Motorola Droid review round-up

PC World is happy enough with the Droid to dish out a 90-percent rating. In his review, Robert S. Anthony singled out the Droid's call quality and the display. (No surprise there – everyone loves the Droid display.) Anthony also gushed over the Web browsing experience:

Especially snappy is the Droid's Web browser, which loads images quickly thanks to the powerful 550MHz processor and speedy hardware-accelerated graphics. Though you are at the mercy of your 3G high-speed data network coverage, once you're in it, Web surfing is breezy and smooth. Video from sites such as YouTube looks equally impressive; the playback of a high-definition YouTube cartoon ("Sita Sings the Blues") was excellent, with no stalling or audio dropouts.

Of course more than a few reviewers have some quibbles. Mr. Anthony, for instance, doesn't like the occasionally grainy shots produced by the Droid camera. And most of the reviews we read criticized the QWERTY keyboard. (Importantly, the Droid does have a touch-screen like the iPhone, but also real rubber keys.) Here's CNET:

Though many users will welcome a physical keyboard, we weren't particularly impressed. The keys are flush and squashed next to each other, which makes it difficult to text quickly or by feel. Also, though the buttons do give a slight downward "push," they're a bit slick and we were thrown off by the "dummy keys" on either end of the bottom row. On the whole it is a better experience than the T-Mobile G1, but not nearly as comfortable as on the Cliq or even on the Samsung Moment.

Bottom line: The Droid is a good phone. It might even be a great phone. Will it blow the iPhone out of the water? Not right away. But the sheer amount of buzz surrounding the Droid debut suggests that Apple is susceptible to an attack from a smartly-manufactured, well-executed smartphone.

Are you sold? Or will you be standing by your iPhone? Drop us a line here, or on Twitter, @CSMHorizonsBlog.

See also:

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