Hate might be a little strong. . . I’ve had my Droid X for a few months now and all-in-all I’ve been pretty pleased. The Android OS is pretty well done and quite fast too. I’ve had these thoughts brewing in my mind for a while and wanted to make a list of things I like, things I don’t like and kind of a wish list. I’ll be adding to this list from time-to-time so check back. And, please make any comments with things you like or dislike about your Android phone, particularly Motorola’s Droid X.
See How To Remove City ID (and other crapware like Blockbuster, Skype and VZ Navigator) From Droid X (and other Android phones) for detailed instructions.
Things I like (maybe even love) about my Droid X:
- There are a lot of things to like. It’s been very nice so far. I was worried about the touch screen keyboard, but it’s been fine. I’m a believer.
- Google Maps & Navigation. Long-time user of Google Maps. Love that on the Android, especially the navigation. Used it over the weekend on a road trip – worked great!
- Fast startup. Really kicks ass over my BlackBerry (Curve, Tour and Bold) which took upwards of 15 minutes.
- Love the size of the screen – especially compared to those iPhone things by Apple.
- I love that it’s not an iPhone or Apple product. A lot could be said here; open, not under Steve Jobs’ control, Flash support, basically that it isn’t an iPhone.
Things I hate (or dislike or that bug me) and problems I’ve had with my Droid X:
Note: I began to notice most of these issues after upgrading to Froyo. . . .
- Shitware from Verizon and/or Motorola. This is my biggest complaint – crap I don’t want and can’t uninstall. Namely CityID, Amazon MP3, BlockBuster, VZ Navigator, etc.
- Problems accessing my corporate (Exchange server) email. Sometimes it just doesn’t fetch email for hours at a time. In fact, it hasn’t worked properly over the past 24 hours since right after I last restarted the Droid.
- No easy way to capture screenshots on Android – very easy on both BlackBerry and iPhone‘s.
- Scrolling through lists, web pages, etc. is choppy. It seemed much smoother before the Froyo upgrade. WTF?
- When long-pressing on a number in the dialer need to have to option to copy the number!
- Contacts. Lots of little things here.
- First, I don’t like that it automatically makes all people I follow on Twitter contacts. Give me a choice.
- After viewing a contact & clicking on the back button I’m taken to the top of the contact list rather than the spot I was previously.
- The Notes field is not big enough (doesn’t display enough information) and not easy to edit.
- Often it cannot recognize media files, particulary music – mp3 files for heaven’s sake. It will display the message, “Sorry, the player does not support this type of audio file,” and I have to restart the phone to correct this problem. This is an issue that’s fairly easy to reproduce – it’s not random.
- Email to SMS messages are duplicated. (This one is a little tricky so you’ll have to follow along). I receive several SMS messages daily that originate from an email account. Essentially they are emailed to nnnnnnnnnn@mycellphoneprovider.com and received as SMS messages. If the message contains both a subject and body I receive two SMS entries, the first with display the body text only, the second displays the subject in parentheses along with the body. If there is a subject only I’ll still receive two messages, the first is blank and the second contains only the subject, in parentheses of course. Finally, if there is a message without a subject I receive only one SMS message. Pretty annoying.
- Ever since 2-3 upgrades ago Handcent SMS displays email-to-SMS messages with UTC time, rather than local time. The built-in SMS app displays the time correctly. Otherwise Handcent SMS is great!
- While typing I’ll enter a space, then a hyphen, but the hyphen is placed right next to the last character I typed, not the space. If I press space, hyphen that’s what I want, not character, hyphen, space!
- Every once in a while when I dial a contact from the recent list it dials the wrong person – another from the recent list. It’s kind of like the list hasn’t fully updated when I load it, and when I click the phone icon next to the contact I want to call, an adjacent person’s number is dialed.
- Camera is a little slow to both focus and take the picture. Certainly Motorola could do better with this.
Suggestions to make Android a better OS:
- Fix all the stuff above, and. . . .
- Allow me to adjust the ringer volume while the screen is locked!
- All my recent Blackberry’s had a great feature I wish the Droid X had – while listening to music long-pressing the increase volume rocker button will advance to the next song in a playlist, and similarly the reduce volume button will go back to the beginning of a song, and even prior song. I really miss this Blackberry feature. Wish Android had it.
- While typing, after pressing space a few special characters are displayed above the qwerty line including exclamation, question mark, comma, @ sign and underscore. These are great, however I would also like to see ampersand (&) and hyphen (-). Better yet, give me the ability to easily edit these options.
Remove Android (cr)apps
See How To Remove City ID (and other crapware like Blockbuster, Skype and VZ Navigator) From Droid X (and other Android phones) for detailed instructions.
Make A Difference
Tell the FCC that Verizon (or AT&T or Sprint or …) is forcefully installing applications with no choice to remove them by filing a complaint with the FCC at esupport.fcc.gov/complaints.htm. You can also file your complaint with the FCC’s Consumer Center by e-mailing fccinfo@fcc.gov; calling 1-888-CALL-FCC (1-888-225-5322) voice or 1-888-TELL-FCC (1-888-835-5322) TTY; or faxing 1-866-418-0232. I suppose if enough people complain Verizon will stop trying to force this crap down our throats!
See More An(Droid X) Suggestions for more things I’d like to have on my An(Droid X) phone.
I have a great idea regarding this phone's reliability.
How about a camera that doesn't corrupt the images or video after shutter release. Or maybe correcting the phones tendency to pretend no memory card is present when trying to save something. Perhaps fix the issue with the back light coming on but displaying no video whatsoever. This requires that the battery be removed and reinserted which is an annoying problem when the phone is in an Otter case(or something simular).