T-Mobile G1: Google's iPhone killer

Now that we early reviewers are free to talk about our T-Mobile G1, you should expect to see G1 referred to as the "iPhone killer." G1 is a killer, all right, but imitating iPhone was the furthest thing from the minds of the Google and open source developers that pulled Android, G1's unique operating system and GUI, together. G1 was a consumer-oriented product from the word go.

Still, a shell prompt from a cell phone can reduce a geek to giggles, and T-Mobile G1, coupled with the Android SDK, signals early Christmas for all of nerd-dom, as evidenced by the fact that the first run of 1.5 million units sold out before the device hit the streets. It turns out that there is a very good reason that T-Mobile G1 is so well received. It is an exceptional, extensible phone with enough consumer and professional appeal to take it past entry-level BlackBerry, and at a starting, subsidized price that's nearly $120 less than iPhone, T-Mobile G1 will give iPhone 3G a serious run for its money. It cannot be said that T-Mobile G1 is all that iPhone is; G1 carves out its niche by being most of what iPhone isn't.

[ Take InfoWorld's slideshow tour of the T-Mobile G1 and then read Tom Yager's review of iPhone 3G and "iPhone 3G enterprise scores are in" to judge how the iPhone compares. See also "Why iPhone won't yet rule the roost in the enterprise" and "How to make the new iPhone work at work" ]

The hardware
When the swivel-out QWERTY keyboard is tucked away, T-Mobile G1 feels great in your hand, like a proper phone rather than a PDA. Grippy plastic keeps the device from sliding around, and a sloping "shelf" near the bottom puts the mic where your mouth is.

The touch-sensitive display (but not stylus-sensitive, one of my gripes) is generous, sharp, and unlike iPhone, consistently put to use in portrait and landscape modes. Swinging out the concealed QWERTY tray reveals a spacious keyboard, and flips the display's orientation from portrait to landscape. The keys are widely spaced, and there's even a row of numeric keys. Swinging the keyboard back to its concealed position, which uses a nice, stiff spring rather than a clumsy latch, flips the display from tall to wide, along with the currently visible application. With iPhone, the orientation switch relies on the position-sensing accelerometer, and the effect is primarily limited to the Safari browser. All of Google's standard apps flip to landscape when the keyboard comes out, lending a welcome consistency to the UI.

Like Windows Mobile devices made by handset manufacturer HTC, T-Mobile G1's build quality is strictly middle of the road. After a little less than a week of use, the display sinks on moderate finger pressure, giving out a barely perceptible creak that is also present when the device is squeezed, but squeezing or mashing on the phone is rarely necessary in normal use. It's the kind of thing a reviewer would do.