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Exclusive Motorola Android Charm

Something came to mind today, I'm curious of the compatibility of apps on the market with this device due to the screen size and layout. If you watch the videos on Motorola's website, you can see the layout is different (contact name & picture to the left and message to the right much like a forum format). And how about stuff like Launcherpro and Open Home. I'm going down to the Telus store this week to give it a look, I'm curious about this phone now, it has surprisingly impressive specs and has 2.1 (chances of it getting 2.2 seems feasible) and improved Motoblur components.
 
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Got the Charm for a test drive, so far not a bad phone at all and with 2.1 it has some decent features as well as a good battery and data usage manager. The camera has no flash which is a bummer but seems to take fairly clear pictures nonetheless. The keys are a tad small but after getting a little getting used to them I can type fairly fast on it. The OS in general responds very fast and hardly any lag yet.

I've already come across some app compatibility issues which is what I was concerned about before getting this phone, Lookout for example loads up sideways as it was designed for taller screens that typical Android phones has, and Hi Yahoo & Hi MSN doesn't remember my font settings. The plus is that you can use the phone without setting up motoblur and don't need to run motoblur widgets, the default ones are there and you can delete them.

It's a tad wider than the Blackberry Curve/Bold/Tour and a tad shorter, but the "tubby" appearance isn't noticeable at all when holding it and with the 2.8" screen it's pretty easy to look at, except Youtube videos aren't fullscreen, they're about 2/3 the size of the screen when playing.
 

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Oh and the CPU is 720MHz, not 600MHz. It's surprisingly fast for a little thing like this, I'm noticing certain text gets a bit blocky in the web browser.

Hm another problem is not being able to get certain apps from market/appbrain, luckily I have a second Android phone to do so and send them over to the Charm and browse and install via file manager, I'm thinking the 320x240 resolution is restricting certain apps from being accepted. Home Switcher for example won't appear in market when searched which is what I needed to be able to switch between default home and LauncherPro (LauncherPro won't launch and home isn't available in manage applications), hopefully this won't be a growing issue in the future.
 
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The small screen is one issue keeping it from showing up. Apps need to explicitly say they work with small screens.

The other issue is if an app requires the camera permission and doesn't explicitly state which features it requires, the market assumes auto focus, so it won't show up on this phone.

Mail your app authors and let them know.
 
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Yeah, there's also a load of annoyances in major apps due to the screen being landscape by default, Facebook, Twitter, Mog.
Along with stuff just not fitting on the screen, Mog.
Noticed that yesterday, the Charm's desktop is in "landscape" mode, when I installed some apps like Android System Info it came out as portrait mode (sideways), that can get annoying.

Even when I can't get the info page in the Market for certain apps, I can still install them via file transfer.

Processor is read by setcpu as 720 mhz. It also has 512 mb of ram it is a powerful phone in a small package.
Yup, actually impressive specs for a $250 phone.
 

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Hy I think we are expecting much from it. Dont forget its just an entry level device.
$250 makes it a low end phone yet the specs are med-high end, 512MB ram is higher than any other phone in that price range. The only low end about this phone is lack of camera flash (then again many high end phones lack flash) and screen display quality, otherwise it probably could be rooted, it's fast (especially when running LaucherPro) and sound quality is top notch AND 5MP camera (most others are 3MP still). As I said in the earlier posts, it may take a while for app devs to add compatibility for the Charm's (and Flipout) display layout.

The closest lowend phone I could compare this phone to is the Samsung Galaxy Spica, except the Spica has less than 200MB ram but has a 800MHz CPU and costed $500 at Rogers except it's already an EOL item. The Galaxy Apollo is supposed to be listed at $250, yet has lower specs than the Charm as well.
 
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Besides it's Motorola! ;)
I've owned many Motorolas in the past 15 years, I always thought they made great phones and so did Nokia but these days the way they treat Motoblur and such is a bit finicky and lots of people are actually dropping their Motorola phones for a different brand because of the long delayed update to Android 2.1 when 2.2 is already gold. My Quench will probably not see 2.1 until after Christmas, if at all, at least the Charm came with 2.1 and seems likely to get 2.2 within half a year if Motorola gets better at integrating Motoblur into the Android OS.
 
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I've owned many Motorolas in the past 15 years, I always thought they made great phones and so did Nokia but these days the way they treat Motoblur and such is a bit finicky and lots of people are actually dropping their Motorola phones for a different brand because of the long delayed update to Android 2.1 when 2.2 is already gold. My Quench will probably not see 2.1 until after Christmas, if at all, at least the Charm came with 2.1 and seems likely to get 2.2 within half a year if Motorola gets better at integrating Motoblur into the Android OS.

Not to sure why people are crying for nothing. My phone works fine? After the last 3.11 update everything has been working flawlessly.
 
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Definitely seems targeted squarely at the crackberry fiends, of which there are many here in Canada, so it didn't surprise me to see Telus pick this phone up. It's pretty nice, and the price is right, can't say I'm crazy about the keyboard, the keys feels a bit off to me, too beveled or something, but it is a little wider and easier to use than a blackberry, as least to someone like me who has never actually owned a BB.

The screen resolution is awfully low though, certainly not the best choice if you like to watch a lot of video or read a lot off your phone. Not going to blow the doors off any Quake3 demos like the Galaxy S either, of course, but with the hardware qwerty and relatively low resolution I bet it's pretty sweet for SNESoid etc. The trackpad on the back is pretty cool too, being able to scroll without touching the screen itself could be quite handy (especially with such a small screen) ;)
 
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Does anyone know what version of android it's on? I'm assuming 1.6 but hoping for 2.1...
It's 2.1, and with Motoblur it runs quite nicely and widgets are resizeable without needing LauncherPro. If Motorola smartens up and gets the Backflip/CliqXT updates pushed soon, they could get 2.2 through for the Charm but that seems unlikely until 2011.
 
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