I had pre-ordered the gPhone about a month ago, when T-Mobile announced the phones were going on sale.

It took me a couple of tries until the screen actually worked, but I eventually was able to place my order. Unfortunately they didn’t have any White units in stock, but luckily they didn’t stick me with the Brown.

For some reason the brown sounded appealing at first, but if I ended up with one, I would have felt short-changed. Look at the Zune: brown doesn’t work.

T-Mobile G1 New gPhone Review

The packaging is very nice, with the box having an insert and the outer frame showing through in the area with the ‘G1′. Inside the box was a nice foam padded area, and the phone was prominently displayed.

T-Mobile definitely took their time crafting nice packaging for the device, but as usual, the accessories definitely underperformed. The new gPhone packaging and look for T-Mobile makes me feel like T-Mobile is starting to build their brand beyond AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon.

I don’t know about you, but I like all of the accessories to maintain the same fit and finish of the device, but the accessories definitely fell short.

There is the headphones, that look like the standard blackberry affair, and the charger was disappointing, as strange as that sounds–I didn’t expect an iPhone charger, but I would have liked a foldable charger akin to the Blackberry.

The device itself is actually pretty impressive. It looks like your typical PDA/HTC phone, but has a little sophistication to it. The all black lines give it a business feel, and the keyboard isn’t as bad as I thought.

Personally, I like the iPhone’s keyboard the best, and can type on it using one hand. With the gPhone, I have to use two hands.

The most annoying part of the keyboard is my right hand. It’s inhibited by the bump of the buttons, and makes it hard to start hacking away like I would on a Blackberry or iPhone. I’d have to say the keyboard is more of a drawback than a feature.

The buttons on the base of the device are pretty useful, and I found myself using the trackball more than I did the screen. Maybe it’s because I’m used to my Blackberry 8800 and its trackball, but it seemed to get the job done for the most part.

The trackball didn’t always became ‘active’ on the screen. And what I mean by this is essentially when you’re using a PC and you’re trying to click in the search box, but the mouse hits the wrong area, and you can’t type. This is the same situation with the trackball. I had to essentially tap on the screen with my finger to get the trackball in the correct sensing-position.

The flip mechanism was a lot more well constructed than I expected, and you can see the locking and snapping mechanism, it looks pretty robust. My girlfriend actually felt the snapping of the keyboard into place was a little too violent and thought it might lead to deteriorating after extended use/drops.

I think it should last you at least a year, but for those people who don’t upgrade their phones as often as me, it could present a problem.

The Android OS was less than impressive. It felt more like a computer than the iPhone, but lacked the fit and finish I’ve come to expect on the iPhone. Browsing around menus was often confusing, and not as intuitive as the iPhone.

I expect over time to learn the ins and outs of the phone, but would have liked more ease of use out-of-the-box. One feature that was appealing was the ability for apps to run in the background. I could listen to music on the Imeem app, while browsing the Internet, or trying to figure out how to connect to a Wifi hotspot.

Managing the connections is also less than intuitive, and I hope will get more updates in the future. You can’t manage connections from the desktop, but have to go into settings, which can be a lot of steps for trying to setup an open network. I actually couldn’t get on our local open network, because it requires you to validate the session in the browser, and I couldn’t get the connection started, and validate in the browser effectively.

Wifi on my home network was great, and I could even stream Imeem over Edge, which was particularly impressive.

The camera was better than I expected, but the shutter was incredibly slowww. It is even slower than the iPhone, making it virtually useless. You can see in the picture below that it seems to have some shake, which is really because you have to hold the camera still for a good 6 seconds.

Hopefully we’ll see a software update for the camera, because as of now it’s useless. As for video recording, I can’t find anything. I was hoping there would be a native app, but there’s nothing included. I searched the App Market, but couldn’t find a video recording app as well.

Using gMail and my email was a little annoying to setup. Unlike the iPhone, you don’t have a central area for mail. You either have your Mail or gMail. You can’t view both inboxes at the same time or even switch to them. You have to log into each application separately.

There are nice notifications that come up when you have new emails/SMS/etc but without PUSH, it’s a little aggravating the email experience is so lackluster.

Overall, my conclusion is that I will most likely be selling the G1. It doesn’t offer me the email ease of use that my Blackberry has, and without a 3G network in my area, the iPhone is killing it in terms of speed.

While I think I would be more confident having only the gPhone if I were on a trip, and the iPhone wouldn’t perform as well. On a day-to-day basis, the iPhone fits my personal uses better, and is more impressive, and show-stopping.

For those of you on T-Mobile, who don’t have an unlocked iPhone, I would say this is a great phone upgrade for anyone not used to Blackberries, and the Sidekick users should be really happy with this upgrade.

There are a couple of caveats you should be aware of. This new gPhone is not the only Google Phone to be released. T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T all will be releasing a gPhone at some point, although Sprint has said they will not have an Android phone available.

As far as comparisons go, this phone is better than anything Sprint has to offer. It is comparable to an iPhone, and is better than the Sprint Samsung iPhone killer.

The Android/Google Phone does not support flash. So you can’t watch Hulu, YouTube (natively), etc. The gPhone does not have A2DP support. And the headphones do not supply a 3.5mm jack meaning you can’t use your iPhone headphones.

The T-Mobile network is also quite slow. It’s on EDGE, and there is not T-Mobile coverage nationwide, so you may be stuck with very slow downloads or streaming audio or video.

Perhaps the next devices will be a little better than this new gPhone, as I think version 2.0 will have a great chance of being a true iPhone competitor or even killer.

Until then, I hope you enjoyed my review of the new Google gPhone G1 or whatever you want to call it

This device is more a cross between a European line than an Apple model, but I can definitely see the iPhone 3G resemblance

The new iPhones I hope will take more of a tactile feel, because that just can’t be replaced with a glass screen.

What do you think — is this the future of the iPhone or how about a full-keyboard, is that still a dealbreaker?

iPhone 3G Killer Behold!

The iPhone 3G will have a next generation, so what will that phone look like? Will it be more of a gPhone variant with a physical keyboard or perhaps it will be a double-sided touchscreen. And what will it be called? The iPhone 3G v2? The iPhone Pro?

What do you think? Is this an iPhone 3G Killer? Maybe it’s just a little better than the EDGE iPhone or perhaps even the Android G1? Either way, bring on the great design!

Apple really is the king when it comes to closed-environments, while Google has long touted itself as the ultimate open-source, free, ubiquitous platform. Will this play out in the phone world? We’ve already seen the huge issues Windows Mobile has had, and the Palm phone operating system is about to die, can Android and Google really be Goliath-killer with this G1 phone?

The G1 gPhone Sure Does Look Pretty

Well at least Google got lucky with HTC’s first Google Phone, the G1. It has a nice svelte finish, great big touch-screen display and a keyboard! Personally I’ve never been a big fan of the slide-out keyboards, as they never have the great tactility of the candybar Blackberries.

G1 vs. iPhone 3G

Well assuming the keyboard is a big decider for you, and you like the looks of the G1 (I do), so let’s see how the features stack up.

T-Mobile G1

* One touch access to: Search, Maps, Gmail, Youtube, Calendar, and Google Talk
* Gmail account and data plan required
* GPS
* 3.1 mp camera, no video recording
* No stereo bluetooth (A2DP)
* Dimensions: 4.6 x 2.16 x 0.63 in
* Weighs 5.6 ounces
* 480×320 65K color screen
* 5 hour talk time, 130 hour talk time
* Expandable up to 8GB
* Removable battery*

AT&T iPhone 3G

* One touch access to: Search, Maps, Gmail, Youtube, Calendar (integrated apps+app store)
* 3G data plan required and standard for AT&T
* Assisted-GPS
* 2 mp camera, no video recording
* No stereo bluetooth (A2DP)
* Dimensions: 4.5 x 2.4 x 0.48 in
* Weighs 4.7 ounces
* 3.5″ LCD 480×320 163ppi
* 5 hour talk time, 300 hours standby
* Built in 8GB or 16GB memory

The phones physical attributes put the iPhone at slightly wider and thinner, and also a little lighter, while the G1 has a better camera, which is a big plus, and the ability to remove and replace the battery is a big PLUS for the gPhone.

Killer? I Think Not

The real killer right now for Google is their decision to go with T-mobile for the first launch. T-Mobile only has 3G in less than 10 cities, while AT&T has over 250 cities, making it a no-brainer for those people looking for obligatory 3G speeds. And speaking from experience, EDGE is HORRRRRIBLE.

Winner: iPhone 3G

So at this point, I don’t think the gPhone is much of an iPhone 3G killer, however, looking back at our original post, I think this Google Phone definitely stands a chance of being an iPhone EDGE-killer. The removable battery, better camera, Android app store (original iPhone had no app store), really push this phone over the edge.

That being said, I think a year from now, when the network differences are equalized, we’ll have a true contender for the iPhone 3G.

Until then, the Wise Startup Blog is happy to announce the iPhone 3G is still the king and champion.

There have been a lot of phones released since the original iPhone and sadly I can’t say any of them are as good as the iPhone. It’s really amazing that Apple can make a single product and completely revolutionize the industry and leapfrog all the competition. I mean Motorola, they are definitely struggling and need to get a grasp of things or sell off their mobile division because it is struggling!

Review of HTC Touch Pro / Raphael

Personally I’m still pretty torn over the iPhone 3G, with me leaning more towards staying with my iPhone EDGE or possibly jumping shit to a Blackberry again. Regardless, MobileBurn seems to think the HTC Raphael looks pretty good and its keyboard is actually better than the Xperia X1, which is good news for full qwerty fans.

Let us know what you think about the HTC Touch Pro in the comments.

iPhone 3G Killers

I definitely want to use the word “killer” lightly, because none of these phones truly match the elegance and ease of use of the new iPhone 3G, however, they all (except one) have physical keyboards and offer similar functionality.

T-Mobile iPhone EDGE
What’s that? Yup, the best iPhone 3G replacement is the iPhone EDGE. I’m currently using an iPhone on T-mobile and have not experienced a hiccup. I’ve even been able to use the $6 data plan to get full Internet avoiding the $20 T-mobile plan as well as the ridiculously high AT&T prices. How do the features stack up?

• 3.5″ touchscreen
• EDGE-data speeds
• Email: HTML rendering
• Processor: 620Mhz ARM
• GPS: No Chip, Cell Tower Location
• Extra: It’s an iPod!
• Price: $300 on eBay
• Data: $6/month
• Size: 4.5 x 2.4 x 0.46 inches
• Weight: 4.8 ounces

Sprint Instinct
You’ve been hearing about it for the past 2 months, and they actually ran a number of commercials touting the features and how this thing was going to be an iPhone killer. That is, until Apple released the iPhone 3G, and that whole campaign went out the door. The main ability the Instinct was touting was its GPS (which iPhone 3G has) and its fast EVDO speeds, which the iPhone 3G also has. Then there’s cost, but let’s see how the phone stacks up.

• 3.1″ haptic-touchscreen
• EVDO Rev A data speeds
• Email: HTML rendering
• Processor: “slower than iPhone” (unknown)
• GPS: Turn-by-Turn Navigation
• Extra: Voice Commands
• Price: $129 (after 2 year rebate)
• Data: $69/month
• Size: 4.57 x 2.17
• Weight: 4.4 ounces

Verizon Samsung Glyde
Aside from the ridiculous spelling of this phone, it has a pretty nice feature-set and doesn’t try to compete head-on with the iPhone, and that’s a good move. The Blackberry line has all stuck to the physical keyboards (besides the Thunder), and they seem to have been able to keep their street cred and wall street cred as a result. Verizon has the most reliable network, which should give all Glyde owners a good feeling, and they also have great data speeds with EVDO-Rev A. Now how do the features line up for the Glyde?

• 2.8″ haptic-touchscreen
• EVDO-data speeds
• Email: HTML rendering
• Processor: Unknown
• GPS: VCast with Traffic ($3/month)
• Extra: Slide-out Keys!
• Price: $249 (after 2 year rebate)
• Data: $29/month
• Size: 4.1 x 2.0 x .7″
• Weight: 4.1 ounces

iPhone Killer Verdict

Well, how you doing? Made your decision yet? You’re already locked into your contract anyway, so you’ve already made up your mind, but after looking at this, if this didn’t make you want to switch to AT&T yet, I don’t know what’s holding you back.

My advice

If you’re not on AT&T and want the best iPhone-like experience, I would go with any of the Blackberry devices these carriers offer. The Blackberry feature-set and UI are the next best thing to the iPhone 3g, but you want a touchscreen, right? Take your pick, but the Instinct looks like the next-best given the EVDO speeds and relatively painless feature set. There is news of a true iPhone 3G-killer in the Blackberry Thunder, but the release date is somewhere in the cosmos.

Let us know your choice in the comments.