Nexus One - review from a Finn developer - there still are some bugs

In the post A Month of Nexus One, Heikki Toivonen lists some the bugs he has encountered on the Nexus One : "I’ve encountered some annoying bugs as well. During my first week the phone got into a state where tapping the messaging icon always launched the browser. The only way I could recover was to reboot. This hasn’t happened since. Far more common problem is the soft keyboard not registering taps, or thinking I pressed one of the four buttons at the bottom (back, menu, home or search, with accompanied vibration feedback). Switching back and forth between apps fixes this eventually. I also seem to have situations when I don’t seem to get any GPS information. Some people have reported that this might require a reboot, but I haven’t been trying persistently enough to confirm if this is the only cure.".

I also encountered some problems with the four soft key at the bottom, where they don't seem to work at all, or when they seem to trigger the same action, or even when touching the screen in the middle triggers one of the four soft key button ... In those situations, the best thing has been to reboot the Nexus. It seems this happens more often when the phone has been up for some time, or when there has been some weakness in the network (I use the Nexus during my commuting time and there are a lot of places where there is no or poor quality network that make the Nexus to frequently switch between Edge and 3G).

And finally, it's Linus Torvalds - THE father of Linux uses a Nexus One

The post Linux founder Linus Torvalds is a BIG fan of Google’s Nexus One from EuroDroid reveals the incredible, that Linus Torvalds : "[...] broke down and bought a Nexus One last week". Read the whole story directly from Linus Torvalds's blog on it's blog post Happy camper.

Just to understand how a great news it is : Linus Torvalds is the man who wrotes the first Linux system as a student project, the system which is at the root of so many devices and production systems today, and at the root of Android too.

Nexus One - detailled instructions to install Cyanogen's alternative firmware from Mac OSX

The post Cyanogen ROM Beta 4 from GeekSage contains detailled instructions on how to install famous Cyanogen's alternative firmware on a Nexus One from Mac OSX.

As it is said : "INSTALLING A NON-GOOGLE ROM WILL VOID YOUR WARRANTY.".

If you wonder why one may want rooting an Android phone, consider the following posts : Why (and How) to Root Your Android Phone, Five Great Reasons to Root Your Android Phone and Why Root along with the following ones for the G1 : Rooting Android and Android – G1 – Root Access Why & How and the "root" tag on FrAndroid (in french).

Nexus One - Google announced the so awaited software update for Nexus One phones

Google announced on the Nexus One official blog the so awaited New Software Update for Nexus One phones that will solve the reported 3G connectivity problem.

The update will also bring some improvements on Google Maps, introduced the Pinch-to-zoom functionality and the Google Goggles app.

Here are Google's instructions to install the update that will be rolled out until the end of the week : "In order to access the update, you will receive a message on your phone's notification bar. Just download the update, wait for it to install, and you should be all set."

Nexus One - activate ADB connection mode

By default, the Nexus One is not visible from ADB while executing the adb devices command from the terminal.

$ adb devices
List of devices attached
emulator-5554 device


Instead, it can be is mounted like a USB key.

To access the Nexus One using ADB commands, the USB debugging mode has to be checked in the Android global setting (Menu button, then Settings item, then Applications item, then Development item, then check USB debugging mode).

$ adb devices
List of devices attached
emulator-5554 device
xxxxxxxxxxxx device


Nexus One - tweaks and bugfixes in the alternative firmware from the famous XDA's Cyanogen

XDA's Cyanogen announced an alternative firmware (CyanogenMod 5.0 (beta2) for Nexus One) for the Google's Nexus One.

Follow the link to get more details and instructions to install it. Among the many good enhancements, there is at least one all early Nexus One's owners will welcome "Many other bugfixes and tweaks from AOSP contributors". And I strongly hope Google include those bugfixes and tweaks in the official update that has been announced on the forum's thread Spotty 3G Part 2?.

Nexus One - available in France on MeilleurMobile.com

Even if the Nexus One is not officialy available in France, it can be bought on MeilleurMobile.com's site.

Nexus One and iPhone connectivity problems - are smartphones revealing the real 3G network quality of mobile operator providers ?

After the HotHardWire's article AT&T Insiders Report iPhone Exclusivity Going Away On Wednesday that's telling us that some part of the iPhoneconnectivity problems may rely on the AT&T 3G network quality — the other part coming from the iPhone itself —, it seems that the Nexus One's connectivity problems also comes from the T-mobile's 3G networks quality — the other part coming from the Nexus One itself —, according to the post 3G Issues on the Nexus One (sadly, the Google's source isn't cited in the post) "It looks like Google has come up with a two-part explanation for the crappy service on the Nexus One. The first half is a weak 3G network with T-Mobile, the second half is software related. There should be an OTA coming out soon to fix the issue.".

Are smartphones revealing the real 3G network quality of mobile operator providers ?

iPhone too seems to have connectivity problems

According to the HotHardWire's article AT&T Insiders Report iPhone Exclusivity Going Away On Wednesday, it seems that iPhone also have connectivity problems : "Inside of AT&T, we are hearing that the iPhone is causing more trouble than ever before. On some level, having the iPhone is hurting AT&T's image. Because they are the only company to carry it, and it's such a data hog, it's largely to blame for AT&T's network troubles. We don't remember hearing about AT&T's "horrible network" before the iPhone--do you? The iPhone itself doesn't really handle the switch from 3G to EDGE very well, so calls that are in-progress tend to fail whenever the 3G bands aren't optimal and the phone attempts to step down to EDGE. It seems that AT&T is tired of taking the heat for this, and at this point, they may be smart to just let another carrier take some of those customers who are most inclined to complain."

Nexus One (N1) - after a few days

After a few days, I still love my Nexus One. It's very fast, nice, slim, ... With this phone, Android is now on par with the iPhone, at least with the 2G and 3G ones - I don't know for the 3GS as I haven't use one so far.

But from times to times, the Nexus One starts to have a very strange behavior, when for example, trying to click (touch) one of the buttons bellow the screen triggers a completely different action than what you ask for. It seems to happen more frequently when a lot of apps have been opened and the phone hasn't been restarted for some times ... It also seems that using the Advanced Task Killer to kill some tasks only makes things worse. The best solution I have found so far is to power down the phone and power it on just after. As everything goes right just after the reboot, I suspect some app to behave the wrong way.