T-Mobile G1 launch day roundup
By Joshua Topolsky 
posted September 24th 2008 11:52AM
posted September 24th 2008 11:52AM
Update: We've added a link to our initial impressions, a more detailed look at the device and software.
The liveblog:
Live from T-Mobile's Android event in New York City
Hands-on coverage:
T-Mobile G1 first hands-on (updated)
Video: Android walkthrough on T-Mobile G1
Product announcement:
The T-Mobile G1
In-depth / details:
T-Mobile's CTO on G1 unlocking and tethering -- plus a few details you might have missed
T-Mobile soft capping 3G data at 1GB per month
Confirmed: T-Mobile G1 has no 3.5mm headphone jack
T-Mobile G1 site goes live for real, first ad appears
T-Mobile G1 has push Gmail with Google Talk presence
T-Mobile G1 impressions: what we love, what we don't
I don't get why people care so much about signing cell phone contracts? You need a phone, pick a freaking provider (they are all relatively the same) and do it, I've never had a problem signing a new one.. you guys are all crazy.
It's just totally insane. Signing up for 2 years at $55 per month. What if Motorola releases a much better Android phone next month? You can't change, you are tied to that idiotic carrier.
Carriers lock-in sign exclusive agreements with manufacturers, they provide the devices, the devices are OVERPRICED by a factor of like 3x or 4x manufacturing price if you want to purchase them unlocked. Basically you could get a laptop or a return ticket to the Bahamas cheaper then buying a device like this unlocked.
You know, there are are less dumb and less corrupt countries in the world that have consumer protection laws that forbid those greedy carriers from signing people up in contracts for any longer then 6 months. For example Denmark.
Also signing up for obligatory voice plan is just totally stupid since Android OS is a supposed data-centric OS, why wouldn't you just run VOIP applications on it and drop that friggin voice and sms plan.
There is no obligation here fortunately. T-Mobile will sell you this phone contract free for $399 and then happily (not so happily) unlock it for you after 90 days to take wherever you want.
$550 for an unlocked HTC Dream. That's 3x or 4x more then manufacturing price. There is nothing fortunate about that.
When you compare the G1 to all available smart phones (or even to unavailable Touch HDs which seems unfair at this point) of course it misses the mark. If you compare the G1 in context against what T-mo currently offers to it's users, this phone is great for anyone not wanting to switch networks.
Judging from FCC approvals, T-mo users wont be seeing the Diamond, or Touch Pro any time soon, and considering how heavily the G1 is subsidized, the Touch HD will likely be unattainable for t-mo users because the phone is redoubtably expensive.
Unless I'm mistaken or unless there's some sort of work-around, t-mo users cant even buy unlocked 3G devices from other networks to use on t-mo's 3G since the carrier's 3G operates on a different spectrum than the other carriers.
anyone stuck with t-mo is happy to see the G1 hit the market.
Chill out. All of your posts on this subject are so negative and demeaning.
Facts are that most companies are in the business to make a profit so they sell them for more than manufacturing costs. Also all the providers charge pretty much the same amount for the same level of service. The real question is whether a buyer feels they will get value received for their expenditures.
So phone manufacturers should sell their phones for no profit? You're living in a dream world...the standard cost of manufacturing is usually somewhere around 15% of the final cost to consumer. If the phone cost $150 to manufacture, then getting it for $400 would be a steal by most standards. Further, the idea that cellular networks can magically support nearly unlimited data usage is totally off. The fact is that there isn't sufficient infrastructure here in the US to support large numbers of people using upwards of 10 GB of data a month. These things will come around eventually, but for now, this is what we've got, if anything else were magically possible and profitable, I'm sure a provider would be doing it.
Where the hell did you get that UK pricing from?? And since when did phone contracts come in 2 year forms in the UK as standard? 18 months or a year is usual, and i doubt very much that £40 a month will be the cheapest price plan available.
Are you just making that up?
I'm intrigued if you're plucking these numbers out of the air, how do you know R&D costs of HTC? What makes you the authority of appropriate pricing for cell providers?
What a joke. If you don't think anything is appropriately priced don't buy it. These companies don't owe you anything, they decide. If enough people have the same sentiment as you they'll soon wake up and lower the price plan.
If you want to sell your house do you just take whatever a potential customer asks for? no, you decide the price and set it, and if it doesn't sell you lower it or make it a more attractive preposition.
T3 and Stuff magazine in the UK got a G1 to test and the T-Mobile people told them UK plans are going to start at a minimum of £40 a month for 2 years.
People aren't going to complain about signing up for 2 years, it is proven fact people are too stupid to understand what it means signing a contract for 2 years with a company.
So many sites are talking about the $179 pricing of the G1 or $199 pricing of the iPhone, but that price is just totally full bogus.
Denmark consumer protection laws has another law that requires cell phone carriers putting in a big font on all advertising what the TOTAL PRICE is for the device and the service contract. People need to talk about TOTAL PRICE. Otherwise they are just treating people as a bunch of idiots.
move to California... mobile contracts have been ruled illegal by a Superior judge in a case involving Sprint.
You can legally walk out of you contract any time you wish. HELLO rest of USA? Challenge authority, it does work sometimes!
I think this phone may be a pass. I have read a few things that the XPERIA X1 may be released on T-Mobile USA. Even if this turns out not to be true, I think that it is worth waiting to find out for sure. The fact that the G1 is big, ugly and doesn't have any exchange support for business users out of the box makes me very cautious about pre-ordering this. If it turns out that it looks better in person and that someone quickly gets a good outlook/exchange sync out there on the marketplace, I may reconsider.
God get this thing off the front page. I'm so sick of seeing pictures of this phone.
Nice phone, but can I unlock it to work on AT&T's awesome network? (just kidding, I own an iPhone for the next 2 years).
Yes. T-Mobile will sell you this phone contract free for $399 and then happily (not so happily) unlock it for you after 90 days to take wherever you want.
Has anyone noticed that they actually gave a device that was not an iSomething tons of posts. Hey Engadget turned over a new leaf intead of posting a dozen or so posts about apple devices they will post dozens of posts about new and exciting other devices too. The only problem is why do you have to post dozens of times about the same freakin' device. grr...
What person in their right mind would buy and contractually obligate themselves to a multimedia capable handset with no headphone jack when pieces of crap like the iPhone can put a headphone jack on a device for $199 or less? Have people learned nothing?
You have to wonder why google and t-mobile would allow the rollout of android to rely on such a lackluster phone. Perhaps this is their way of getting Android into the hands of a limited few already enthusiastic folks, willing to forgive and forget, at first so all the bugs can be wrung out before trying to make it appeal to the masses?
No, $179 is the price for current Tmo customers outside of any contract or in their 11+ month on a 1 year contract or 22+ month on a 2 year contract.
I received mine for about $217(ish) after tax/upgrade fee ($18). Somebody on this site yesterday posted a screenshot of their order screen showing the same thing.
still dont understand why in the world wide hell would they not launch this on a sexier/betterer device, I mean sure its all bout that damn OS but have they learnt notn? WE NEED BOTH!
1GB/mo?? no 3.5mm headphone jack??? no desktop sync??????? no exchange?? no USB port???
ridiculous!, ludicrous!
boooo, booooo
reminds me of the Air disappointment
The device is definitely not as sexy as some of the other phones out, present or future.
1 GB/mo is just a softcap and there's fine print stating "Some downloads, such as movies, music, and games, not included". So 1 GB/mo, outside of those media items, should be sufficient for MOST G1 users. Who knows how strictly Tmo will enforce this and if/how they'll raise the cap once their 3g stabilizes.
3.5 headphone jack - sucks you have to buy a proper adapter, but they're not expensive and can be found easily.
no desktop sync & usb port - there's a ExtUSB port, which is proprietary, but it accepts mini-usb, so plug it into your PC and drag-and-drop until you can't stands no more. No official desktop sync software, but with this being open source, we might have this software before this phone even hits consumer hands.
This phone isn't going to have all the bells and whistles other phones have right out of the gate. They're tossing this out to the world as a blank canvas and telling us to paint something.
It lacks a bit of 'wow' factor.... it's like meh... just another phone.
The OS sure has a lot of potential though.
Nice nerdphone, if you're willing to put up with T-Mobile's spotty network. Their lousy coverage does not command the high monthly fees. Don't worry about the 1GB limit: it's highly unlikely you'll ever get enough signal to be able to reach it.
Will someone please clarify if this thing will support UMA? If it doesn't, no deal, period. Is it something that can be open sourced into it?
no uma, because tmobile is gay
HTC's G1 = Getting a Hot Fudge Sundae from HTC/Google and T-Mobile traded the cherry for a TURD!
That is one seriously ugly phone. T-Mobile? You've got to be kidding. Well, I guess since Apple has a contract with ATT/Cingular, they had to settle for something. Something like 11% of market share. Considering that anyone on T-Mobile where ATT is available is not likely an early adopter (or high school graduate) I think they're pitching to less than 1% of US customers.
my questions is, how does it handle software updates? Will it be via OTA, or would one have to wait for T-Mobile to release it on theyre site like with other HTC, and Blackberry devices? Could we just......Google for an update and install?
HOLLY FREAK'N FUGLY BATMAN!!!
is it supposed to be a throwback to the 1970's Russian technology look or something... who the hell designed that thing... the interface is freak'n ugly too
...what do they say about first impression... looks like some kid came up with it in his basement or something
Is A2DP bluetooth really that hard to include in a phone?? The HTC Wizard had it 3 years ago, yet HTC cannot include it in a brand new phone. My wife's $50 Samsung slider has it, for God's sake!! The video recording problem will have an app out in a matter or days.
Tweenies like these phones that open up. Enjoy your phones girls. I'll stick with my iphone.
T-Mobile coverage is absolutely awful here in Southern California - I switched recently to ATT in anticipation of the iPhone 3G. While I waited for the iPhone to come out I just swapped SIM cards and used my old T-Mo Samsung. While the switch made my wireless bill double, my coverage and signal strength also doubled - fair trade for me.
I'd never go back to T-Mobile. More dropped calls than a 2.0 iPhone...
These thoughts come to mind after reading reactions to this post about the G1:
1 - How many here are previous HTC users? (Regardless of cell provider)
2 - I wonder what non-tech types reaction would be to the G1 (It seems like most commenters here get too "hung up" on looks)
Thought number 1 in particular - I actually switched to T-Mobile to get the Wing, because of the cost. I was on AT&T before and their HTC slider devices were way more than what I wanted to spend. That being said, I'm looking forward to getting a G1.
Just wanting something other than WinMo to use and I have no intention of going back to AT&T. (for the record I am familiar with the i-Device experience, being an owner of an iPod Touch...)
I admit for me the promise of Android far outweighs any concerns about looks..
Does anyone know about average actual dataspeeds in major urban areas between G1, Iphone 3g (ATT + Tmobile hspda) and various Verizon/sprint phones that can do EVO Rev A?
I need an iPhone with Google Apps integrated like this
does anyone know if you'll be able to purchase music on the G1 from amazon, and then transfer to your itunes library on your laptop?
appreciate it!