You would’ve had to have been living under a very big and heavy rock not to be aware of the launch of the T Mobile G1, the very first mobile phone ever powered by Google Android. However, very few people have actually had the chance to play with one.
Well, it’s not the real thing in the flesh, but now everyday folks like me and you can have a muck around with it, virtually, online, as T Mobile have put up a T-Mobile-G1-stylee-emulator-thing, to let people fiddle with the menus, and see how it works.
However, since it’s not actually a real mobile phone, just a flash-presentation, you can’t do thing s like send a text message, or see where you are with Google Street View, but it will let you see how fast the menus are, and see how the slidy screen works, and so on.
I have to say, it is actually quite nice, and pretty quick. I’m still not convinced the T Mobile G1 is a good-looking mobile phone, it looks a bit like a high-tech Duplo block to me, but there’s no doubting the chops of the Android operating system. It’s fast, it’s responsive, and it’s intuitive, although I’m hard pressed to find anything in there that my Symbian UIQ phone can’t do. And I think the new Nokia 5800 looks way nicer than the G1.
As I’ve said many times before, though, the big, big thing about Google Android is the effect it’ll have on other mobile phones, I reckon. Windows Mobile, the new Symbian Foundation, all bringing their A-game to fight the T Mobile G1 (and other Android mobile phones when they come out) and the iPhone.
Interesting times, indeed!
Want to see the big fight unfold? Check out the competitors, the T Mobile G1 and the Nokia 5800 Xpress, on our coming soon page!
