Verizon Droid Gets Previewed; AT&T Version Spotted; Droid Army Predicted
By now we know that the Verizon Droid not only looks good, but has plenty of technical promise too, and BGR have followed up their preliminary hands-on with a more comprehensive preview of the Android smartphone. The Motorola Droid gets praised for its "sharp, vibrant, bright and really, really responsive" 3.7-inch capacitive touchscreen, while the keyboard may lack travel and feature closely-packed buttons but it's good enough for "efficient" typing and is better than the T-Mobile G1. Meanwhile the charging dock/multimedia station (which you can see in a video demo after the cut) automatically turns the Droid into a weather station.Droid feedback, plus news on AT&T's Droid and a whole Droid army after the cut
There's also a multimedia mode, which like the weather station dock is triggered by a magnet held to a certain position on the Droid's body; BGR are predicting a car cradle/dock which take advantage of that, though right now only the charging dock is confirmed to launch alongside the Droid. As for battery life – quoted at 6.5hrs use, or 270hrs standby by Moto themselves – it's the "best ... out of any Android device we've ever tested" which comes as pretty high praise. BGR are excited about the official launch model, and frankly so are we.
Meanwhile, while the Verizon Droid may be a CDMA-only device, according to an FCC listing unearthed by one of MobileCrunch's tipsters there's an AT&T-friendly version of the smartphone in the works. The AT&T Droid will support WCDMA 850/1900/2100 and quadband GSM, making it ideal for Canadian carrier Rogers, too; this come on the heels of a European UMTS 3G version spotted previously.
The range explosion shouldn't come as a surprise, however, according to Engadget's "trusted source". They're claiming that Droid isn't a single device but a brand name for Verizon's entire range of Android-based smartphones; while the Motorola Droid "may" be known solely as Droid, it'll be followed on November 6th by the HTC Droid Eris, the phone previously known as the HTC Desire. According to the preliminary specs on gdgt (which are yet to be confirmed) the Droid Eris will have a 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen, 5-megapixel autofocus camera and support EVDO Rev.A. In fact, it sounds a lot like Verizon's own version of the HTC Hero.
Verizon are holding an event on October 28th to announce the Motorola Droid, and SlashGear will be there to bring you all the details. Android 2.0 looks like it could really help change the smartphone market.
