Smart Phones

Verizon announced changes to their plans that would have seriously increased by monthly phone charge. I was eligible for an upgrade anyway so I got a new phone and (hopefully) grandfathered my current rate for another two years.

I had been using a Droid Incredible which was top of the line when I got it. It still did everything I need from a phone although an operating system upgrade left it with a serious bug. It didn't recognize all available memory and would give me out-of-memory errors. When this happened some things like Gmail stopped updating. There is a fix for this but my phone complained that it did not have enough memory to install the patch.

Anyway I got an LG Lucid. By current standards this is considered an entry-level phone but I mainly use it for email, Facebook, driving directions, photographs, and occasional web searches so it does everything I need. I'm not thrilled about the battery. My Droid had an extended battery which was good for 2-3 days. I have had to charge the new one twice in a day. I have an extended battery on order. I will see how that helps.

One nice thing about this phone is that everything except the case from my old phone still works. I moved the memory card from the old phone to the new one and had all of my pictures and music. You can't do this with an iPhone or Windows Phone - they don't even support memory cards. Also, the rumor is that the next iPhone will have a new connector that will be incompatible with the old one. Worse, Microsoft announced that the current line of Windows 7 Phones will not be able to run Windows 8. My Lucid is supposed to be upgradable to the next release of Android (Ice Cream Sandwich) although nothing has been announced.

This is my second Android phone plus a couple of Android tablets so I know my way around the operating system. LG made a few changes, mainly cosmetic. One I like is that the wallpaper changes when it is charging. This is an easy way to be sure that your phone is solidly connected to the power supply.

I did have trouble connecting with my Roadrunner email. I could not get the native email client to do it. Eventually I downloaded one called K9 (after Doctor's Who's assistant) and this works just fine. I can get both to connect to my work email.

One complaint I have with the Lucid is the lack of an indicator LED. This is useful for seeing when a new email has arrived and for seeing when the battery is fully charged. Other than that and the battery, it is a nice phone. Considering that the current iPhones and Windows Phones are about to be made obsolete, I'm glad I stuck with Android.