Basic Features of the Droid

This is a tricky one to answer to directly as there are several different Droid versions. This is perhaps the biggest single difference between apple products in general and most other manufacturers. Apple usually offers a single version of their product (with minor memory upgrades) while other manufacturers typically have many models. Whether having multiple models and ultimately more consumer choice is a good thing or a bad thing, I’ll leave you to decide. However, too much choice can be confusing to the customer. I’ll try and clarify some things here in this blog post.
Not unlike the iPhone the basic features of the Droid series contains:

Droid Bionic

• •voice calls
• •text message
• •still camera
• •video camera
• •media player
• •email
• •web browser
• •multi-touch navigation screen
• •Wi-fi and 3G connectivity
• •2 (front and rear facing) cameras (Droid Bionic)

One of the features that all of the Motorola Droid phones have that the iPhone doesn’t, is a physical keyboard as well as an onscreen touch keyboard. The Droid Bionic will be the first of the Droid series to not include a physical keyboard.
140 million Android powered devices are projected to be in use by the end of 2011. That is huge!! It may even outnumber the iPhones on the market. Time will tell. More is definitely better in this regard as the larger the customer base, the more apps will be made available for Android powered phones and the more likely the Android OS will be updated to contain user feedbacked requests.

Here are some other features compared in table format:

	Droid	Droid 2	Droid 2 Global	Droid Pro	Droid X
	•5MP Camera w/flash •DVD quality video rec & play	•5MP Camera w/flash •DVD quality video rec & play	•5MP Camera w/flash •DVD quality video rec & play	•5MP Camera w/flash •DVD quality video rec & play	•8MP Camera w/flash •DVD quality video rec & play
	•Standby up to 270 hrs •Talk time up to 385 min	•Standby up to 315 hrs •Talk time up to 575 min	•Standby up to 320 hrs •Talk time up to 500 min	•Standby up to 330 hrs •Talk time up to 480 min	•Standby up to 220 hrs •Talk time up to 480 min
	•mini usb connector GPS, WiFi, Speakerphone •QWERTY keyboard •Touch screen	•mini usb connector GPS, WiFi, Speakerphone •QWERTY keyboard •Touch screen	•mini usb connector GPS, WiFi, Speakerphone •QWERTY keyboard •Touch screen	•mini usb connector GPS, WiFi, Speakerphone •QWERTY keyboard •Touch screen	•mini usb connector GPS, WiFi, Speakerphone •QWERTY keyboard •Touch screen •HDMI (connect to t.v.)
	16GB pre-installed expandable + 32GB	16GB pre-installed expandable + 32GB	16GB pre-installed expandable + 32GB	4GB pre-installed expandable + 32GB	10GB pre-installed expandable + 32GB

You might have noticed that the Droid Bionic wasn’t included in the chart. This smartphone, which is due to be released this June, will be quite different from the previous Droid models and we should look at it separately.
The Droid Bionic will have:

• •screen size of 540 x 960 pixels, 4.3 inches
• •Swype input method
• •16 GB storage (expandable to 48GB), 512 MB RAM, 2 GB ROM
• •8 MP, 3264×2448 pixels, autofocus, dual-LED flash
• •DVD quality video
• •Dual-core 1GHz ARM Cortex-A9 proccessor, ULP GeForce GPU, Tegra 2 chipset
• •GPS
• •4G

Like most of the other Droid models, the Bionic will allow for Swype input. If you don’t know what Swype is, here is a video that can explain it much better than words:



The features of note on the Droid Bionic are the dual core processor, 4G network access, 8MP resolution camera, and huge amount of memory. More on each of these later… Multitasking should be smooth and effortless on this phone as already the Android OS is quite good at this. With a dualcore processor to help it along, the Bionic should really excel in this area. At this point there is no information available as to how long the battery will last between recharges. With a dualcore processor and a large touchscreen to power, it better have a substantial capacity or users will find themselves recharging every few minutes!

Size and weight of the Droid Bionic

Height: 4.96 inches (125.9 mm)

Width: 2.63 inches (66.9 mm)

Depth: 0.52 inches (13.3 mm)

Weight: 5.5 ounces (158 grams)