Review: Nexus One

I received my Nexus One earlier this week after snatching up a bargain from eBay. It came in such good condition that I actually thought it was brand new. I’m completely blown away by how fast it is compared to my Hero. Here’s what I think after 3 days of use:

Speed – it is FAST. There’s no such thing as lag. I open as many applications as I possibly can and still it handles everything fine whilst closing older apps in the background as Android does. Everything runs very smoothly, including all animations, games, video streaming to Qik, watch video on iPlayer. The browser is superb too and takes a mere few seconds to load a full webpage even on 3G.

Camera – another massive improvement.  The quality is excellent with pictures and video now being far superior to the Hero.  I’ll take some photos later on and upload so you can see for yourself.  The Flash works perfectly and taking pictures in low-light conditions is no longer a problem.

Applications – absolutely tonnes of applications to choose from.  As you probably know, or if you didn’t know, then the Android market saw over 9000 applications added in March alone, but bear in mind a large per cent of these will probably be spam apps.  Games are great to play now, no lag, smooth graphics and very responsive touch.  Here’s a list of a few favourite apps and games I have installed right now:

• Act 1 Video Player – video player
• BeebPlayer – iPlayer app
• FarmFrenzy – farm game
• idemolished – puzzle game
• LightUp – awesome puzzle game
• Layar – uses the camera and GPS to provide all different kinds of information about your surroundings
• Pkt Auctions – eBay app
• Qik – stream video from your phone to web

User Interface – I was always concerned about getting a Nexus One thinking that after using the Hero, I would always need Sense on my Android phone.  In fact, I only bought the Nexus after reading that Paul at Modaco had launched the Desire ROM for Nexus One’s.  After receiving the phone and playing around with Vanilla Android I’ve realised that I don’t actually care much for Sense any more.  The novelty of so many widgets has pretty much worn off after using the Hero for so many months.  I only really need the Power widget and and links to a few favourite apps.  I did install GDE which is a desktop replacement for the default launcher.  It’s application dock widget is fantastic, and so’s it’s launcher.  I’ll try to get some screenshots or videos of my Nexus up soon.

Problems – despite having so many positive things to say about it, it’s not all been a smooth experience.  The display is very crisp, bright and even outdoors under the Sun the AMOLED isn’t a problem with auto-brightness turned on.  No, the main problem lies in the responsiveness of the touch screen.
When I’m holding the phone in one hand and controlling the touchscreen with the other it’s no problem.  However, when I’m in bed trying to do anything, it completely misjudges the location I’ve touched and does something completely random for instance typing a message and hitting the letter ‘q’ might sometimes decide it wants to go to the Home screen!  Sometimes it just acts like you’ve not even touched it.  As you can tell, it gets very frustrating very quickly and I’m hoping so hard that this is a bug that can be fixed by a software update.

Verdict – Overall, superb phone, very responsive.  I love the display, the speed, the camera and the actual feel of the phone.  The problem with the touch-screen not responding correctly is the biggest drawback, but I still think it’s worth getting.  Lack of Sense wasn’t a problem, in fact it gives more space for applications for people that don’t root their phone (I haven’t root mine(yet)).

Regards! MAriano!