I haven’t written in a while… mostly because there has been nothing additional to complain about. The phone pretty much does what I want it to do. Some of the apps, well I have issues with them. For example, Cardio Trainer has a hard time picking up the GPS signals. Seems like it should be easy, I stand in the same spot and access Google Maps. I quickly get my location. Switch over to Cardio Trainer and sometimes I am lucky to get a signal after a few minutes. However, I don’t think that’s the Droid’s fault at all.

Still wish it was slimmer and lighter. I am going to take off the rubber case and protective screen. People keep telling me the screen is a special ‘hardened’ screen and won’t scratch easily. I guess we’ll see if they are right.

I like using wired boom headsets. The only problem is I can’t find one with a native 3.5mm jack. If you look around, there are tons of boom headsets that are compatible with the Droid*. The * when you read on means that you need a 3.5mm male to 2.5mm female adapter. I personally don’t think the adapters work to well. I had picked up 22 from the “Shack” and everyone tells me they have problems hearing me, I keep cutting out on them. At first I thought maybe it was my cheap headset that I was using, but even when I put it a better one I would get the same results. With the iPhone and now the Droid using these has headset jacks, why don;t manufacturers make some where adapters aren’t needed? It is my belief that any extra connection the loop negatively impacts the quality of said connection.

I had a fully charged phone in the morning. i took it off the charger, made a few calls, sent a few texts. Maybe looked at the maps and a few apps in the market place. Later that night, it is blinking red. The battery was extremely low. What the hell? I check and there as an app running that should not have been. I had killed it the night before, or at least I thought I did. Not only does this app not have an exit feature, but it seems to be able to mimic the trick candle that can never be blown out. I had to kill it several times the night before before it left the running services page. Somehow, it resurrected and was running was again. This app is no longer on my phone - at least I think it is, who knows if it is actually removed?

My point here is if you create an app for a phone, add in the functionality to exit the app within the app itself, and adhere to it.

Things are going well with the phone. I have not used the camera much, mostly because of my disappointment with its performance. The bulk is still an issue, I am sure future version will be smaller.

Right now my main issue is the headset. I don’t like using Bluetooth devices for the simple reason that I do not want to charge another device. I always forget to do that, and on long conversations, it might be impossible. So I prefer wired sets. I have a bunch of boom headsets, but they are 2.5mm plugs. I got a 2.5mm to 3.5mm device at Radio Shack to make my current headsets work. It is not ideal, but it did work. However I have been getting a lot of complaints that people can’t hear me and when I wiggle the plugs around it sometimes gets better. I suspect it might be the adapter, so I have been looked for boom headsets with 3.5mm plugs. Frankly, there just are not that many ( some might say any ) ones out there, at least ones not made for cellphones. I just ordered some Labtecs ones made for PCs. Hopefully they will work, they look to be bulkier than I would like, but if they work better I might not mind.

I have been noticing lately that when I in my house and connected to me wi-fi network, my signal strength goes down and 3g indicator never shows up. I think the 3g disappears since it will try to send data over the wi-fi link, but I don’t understand why it affects my signal. I am going to have to look it up.

Now that I have had the phone for a little while, the bulk size of it is beginning to annoy me. Not when I am using it, but when it is just sitting in my pocket, when I move to do certain things that I use to without noticing a phone in my pocket, I now do. This involves mostly bending over at the waist. Is it a dealbreaker? Not by any means. I also notice that I am really not using the slide out keyboard at all, even with the D pad that I like. What I have also noticed is that I have to constantly slide the phone shut, just from movement in the pocket it cracks open a little.

I am trying out a new text messaging app called Handcent. It offers a couple of different styles of display of messages. I chose the iPhone version ( who are we kidding, I have had a Mac for a long time and this is really just a port of the iChat interface ). It seems like the best one so far. I am not sure of all the other options, but the one thing that I do like is the batch mode. It is a lot easier for me to send a message to multiple people than the one that comes installed. I plan on trying it out for a few days to see if I like it. So far, so good.

After a call is ended, the phone returns to the call log. At this point I would prefer the phone to just go to the home page, but I have to hit another button to complete that action. I am not sure, but most of the phones I have had in the past would do this, so this is what I came to expect. However this is my first non-flip hone that I have had in quite a while, maybe the style of phone dictates the action? Maybe this is configurable, I will have to search to see if I can change it.

I carry my phone in my pocket most of the time. I have noticed that the ringer volume keeps turning off. Something about how I put it in or take it out of pocket turns it off. It just seems to be to easy to do by accident. I am sure they thought it was good to put it in the location outside, but it just doesn’t seem to be working all that well.

Here is a sample of video taken from the Droid. I think it came out rather well. The upload could only be done over Wi-Fi though, not the 3G network since it said it was so large. Only 21 seconds of video.

Sample Droid Video