I have owned my G1 now for over a year, and I really like it- it was my first real smartphone that I have ever used and I would say that this phone is very smart indeed- many of its features are greatly enhanced with their web-interactivity, such as with maps, or the android market.

The market is android's answer to the iPhone's "App Store" with many quality, free or low-priced apps- my favourites are GameBoid, a GameBoy Advance emulator, Musical Pro, a virtual piano/keyboard/drums, and Picsay Pro, an advanced mobile photo editor. The "stock apps" (i.e. the apps found on a new phone providing its basic functions) are a little underwhelming, such as with the basic music player and the clumsy media gallery, but thankfully replacements can be downloaded. For example, TuneWiki is a very well featured music player. The user interface is effective- a status bar is always shown at the top of the screen, and this can be pulled down like a "blind" to give easy access to text/email alerts, and messages from other apps. The home screen can be populated with icons to open apps, or with widgets, which can be compared to gadgets found on a computer desktop- although I find some of these useful (to provide headlines for example), many will slow the phone's operation.

The hardware is generally good, as I find the keyboard a huge advantage over other touchphones (even though it could be a little more comfortable to use), and the screen itself is quite responsive. The trackball is a little fiddly to use however. The indicator light is very convenient, as you can choose how you want it to be used within various apps. The wifi works well, as does the GPS, which usually finds a satellite quickly, but this does run the battery down very quickly (and can make the phone become very hot). This is a problem, as the phone's battery is already very easy to flatten- with moderate use, I consistently need to recharge every night. I will finally mention the camera- its reasonably good quality, with not much noise, but it can't really handle low-light (especially with the lack of flash). Outdoors though, its colours and white-balance are generally very good.