Google Android was out few months back. But only a couple of months back only Airtel introduced it in India. Here in this article we will review the gadget.

Please note that I am using Android Developer’s Phone 1 (Android Dev Phone 1 or ADP 1) for this review:

The Android Boot Screen will appear for some 2-3 minutes.

ADP1 is a fully hardware unlocked and SIM unlocked phone. This means that you can use the SIM of your favorite service provider.

Since it is hardware unlocked, the programmer can even meddle with hardware specific features.

The boot screen is shown along the right side. This is also fully configurable.

If you are a novice you can simple replace the ‘logo.rle’ file. But if you wish to perform advanced level hacking, you can use the SDK for re-programming it.

Once it is loaded you will see the Android ‘Desktop’ (Home). This is shown on the left side.

This smart phone also supports touch screen.

There are innumerable number of applications available in the “Android Market”.

You can download them and install it in your gadget. But one problem that you may encounter is that the inbuilt space (memory) of ADP1 is very low. Still, you install all your favorite applications with the help of the micro SD card attached to the device.

The phone will cost you roughly $400. And if you are based in India, you may need to pay around $650 (including duty and shipping). But I would say, it is worth paying!

Now, let’s have a glance at the specifications.

Android Dev Phone 1: Tech Specification

Touch screen
Trackball
Slider keyboard
Wifi
GPS-enabled
Bluetooth
3.2 megapixel camera (autofocus)
3G WCDMA
Quad-band GSM
1GB MicroSD card (can be replaced with up to 16GB card!)

The figure below shows the inbuilt dialer of the ADP1 phone (based on Android OS). You can also use the keyboard for entering the number.If you are using a 3G service provider’s SIM card, you may not require access to internet via Wifi. But if your data plan is a volume based one, then you should really go for the Wifi.

You can connect the phone to your laptop / PC using the usb cable. Then, you need to download Andoid SDK from Android Site(www.android.com). Please note that you need to download the SDK corresponding to your OS type.

I’m not covering programming in Android platform in this article since this is only a basic review.

Back to review: You have a slider in the desktop that will show you the ap

ps that are hidden in the ‘desktop’. You can use the trackball for scrolling.

Another interesting aspect is that your calender, contacts and email (gmail) will automatically get synchronised with the server details. This means that you will have all your Gmail contacts in your dialer! And you can save all the contact numbers in your Gmail account itself, so that you will never lose it!

The screen shot shown below shows an application (game) running in Android OS. Now, let us see some ‘cons’ of the Phone. The most prominent one in this category is that the battery hardly holds enough power. A fully charged battery can give power only upto 5-6 hours if you use applications.

And if you use GPS along with that, then it will run out of power in 3 hrours. But an ‘idle’ device can retain power upto 3 days. Another problem is regarding the sound clarity if you turn on the speaker. The quality is equivalent to a $100 phone.

Here are few resources for you to begin with:

http://developer.android.com

http://developer.android.com/videos

http://developer.android.com/community

If you wish to start programming using the phone, the you need eclipse to do it effectiely. We will covering those aspects in the coming parts.

You may also have trouble in registering the phone using a Google Account.

If you need any help regarding the following things, please refer to the next part of this series

1. Registering Android with Google (using Wifi)

2.Installing Eclipse and setting up the software

3. Android SDK – an over view

4. Programming in Android

Happy Android Hacking!