iPhone.
G1 Sideways Opening Keyboard
That being said, the G1 doesn’t yet support Exchange push, which the iPhone does with the release of the iPhone 2.0 software. There will be an applications store where users can download new apps. G1 users will be able to download music from a special Amazon.com store–directly to the device and DRM-free.
That’s all good, but it appears to only come with a 1GB memory card–I wasn’t able to find the specs on the built-in memory. While it may be $20 cheaper than an iPhone, but they come in 8GB and 16GB versions, so you’re going to spend a lot more than that buying 7GB worth of memory cards to store the other part of your music library. While their website says “With the 1GB memory card, youll never be without your favorite tunes,” I’m willing to bet many will feel differently. Also, is it me, or do all the home screen flick interactions seem very iPhone-esque?
Either way, I’m sure there will be a lot of people who will be eager to get their hands on the device. It will be interesting to see if and when lines start forming.