To begin, it must be noted the author is an iPhone addict, and duly biased. And, this review will pit the G1 vs. the iPhone in many regards. The photo shown here was taken with the iPhone (yes, the crappy iPhone camera).
Getting up and running was simple and fast: add the SIM card, power on, and configure the GMAIL account you want associated with your phone.
First catch: make sure the GMAIL account you are using is the one you REALLY want to use. After you add the account, there is currently no way to change it other than resetting the phone to factory settings. See the manual on how to do this.
After you have the GMAIL set, you are off and running. And playing. There are many features to check out, and the input methods are numerous: touch screen, track ball, full QWERTY keyboard and few tactile buttons to boot.
After some time cruising around the device, some initial thoughts came to mind:
- If you don’t like the idea of being forced to have a GMAIL account, don’t get one. Or hack it!
- Its much bulkier and heavier than I thought it would be; much more than the iPhone.
- The applications available in the ‘Marketplace’ are very average, and seem out of date
- Getting on WiFi is easy, but unlike the iPhone it doesnt pro actively ask you to join one
- touch screen is fine, appears very responsive
- adding additional email accounts is straight forward, no harder/easier than iPhone mail application
Feels much more like windows mobile than I would have thought.- Awkard holding it in landscape position (for your right hand) and using keyboard, not as nice as Sidekick, as the device gets in the way of itself
- trackball might be overkill for everything but games. but I love it for games, and this is an important part
- Camera is pretty solid, though not sure on exact method to snap shot (see photo on right)
Overall, good first effort. its apparent that the HW and SW is from different firms as its not totally tight. Its a PC, not a Mac 
