Dell's Aero Smartphone: An Embarrassment to Android

http://www.pcworld.com/article/204040/dells_aero_smartphone_an_embarrassment_to_android.html?tk=nl_wbx_h_crawl1

by techiediy • 16 years ago

87 73 16 years ago

What do decisions and devices like this one do for the Andriod brand? not a lot of good I would immediately think. This is probably google's biggest problem.

theBobMcCormick3• 16 years ago

No, their biggest problem is having so many countries you can't buy apps in yet. I don't this does more than minor damage to the Android brand.

Companies like Packard Bell and eMachines make nothing but low quality shitty Windows computers for decades and they didn't really damage the Windows brand. Not saying that Windows has a sparkling reputation mind you, but the things that have damaged their brand have been their own fault really. And in the end, everyone still ends up buying a Windows PC because they're everywhere, at every price point and every form factor.

thehigherlife2• 16 years ago

Windows and Android are not the same platform and buying a computer is a difference experience than buying a mobile phone.

Even if I give you that they are the same, The eMachines and Packard Bell still looked and felt the same (from an OS perspective), you could blame the performance on the crappy PC, not the software running on it.

glhaynes3• 16 years ago

I understand handset makers not providing timely upgrades (who wants to spend engineering/support $s on software upgrades for a sale you already made to a customer [really, a customer of your customer] who probably won't hold any loyalty to your brand either way), but why are so many new devices coming out with really old versions of Android? I've never really seen anything like that before... PC makers are ready to go with Windows Next the day it's out.

nkassis2• 16 years ago

Because they spend a ton of money on crap "enhancements" to the original UI (except for HTC sense which I don't really care about, all others I've seen are crap). If they just released plain Android they wouldn't have anything to differentiate themselves. The problem with their plan is that they suck at software development and their enhancements make the phones worse and outdated.

glhaynes3• 16 years ago

I suppose you're right. Seems strange for those things to apparently be so badly broken by OS upgrades that they need months/years to fix. You'd think the savings on support costs alone would be substantial from not having to support older, presumably buggier, versions of the OS. Though I suppose most of the support for these devices comes from the telcos not from the handset makers.

Anyway, here's a radical and not necessarily good idea: what if the base "Android" release didn't have a launcher/etc at all, leaving what's commonly called "the UI" entirely up to handset makers. Sure, spin off the existing launcher as a separate open source project, but make it just one competitor among many. If diversity in this area is good and manufacturers really do want to differentiate themselves, make that a core part of the platform. It's not like it's that expensive to write a launcher.

tvon2• 16 years ago

Hardware manufacturers don't see themselves as Android distributors, they don't want to compete to see who can make the best home for vanilla Android. They see Android as a jumping off point, not a final product.

aphistic• 16 years ago

I'm not surprised. When I first found out Dell was re-entering the "small devices" sector I decided I was going to stay far away from anything they produced. I was burned on the Axim X50v and I'm not going to make the same mistake twice.

It was for close to the same reason as mentioned in the article as well (outdated system software). I bought it on the promise of an upgrade from WinMo 5 to WinMo 6 and while they delivered on the promise of WinMo 6 it was many months behind the expected release date and was so buggy and slow that it was unusable. Though that may have been the fault of WinMo more than the device itself. They never did release an update to fix any of it, either.

raganwald• 16 years ago

I was going to write that Android needs a Dictator that lays down the law with minions and partners alike, especially to enforce a "No Devices That Suck" policy. But honestly, does Google care? If Dell wants to ship a device that sucks, let HTC prove this is a terrible idea by eating Dell's lunch. If Android 2.2 is better than Android 1.5, let customers vote for 2.2 with their wallets.

Of course, there is always the risk that a customer who hates a Dell Aero will replace it with an iPhone instead of an HTC, ...

nkassis2• 16 years ago

Well, the largest problem I can see is that it's hard for customers to know what version of the OS comes in the phone they want. Google owns the Android trademark, they could just prevent anyone who isn't complying with certain guidelines from advertising the name Android.

They could call it whatever they want, just not Android.

SandB0x• 16 years ago

Exactly.

Just as raganwald suggests on his last line - people will be stung by their experience and simply buy an iPhone next time.

Crap like this damages the whole Android brand. Nobody wants to hear "Oh, well you bought this specific instance X of Android on phone Y. That particular one is no good, but it's your fault because you didn't spend a week reading detailed product reviews on Ars Technica before buying your phone."

It's entirely possible that sales will nosedive after the current round of phone contracts/plans are up, as most Android owners are on their first model.

(an Android user)

aamar• 16 years ago

A half-measure would be to brand the versions with something more distinctive and memorable than a number, e.g. 2.3 = "Android Ginger".

Maybe Google is shooting for where Apple is -- frequent, free updates compatible with the vast majority of active hardware. If they could get there, it wouldn't make sense to invest in branded updates. But what do they need to do with (or to) the carriers/manufacturers to achieve that?

eli2• 16 years ago

Telling people what hardware they can and cannot use to run your code isn't very Open.

natrius• 16 years ago

Sure it is. You restrict the use of your brand to people who meet your restrictions, à la Firefox. Everyone else can still use the code, just not the brand.

SoftwareMaven• 16 years ago

You aren't telling them where they can or cannot run the code. You are telling them where they can or cannot brand the product. The Android brand is not open source.

bmelton• 16 years ago

As I understand, I don't think Google particularly cares if someone replaces their device with an iPhone -- the last I heard from Google on the subject was (paraphrasing) 'any phone with mobile web and applications is good for us', the premise being that any device capable of visiting Google's web services was all that they wanted out of consumers, so that we could keep consuming their services and being served their ads.

rryyan3• 16 years ago

I think this was the original idea. But now Apple is a direct competitor (iAds), and clearly not shy about blocking competitors from their platform. Microsoft (or whoever) could do the same as well. It makes sense for Google to control and promote their own platform for their services (see Chrome and Chrome OS), as an insurance policy if nothing else.

danilocampos3• 16 years ago

I think they care a little. Apple continues to make interesting moves that hint at moving away from using Google's service stack. They've acquired some companies that specialize in services that Google currently provides, for example. Plus, Bing is now an option for Mobile Safari's search bar.

Android is a direct win for Google because they're guaranteed some influence, which means more opportunities to serve the latest hot ad unit. Anything that isn't Android is a much more tenuous proposition. Look at iAds.

protomyth2• 16 years ago

If a customer spends 90% of their time in service specific apps and iAds are the preferred ad platform for free apps, then Google is losing a chunk of their revenue stream. Heck, if a person buys the apps without advertising that further eats into revenue.

I get the feeling "there is an app for that" means that people have internalized getting an app instead of using the web for services where an app is available.

msluyter• 16 years ago

I thought there was already a dictator like that, named Steve Jobs. ;)

ergo98• 16 years ago

Consumer education and awareness is the critical element of this. Google doesn't need to dictate, but they should create some sort of gold star standard that certifies that a phone is the latest release or is promised to be updated to the latest release in some reasonable time frame. Companies like Dell that inexplicably stick some ancient version on their phone will suffer the consequences and will prioritize staying up to date.

whalesalad• 16 years ago

Everything Dell is doing is Android 1.5... they're WAY behind the curve. People need to wake the hell up and realize that the most important part of their devices is the EXPERIENCE, not the bells and whistles. They won't even remotely be able to compete on the experience front without Android 2.2.

draebek• 16 years ago

Are there many new applications that require the use of Android 2.x? It seems to me that could be a serious problem for "Android": consumer buys new Dell phone running "Android," finds they can't run half the cool apps their friends' EVOs can because they've got some old version of Android, consumer now hates Android.

mike-cardwell3• 16 years ago

Flash requires 2.2 iirc.

ydant• 16 years ago

My understanding is that the difference between 1.5 and 1.6 was huge in terms of what it provides in API/functionality and a lot of apps target 1.6 as a minimum as a result. Probably a lot more than target 2.1 or 2.2. 2.0 almost doesn't exist, it was upgraded so quickly on the devices that had it.

My experience is that if you're on 2.1 you can run most of what's on the market. I haven't used 1.5 or 1.6 enough to know about them (other than technically), but I wouldn't be surprised if 1.5 can't run a large chunk of the market and 1.6 probably gets excluded from a lot of cool stuff, too.

theBobMcCormick3• 16 years ago

One of the major differences between 1.5 and 1.6 is that 1.6 added support for different screen densities. That's pretty major. If you only target 1.6 and above with your app, it's trivial to support different resolutions and screen densities. It looks like it'd be tricky to support 1.5 and be resolution independent. I don't know for sure though.

jsz02• 16 years ago

Most of Google's own first party apps require at least 1.6 -- these devices can't even run Google Navigation for example.

napierzaza• 16 years ago

Whoa, I thought there were issues with the sprawl of hardware that has come out, and the phones which can't upgrade to new OSes. But now we find out that you can't even trust a NEW phone to have the newest OS?

This is as bad or worse than the PC industry.

But is this because of Google? Are they manufacturers starting projects for ver x.x and then only to find out after 6 months of work that the new OS is not compatible with the software/hardware they've developed?

Is there information on the road-map to the development of specifications? Or are these companies just aiming low?

BrandonDC• 16 years ago

I find this type of corporate cluelessness fascinating. When a product like this is released, it feels as though the company ignored everything; the market, the competing products and the customers. How does this happen? Is it Dell's lacklustre R&D funding? Poor leadership? Is the team who developed this product made up of soccer moms who don't know anything about smartphones? All of the above?

dannyr2• 16 years ago

This comes with the territory of having an open-source OS.

I don't like what Dell is doing but they are damaging their own brand more than they are damaging Android.

But before we get too hung up on having the latest version of Android running on our phones, let us put things in perspective.

I do care a lot about having the latest version of Android. But I'm like you guys, we're plugged in to the tech scene. We love our apps, the coolest and latest UI, etc.

But for the rest of the country, a survey of my friends suggest that most of them do not care.

My roommate just bought a Palm Pre. There are very few apps in the market. But guess what, my roommate is very happy with his phone. He said it's the best phone he's ever had.

I was happy with my Android phone even when my G1 was on 1.5. I'm glad that I upgraded to a Nexus One and I'm now on 2.2 but I never felt that 1.5 was a piece of crap.

My observation with the tech community is that we think we are mainstream. We're not. I don't know many fellow geeks that play Farmville but you know what, it's got 100+ million users.

So before we start raising hell about having different versions of Android out there, we should consider that maybe the mainstream users do not really care.

tvon2• 16 years ago

> So before we start raising hell about having different versions of Android out there, we should consider that maybe the mainstream users do not really care.

The problem is that it exacerbates the fragmentation situation for developers, or at least that's how I read it.

jsz02• 16 years ago

If they were shipping 1.6 or 2.0 I might agree but 1.5 has a ton of compatibility problems these days. You can't even run Google Navigation on it. That's something the average user might notice.

mike-cardwell3• 16 years ago

My G1 is running 1.6. I thought this excluded me from getting Google Navigation, so was intending to upgrade at the end of my contract. But then one day I got an update and navigation came with it.

I'm not entirely sure why I would upgrade now? I don't want to sign up for another 18 month contract if all I'm going to get for it is Flash, voice recognition and a shinier interface. So I've gone PAYG and saved myself about £30/month.

When the next useful feature comes along which doesn't work on 1.6, then I'll upgrade. Or if an Android phone is released with considerably improved battery life.

glhaynes3• 16 years ago

I don't like what Dell is doing but they are damaging their own brand more than they are damaging Android.

I'm not sure that's the case.

I'm not sure it's not, either...

How much users think of their Dell Android-running phone as "my Android phone" versus "my Dell phone" versus just "my phone" isn't really clear.

danilocampos3• 16 years ago

Differentiation through user experience is becoming more and more important to success in the computer hardware business.

Ten years ago, a computer was a computer. For mainstream buyers there was this thing called a Mac but only your brother's kid, who wanted to be a designer, used one and it seemed kind of expensive.

Today, the tide is shifting and people expect more and more out of their bit crunchers, whether they're in your pocket or on your desktop. Smartphones, of course, are extra competitive because a lot of manufacturers are duking it out to be the best. Between Apple, HTC and Motorola especially, the bar gets set higher and higher each quarter. Who can jam in the most useful hardware widgets? Who can accomplish the tightest software/hardware integrations so features feel great to use? Whoever it is, they gain a bit more mindshare, a few more sales, a few more solid reviews.

And here comes bumbling ol' Dell, treating the smartphone like it's a commodified piece of tech and all they have to do is build it cheap and somewhat good enough.

Regardless of whether we're in the mainstream or not, the mainstream isn't stupid. $99 buys you a lot of (subsidized) phone these days -- whether it's an iPhone 3GS or one of the many solid, 2.x Android phones. Either option is just obviously, demonstrably better than Dell's little turd RIGHT THERE IN THE CELL PHONE STORE.

Dell took their eye off the ball and they think they can apply the lessons of commodity PCs to smartphones. Just like they did with MP3 players, they will find they're well out of their depth.

I think in the end this won't affect Android fragmentation by much for the simple reason that they're not going to sell many of them.

listic• 16 years ago

> $99 buys you a lot of phone these days

Are you talking about subsidized price? I wouldn't talk about "buying" for $99 in that case, because there are strings attached. If not, please link to solid 2.x Android phones for $99, I could use one.

flatulent1• 16 years ago

>This comes with the territory of having an open-source OS.

Huh? If Dell shipped a PC with an old version of Ubuntu, would anyone really have a problem getting up to date? If Dell hasn't added anything compelling to Android, what is stopping people from getting the latest vanilla version from someplace besides Dell?

I thought the openness and freedom from restrictions were supposed to be the strong points of Android. If you don't like one fork, can't you just load another?

Maybe I've missed something big. (I'm not an Android user and don't claim to be an expert) I am puzzled that a forum with so many developers has most acting like users are helpless in this matter. What's the dang deal??

Hopefully most phones aren't stale out of the box, but without updates all would become that way. Other than seeming old already, isn't the Dell really like the rest?

michael_h• 16 years ago

I'm not 100% sure about the dell phone, but with a few of the android phones that I've been looking at, the OS image needs to be signed. So, to upgrade your samsung galaxy s to 2.2, you need to wait for samsung to release their version of 2.2. When they decide to stop releasing updates for your model, you're out of luck (jail-breaking aside).

I really, really wish it were as easy as downloading an update from android.com and installing it, but that marginalizes the manufacturers.

krschultz2• 16 years ago

I disagree. Cell phones are mainstream tech that people obsess over. My girlfriends high school and college age sisters know nothing about laptops, TVs, and blu-ray, but they know every version of every cell phone available in a Verizon store.

i.e. "How can you only have an LG enV v2 when the Droid is so much better? Come ON, I thought you were into technology?"

A survey of people will return a lot that could care less about their cell phone (I care far less about my cell phone than my laptops/computers), but it would also return a large chunk of the population that cares far more about their cell phone than their laptop.

If anything, this is why laptops are now commoditized and cell phones are getting more feature competitive.

rryyan3• 16 years ago

Take a look at the comments on Motorola's Facebook page to see (relatively) mainstream users caring about the version of Android their phones are running: http://www.facebook.com/motorola. The complaints about un-updated phones are relentless.

I think the phone manufacturers can blame Apple for this -- they set the expectation for mainstream phones to get regular and significant software updates. Now customers feel slighted if their phone doesn't get upgraded.

dannyr2• 16 years ago

How does that compare to the overall number of Motorola devices?

The unhappy ones are the loudest but that doesn't mean they are the majority.

runjake• 16 years ago

| But for the rest of the country, a survey of my friends suggest that most of them do not care.

They're going to care when they find out that the latest, greatest apps spammed in Android commercials don't run on their old versions of Android.

alanh2• 16 years ago

Yes. This includes the official Twitter app.

Zev• 16 years ago

My roommate just bought a Palm Pre. There are very few apps in the market. But guess what, my roommate is very happy with his phone. He said it's the best phone he's ever had.

I'll second the sentiments. I've got a Palm Pre Plus for personal use and an iPhone 4 that I use for work (iPhone dev). I love the Pre. It's a fantastic phone. Looks great, is more open than Android, etc. But, it could use an update in hardware. The cpu is somewhat (affects scrolling) and the screen is really scratched up (despite taking reasonably good care of it and only having it for a few months).

But, the Pre has some drawbacks. There's some fragmentation; Sprint is the only network provider to release the 1.4.5 update -- which is big for games. And the openness might not necessarily be for the best. I had some patches installed that really screwed up performance (iPhone 3G-running-iOS4 bad) and it took me awhile to realize that.

anateus• 16 years ago

I'm running the latest UberKernel at 1Ghz with Govnah set to screenstate 500/1000 (it downscales CPU to 500Mhz when screen is off). This turns the phone pretty damn fast! Lack of graphics acceleration for the OS means animation is still not perfect, but now apps load very very quickly. (Both are available from the WebOSInternal feed via Preware)

The Pre was released with plenty of its hardware capabilities just not utilized! The 3D gfx chip being just one example (the on-board H.264 encoder that's now enabled is another).

mattmaroon• 16 years ago

I too love the Pre. I've used iOS devices a ton, and Android a little, and feel qualified to say the WebOS is just hands-down the best. You're right about the screen, you have to get a protector for it. App support is relatively minimal, but at the same time still covers most bases.

The best thing about it is the Touchstone. That's one of those things that you can't even fathom how much you'll love until you use it. I even mounted one on my dashboard.

acon• 16 years ago

Sure, selling devices with outdated versions of Android is bad, but to me it is worse that they don't release updates for existing phones in a timely manner. If I buy a phone I want it to feel fun at least until the contract runs out, which means 18-24 months. If my friends gets new phones running better software, my fun is reduced and my next phone is more likely to be an iPhone, where I know I'll get timely updates.

QE2• 16 years ago

> my next phone is more likely to be an iPhone, where I know I'll get timely updates.

One significant update per year, on which Apple has disabled half of the features because you don't have the latest model?

awe• 16 years ago

Embarrassing? I'd call it growing pains. Google allows manufacturers free reign and once the UI has reached a certain point I'd say that's when Android will start to get locked down. Too early for that though.

S_A_P• 16 years ago

I think what this really says is that Dell is happy to release average, "me too" type products that really add no value to the market segment.

I dont see that the major PC vendors carry alot of weight in this segment anyway, so why the mediocre device? Seems to me that Dell has been caught completely off guard by mobile devices and still really doesnt have an answer.

protomyth2• 16 years ago

Dell has a big enterprise sales force. How long before they start pushing some "all-in-one" purchases that bring this phone (or the next version) to the enterprise?

Potter• 16 years ago

"This trend is precisely why I've argued that it's time for the baked-in Android UI to die."

Google seem to be taking the opposite approach to solving this problem. Rumours are that the next major release is set to include significant UI enhancements.

If the UI is good enough, manufacturers won't bother rolling their own. Well that's the theory, but they still need to differentiate somehow...

swilliams• 16 years ago

At the time, I mocked Verizon for branding their Android devices as "Droid," but now I think it's a little brilliant. Companies like Dell and anyone else can release crap, and it won't damage Verizon's brand, since most of the public doesn't know that they have the same OS underneath.

brianobush• 16 years ago

I am still running android 1.5 on my phone (the Cliq) - since T-mobile and motorola are a bit slow to update their older platforms. However, it still does what I need - browsing, email, calling. Bleeding edge usually add much more functionality, though I would sure like to try out the new voice activation features in 2.2

Dell's Aero Smartphone: An Embarrassment to Android

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