Dell Streak Out-of-Box Experience and UI

Aug 17 2010

I finally found time to power on the Streak to run it through the initial user set up.

This out-of-box experience (OOBE) is what distinguishes the Dell Streak from the other Android devices I’ve seen so far. As you will see below, a simple OOBE application runs the first-time user through the different components of the user interface.

This is the boot up screen:

The boot time is a little long and disconcerting because other than an initial sound effect, nothing really happens at this stage. Is the system dead?

When the system finally comes up, you get to select your language:

Then you have a quick introduction to the various buttons etc:

You also get an introduction the menu bar, which is the bar at the top of the screen. The icon here drops down a panel to access all the applications:

“Additional views” here actually refer to additional desktops that you can create, above and beyond the 4 that are already created for you:

The notification area is a section of the menu bar:

Explanation of what information status area contains:

The ubiquitous Android “back” button. You can see that it is designed in such a way that the orientation of the device during normal use is expected to be horizontal (landscape mode).

What the “menu” button is about:

What the “home” button is about:

The last screen of the OOBE contains more tips:

This is the home screen:

This is screen #3. The theme of this screen is communications (contacts, messaging and Gmail):

Screen 4 is the social, media, entertainment center:

Tapping on the arrow will drop down an abbreviated menu with a set of commonly used applications. This fixes one of the usability problems of the Android application list: that there are too many icons to scroll through if you need to look for a particular application.

Clicking on “more” will get you the full list of applications:

View of the web browser with the keyboard:

So how does the physically large screen help the web browser experience? The resolution here is 800×480. Unfortunately, most modern websites are designed with a screen width of 1024 in mind. Here is an example of this blog on the Streak. Notice that the right column is cut off.

The same webpage on an iPad which has a 1024 pixel wide screen.

And there we have it. I will continue to use the Streak and post my observations on Twitter: @benchong408

Comments are off for this post

Dell Streak Unboxing

Aug 17 2010

The Dell Streak was originally launched in the UK on the carrier O2. Now, it has finally arrived in the US.

I signed up for the Dell Streak pre-sale event, which entitled me to order it one day before the main “launch” day and get a Plantronics Bluetooth headset for 99 cents.

The pre-sales event was on Thursday, August 12th, and I got both items on the 16th.

Unpacked:

Close up:

Another closeup. Note the part about it being “Pocket Friendly(TM)”…

Yet another closeup. Note the use of Gorilla Glass. Dell even specifies the CPU type and speed. Yes folks, CPU type and speed is now an important differentiator. Did you even care about that when you bought your Motorola Razr?

Opened box:

The Streak itself:

I bought the Streak without a subscription, but an AT&T SIM card is included:

This is the battery cover:

And the battery:

This is the soft case:

AC adaptor, separate charging cable, wired headphones. Note that Dell is using a plug adaptor like the Apple MacBooks to deal with different power socket plugs in different countries. That’s the item in the middle of the picture.

Everything all laid out:

The backside of the Streak. It comes pre-installed with a 16GB microSD card:

With the battery and SIM. The latter is a little difficult to insert:

The one thing I dislike here is that Dell chose to use a proprietary connector like Apple instead of the more common micro USB found in most newer Android devices:

This means that you will have to deal with incompatible car chargers, spare chargers and the inevitable missing cable…

So there it is, the unboxing of the Dell Streak. I will use it and post impression on my Twitter stream: @benchong408

Comments are off for this post

History revisited Android=MSDOS, iOS=Apple Macintosh

Aug 13 2010

Are we seeing history repeating itself here?

Apple has been very successful with the iPhone, iPad and the newly re-named iOS operating system driving both these devices.

But Google’s Android has come out of nowhere to overtake iOS as the 3rd most popular mobile OS, as this Gartner report claims.

The advantage of Android is that it is open source and generally available to anyone wishing to make a smartphone or tablet device. This is very much like the PC industry, where the appearance of non-IBM BIOS vendors (Phoenix, AMI etc) and Microsoft’s MSDOS pretty much allowed anyone to build personal computers that were somewhat mutually compatible.

In contrast, Apple has always operated in the framework of a closed system. Apart from a brief period in the 1990s, Apple has not and does not license its operating system for use on third-party hardware.

Advantages of a closed system is that Apple has full control over the software and hardware and is therefore able to innovate and deliver an awesome user experience. The regular PC manufacturers who have depended on Microsoft to deliver that experience have been sorely disappointed by Windows 7′s inability to function well as a tablet OS.

The downside is that Apple as a single company, with finite resources, can only deliver a finite number of variants of its products. Variations are limited: amount of memory, WiFi vs 3G/broadband, color scheme etc.

On the other hand, an open system allows more participants. In the Android space, for example, we had Motorola and HTC taking the lead in delivering Android devices, but other players like Sony Ericsson, Samsung, LG, Dell, Asus and a whole slew of who’s-who in the PC and mobile device industry are also jumping in.

The sheer number of players in the Android space is allowing for innovation, in both hardware, software and user experience. There is also a better ability to fill the needs for a larger number of market segments. For example, you can get simpler, lower cost devices with smaller screen sizes and resolutions or you can spring for the supersize 4″ displays in the Sprint EVO 4G or Motorola Droid X. You can opt for physical keyboards (Droid, Droid 2, MyTouch Slide) or just use the touch screen keyboard. If you don’t like Motorola’s Motoblur interface, opt for HTC’s Sense UI or Samsung’s Touchwiz.

So in brief, the larger number of Android player results in not only  economies of scale, but also economies of innovation as there are more resources to innovate and deliver on that innovation.

Comments are off for this post

The hidden cost of mobile ads

Aug 10 2010

Mobile advertising is getting more mainstream.

I am not talking about unwanted SMS messages. I’m referring to the embedded advertisements that are found on many mobile applications on today’s smartphones.

For example, on my Android phones, I use something called Advanced Task Killer. The free version of this application displays ad banners at the bottom of the screen. The developer of the application gets revenue from the advertising to offset his development costs and I, the user, get the application for free.

Unfortunately, though, the ads come with a cost: bandwidth. The ad banners have to be sent to your smartphone somehow and mostly likely over the Internet. Although the ads are small, they still consume some amount of bandwidth.

We have seen this year that AT&T’s reputation has taken a bashing thanks to iPhone users overloading its data network. As result, AT&T has moved towards limited data plans. Verizon is rumored to be considering a similar move. Users will then bear the cost of any data consumption over and above their “quota”.

So while those tiny mobile ads appear to be innocuous, they result in hidden costs:

  • Infrastructure investment costs as operators try to build up their network to deal with bandwidth demands
  • Reputation costs (see this Wired article)
  • Potential data overage costs to the user

What may happen, though, is that before the impact of mobile ads get too big, mobile operators will start demanding their share of the advertising pie.

This is where the business model may get interesting: rather than you paying for your smartphone via monthly subscription fees and a 2-year contract, perhaps the ads on the phone can pay for the phone instead.

Comments are off for this post

« Newer posts Older posts »