Google maps makes this phone an iPhone killer

The OK button stopped working on my LG Envy2, so I needed a new phone and the Droid was on the top of my list. I bought it from a big box store that gave me credit for the Verizon new every 2 upgrade and discounted the window mount and car charger. They also transferred my contacts, but when I signed up for a new gmail account it wiped out the contacts on the Droid. I was able to upload my Outlook contacts to gmail and they synced to the phone, so all was not lost. Uploading music was as easy as drag and drop and the music player works fine and can do party shuffles of the songs in your directory. I have not been able to add playlists and the functionality of the music player falls short of the iPhone and iTunes. I don't use my phone for music that often, so this wasn't a big concern. The browser is great and access is fast with 3G. Double tapping on the screen enlarges it. When you need to enter user names or passwords, you simply tap on the entry box and the on-screen keyboard will pop up. The touch keyboard is easy to use and I find that I have not used the slide out keyboard in favor of using the touch screen. It was easy to bookmark favorites on the browser.

As others have reported, the navigation works great with voice recognition You can say something simple like "gas stations" and it will bring up a map showing the nearest gas stations. For a test, I put the Droid in the screen holder and hit the car navigation button and spoke "Ruskin Gun Club" and it brought up the club on a google map. When I selected navigation, the Droid gave me turn by turn directions to the club. Unlike my Magellan GPS, the Droid does not give an audible tone when you come to a turn, it simply repeats the directions with the street name, "turn right on Kings Blvd.". The screen was bright and easy to read in daytime. If you need to send an address to the phone, you can send it in a text message to your phone [...] and when you open the message it will appear as a hot link that you can click on to open Google Maps, then just select navigate to get your directions. Of course, if you remember the address, you can just speak that into the phone and it will appear on Google Maps.

Using the phone is easy, but requires a few steps. You have to power on the phone, then unlock it, then select the phone feature. Voice quality is good. Volume on the speakerphone was low, but audible. I have downloaded about a dozen free Android apps from the market. It is easy to search the market by keywords, like "ESPN" or MLB for sports scores, or "solitaire" for card games. One of the apps was a barcode reader that uses the phone's camera to capture barcodes and offer online links to that product.

For messaging, online browsing and navigation, this phone can't be beat.