Contemplating move to Android from Symbian (AT&T user)

[jcostom]

Greetings all..

I've been using Symbian devices for years now. However, due to stagnation in the platform, I'm considering a move to Android. I'm staying on AT&T, as my phone is direct billed to my employer, and I'm not really interested in giving that up in favor of getting a bill that I've got to itemize and expense each month.

I use email on the phone (ActiveSync), though only in moderate volume - mostly reading. Anything I write on the phone is short - nothing long. While a physical qwerty would be desirable, it's not a must-have, provided the onscreen keyboard is responsive and accurate.

My desires in an Android handset are:

1. GSM/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900
2. WCDMA 850/1900 (at a minimum, adding 2100 would be useful for travel)
3. HSDPA 3.6 at a min, 7.2 would be useful, and HSPA would be better still, more future-proof.
4. 3MP or better cam
5. 3.5mm headphone jack desirable, but not required (or support for BT A2DP)

Looks like my current best option would be an unlocked Rogers HTC Magic, as it meets the first 4 requirements. I'd like something that's going to be getting Android 2.0 as well, again, a bit future proof. Any word on if that's going to happen for the Magic?

Or is there something else on the near horizon that meets my requirements?

[thefran1996]

you could get the unlocked magic. Thats a good choice. But theres the unlocked hero which is good also.

[bpear96]

you could get the unlocked magic. Thats a good choice. But theres the unlocked hero which is good also.

The hero wouldn't work on att because its cdma and at&t is gsm but the magic would and you could get the rogers magic so it would work on at&ts wifi or you could get the rogers dream which has a full keyboard and will work on at&t 3g

[bpear96]

I'd like something that's going to be getting Android 2.0 as well, again, a bit future proof. Any word on if that's going to happen for the Magic

yes the magic would be a good choice or a dream and yes the magic sould be getting 2.0 and it may get the sweet sense ui

[scrannel]

Make sure, before you move from Symbian, that the Andriod platform you want will have all the features you need. When I went to the G1 I was shocked that their email app sucked (still does) and that the bluetooth was incapable of sending or receiving data (files). K9 or Seven email apps solved email issue for me, but bluetooth will, with a market app, only work one way unless you are rooted. My old Nokia N80 (Symbian) not only had a great email app, could handle bluetooth data, but had programs built in for Office and reading PDF docs. I had to buy an app to make this work on Android. Maybe 2.0 is great... but make sure. If I upgrade my G1 in the near future it will be for a Nokia N900. Oh yeah... and Android has no speed dialer!? Yeah, there are work arounds and apps... but dude, Adam and Eve's cell phones had speed dialers.

[simms22]

lol , Symbian is still around ? ;)

[jcostom]

Make sure, before you move from Symbian, that the Andriod platform you want will have all the features you need. When I went to the G1 I was shocked that their email app sucked (still does) and that the bluetooth was incapable of sending or receiving data (files). K9 or Seven email apps solved email issue for me, but bluetooth will, with a market app, only work one way unless you are rooted. My old Nokia N80 (Symbian) not only had a great email app, could handle bluetooth data, but had programs built in for Office and reading PDF docs. I had to buy an app to make this work on Android. Maybe 2.0 is great... but make sure. If I upgrade my G1 in the near future it will be for a Nokia N900. Oh yeah... and Android has no speed dialer!? Yeah, there are work arounds and apps... but dude, Adam and Eve's cell phones had speed dialers.

All sound like reasonable considerations... In terms of email, I need to be able to send & receive mail via ActiveSync, and GAL support is a nearly must-have. I don't so much use traditional speed dial, per se at this point. These days, I mostly use the the "just start typing the contact's name" feature that the E71 offers.

N900 looks interesting, though looks like a bit of a wide-body, not so hot in that way..

Can anyone else confirm if Android has the ability to handle OBEX or not?

[extorian]

I came from a Nokia N95 to the T-Mobile G1 (HTC Dream). I agree that the email apps on Android really suck, but, then so did the Symbian one. The GMail app is pretty good though. You can configure your GMail account via the website to pull emails from your other accounts via POP3 (with the option of keeping them on the server). This works very well for the most part.

Another option is to use your phone for important/urgent emails only. What I do is use GMail to pull all my emails from all my various accounts (Hotmail, ISP, work, etc). In some cases I actually just forward all emails to my GMail account as that's faster. The beauty of this is that your phone will be INSTANTLY notified of any new emails. It will literally beep within a couple of seconds of the person hitting send on their email to you.

But - that gets annoying and spammy right? So you then set up a filter on the Google Mail website to delete all your emails, with some exceptions (the important/urgent ones). You can set exceptions by any word, phrase, address, domain, in the subject or body, or just by account. Easy and effective. The end result is that your phone will notify you instantly whenever an important email arrives, and you can read it on your phone. Alas, you can only apply to it "from" your GMail account. But at least you can read it and use webmail or whatever to reply if it's important. Or you can put up with the standard email apps, or the alternatives such as K9.

The camera on the G1 is utterly utterly terrible compared to the 5MP camera on the N95 with Carl Zeiss optics. Don't expect it to be any good. Some Android phones have much better cameras. The G1 is 3.2MP.