The last straw.

[Caindris]

Fair enough on that end. I admittedly do not know enough about the tech end! If it does work great but its not user error either. I didnt make an errors I just dont have my company setting it up the correct way then. I will accept that.

Then its not a true biz device because too many people fall into my category.

It most certainty is a user error. If you're going to be gung-ho and get a new phone that your IT department hasn't authorized to work on your network that is your fault. The phone is still a true biz device. It works with Exchange and it works with Google Apps.

You have no one to blame but yourself if you are using a un-supported phone within your business.

Sure I do google, MOT, and VZW for leading me to believe that all is well out of the box. come on now!

Legos work coming out of the box too. That doesn't mean you get to skip the instructions or reading the assembly.

 

[sterdroids]

It most certainty is a user error. If you're going to be gung-ho and get a new phone that your IT department hasn't authorized to work on your network that is your fault. The phone is still a true biz device. It works with Exchange and it works with Google Apps.

You have no one to blame but yourself if you are using a un-supported phone within your business.

Sure I do google, MOT, and VZW for leading me to believe that all is well out of the box. come on now!

Legos work coming out of the box too. That doesn't mean you get to skip the instructions or reading the assembly.

Well thats why I am here but VZW said all will work just buy it! Which I did and now I am becoming much more well versed then I intended but I am having fun. But again its not open it up and boom your off.....

 

[darreno1]

Yeah I was able to send attachments from day 1, just not save them and that was easily taken care of by Touchdown. Also using gmail from the web browser was a good workaround.

People should remember that no smartphone does everything 100%. Out of the box I'm bewildered as to why users think the Droid should be as feature rich as a Blackberry, a phone designed with the corporate user in mind. Just like I'd be equally surprised to hear someone buy a Blackberry only to complain about it's crappy web browser and small screen.

Right now they're converging, true, but they are not quite there yet (iPhone included).

And for those complaining about the need for third party apps, well, the Market is not there for show. It's expected to be an 'extension' of the phone. The idea is that users would find the apps in the Market useful and would therefore purchase the ones that satiate their needs for non default features or add to what's already available. If this is a problem for some, then they should purchase the phone with default apps/features that come closest to what their usage needs are.

Of course it would be nice to have every feature available right from the get go but what would be the point of the Market? And what about the Dev community working hard to had features? I love games, but the Market would be pretty boring if that's all it offered. What that said however, there are certainly some things that should come by default, like the ability to easily save attachments. And I'd agree with anyone who became a little annoyed on discovering the omission of such a fundamental feature. However, the overall experience and the ability to easily find apps to fill in the gaps not only makes the Droid very dynamic but is part of the fun/appeal of owning such a device. Just my 2 cents.

 

[moparharn]

We don't have an IT department. You are right I should

not have trusted Verizon to deliver a new phone that would work. Why did my calendar sync yesterday and not today? We don't have an exchange server, just some over the counter host for our email that can be retrieved through squirrel mail (I think it is something "five", as the host). Aol, Comcast, Google, and yahoo are my others. Why do they send one day and not another? Why did Verizon tell me that the Droid will not forward attachments? I DON"T KNOW. I WANT TO KNOW. I WANT TO KEEP MY DROID. I WILL PAY WHATEVER IT COSTS TO MAKE THESE PROBLEMS GO AWAY. WHO DO I PAY? IPHONE MOBILE ME? MY WALLET IS WIDE OPEN.......HOOK ME UP! I looked down at my phone today and it was turned off!! It just shut itself off. WTF!! If I exchange this for another and explain my problems to the Verizon store, I will bet you a million dollars that they will have no idea how to help me with my problems. I am sorry sir but I just talked to Motorola and they will not have a fix for that until January.....Maybe. I am sorry sir, is there anything else I can help you with today???? Thank you for calling Verizon Wireless. Is there someone in Detroit that I can pay to help me? Nobody I call in tech support seems to be as high on this phone as some of the people on this board. They give up too easily, and thus so do I.

 

[sterdroids]

Yeah I was able to send attachments from day 1, just not save them and that was easily taken care of by Touchdown. Also using gmail from the web browser was a good workaround.

People should remember that no smartphone does everything 100%. Out of the box I'm bewildered as to why users think the Droid should be as feature rich as a Blackberry, a phone designed with the corporate user in mind. Just like I'd be equally surprised to hear someone buy a Blackberry only to complain about it's crappy web browser and small screen.

Right now they're converging, true, but they are not quite there yet (iPhone included).

And for those complaining about the need for third party apps, well, the Market is not there for show. It's expected to be an 'extension' of the phone. The idea is that users would find the apps in the Market useful and would therefore purchase the ones that satiate their needs for non default features or add to what's already available. If this is a problem for some, then they should purchase the phone with default apps/features that come closest to what their usage needs are.

Of course it would be nice to have every feature available right from the get go but what would be the point of the Market? And what about the Dev community working hard to had features? I love games, but the Market would be pretty boring if that's all it offered. What that said however, there are certainly some things that should come by default, like the ability to easily save attachments. And I'd agree with anyone who became a little annoyed on discovering the omission of such a fundamental feature. However, the overall experience and the ability to easily find apps to fill in the gaps not only makes the Droid very dynamic but is part of the fun/appeal of owning such a device. Just my 2 cents.

Beautifully said! Not an arrogant fanatic. i have nothing to add except I am having fun like you mention!

 

[Caindris]

Sure I do google, MOT, and VZW for leading me to believe that all is well out of the box. come on now!

Legos work coming out of the box too. That doesn't mean you get to skip the instructions or reading the assembly.

Well thats why I am here but VZW said all will work just buy it! Which I did and now I am becoming much more well versed then I intended but I am having fun. But again its not open it up and boom your off.....

Please, tell me of a phone that works out of the box that has been untested within the IT department. Go ahead, I'll wait.

 

[LordKastle]

Peace... we want an army ... not a democracy full of infidels.

 

[sterdroids]

Legos work coming out of the box too. That doesn't mean you get to skip the instructions or reading the assembly.

Well thats why I am here but VZW said all will work just buy it! Which I did and now I am becoming much more well versed then I intended but I am having fun. But again its not open it up and boom your off.....

Please, tell me of a phone that works out of the box that has been untested within the IT department. Go ahead, I'll wait.

What I will say is I am done. Have a goodnight and enjoy your phone

 

[atlharry]

not have trusted Verizon to deliver a new phone that would work. Why did my calendar sync yesterday and not today? We don't have an exchange server, just some over the counter host for our email that can be retrieved through squirrel mail (I think it is something "five", as the host). Aol, Comcast, Google, and yahoo are my others. Why do they send one day and not another? Why did Verizon tell me that the Droid will not forward attachments? I DON"T KNOW. I WANT TO KNOW. I WANT TO KEEP MY DROID. I WILL PAY WHATEVER IT COSTS TO MAKE THESE PROBLEMS GO AWAY. WHO DO I PAY? IPHONE MOBILE ME? MY WALLET IS WIDE OPEN.......HOOK ME UP! I looked down at my phone today and it was turned off!! It just shut itself off. WTF!! If I exchange this for another and explain my problems to the Verizon store, I will bet you a million dollars that they will have no idea how to help me with my problems. I am sorry sir but I just talked to Motorola and they will not have a fix for that until January.....Maybe. I am sorry sir, is there anything else I can help you with today???? Thank you for calling Verizon Wireless. Is there someone in Detroit that I can pay to help me? Nobody I call in tech support seems to be as high on this phone as some of the people on this board. They give up too easily, and thus so do I.

Best thing for you. #1 - Switch your phone out! Lemon for sure! #2 - move to Google Apps for your business email. It's very cost effective, SLA for uptime and, best of all, it'll integrate SEAMLESSLY with the droid! haha. No, but seriously, for a small business, $50/person/year for all that you get is a STEAL.

 

[LordKastle]

Yeah if you want to become a puppet to Google. I never understood the fascination with becoming a slave to one organization. But whatever is easier I guess right? Just like neocolonialism....the illusion exists --but you become dependent on the hands of the few.

 

[sterdroids]

Yeah if you want to become a puppet to Google. I never understood the fascination with becoming a slave to one organization. But whatever is easier I guess right? Just like neocolonialism....the illusion exists --but you become dependent on the hands of the few.

They will be broken up one day.

 

[Caindris]

not have trusted Verizon to deliver a new phone that would work. Why did my calendar sync yesterday and not today? We don't have an exchange server, just some over the counter host for our email that can be retrieved through squirrel mail (I think it is something "five", as the host). Aol, Comcast, Google, and yahoo are my others. Why do they send one day and not another? Why did Verizon tell me that the Droid will not forward attachments? I DON"T KNOW. I WANT TO KNOW. I WANT TO KEEP MY DROID. I WILL PAY WHATEVER IT COSTS TO MAKE THESE PROBLEMS GO AWAY. WHO DO I PAY? IPHONE MOBILE ME? MY WALLET IS WIDE OPEN.......HOOK ME UP! I looked down at my phone today and it was turned off!! It just shut itself off. WTF!! If I exchange this for another and explain my problems to the Verizon store, I will bet you a million dollars that they will have no idea how to help me with my problems. I am sorry sir but I just talked to Motorola and they will not have a fix for that until January.....Maybe. I am sorry sir, is there anything else I can help you with today???? Thank you for calling Verizon Wireless. Is there someone in Detroit that I can pay to help me? Nobody I call in tech support seems to be as high on this phone as some of the people on this board. They give up too easily, and thus so do I.

Slow down there chief. Take a step back from the giant wall of text and breath.

What are you using to sync your calendar? As far as I know Corporate calendar only syncs with Exchange, I could be wrong on this point. There is also a known issue with syncing Yahoo mail but I wouldn't imagine this affecting your other mail unless its causing the mail sync service to just fail.

If your phone is randomly shutting off then the device is defective. Troubleshoot this stuff one step at a time. Get a new droid, fix the random power issues and then we can address the other stuff. Borked phones can cause a number of random events, some of them causing false positives.

 

[Milehighjc]

Ok, well we've been bickering amongst ourselves (me included), but failed to ask the OP some relevant questions...

1) what email system ARE you using? Exchange, Lotus Notes, Yahoo (gasp), etc...
2) Call quality - i actually did have some echo and call quality issues previously, but after I did the *228 trick, it cleared it up. I'm not sure if that was the actual fix or if I was just lucky or the planets aligned or whatever, but there IS a fix coming OTA. Maybe you can try the *228 trick?
3) This isn't really a question - The passion won't fix the email issue since it'll run on the same OS. It's not a HW problem, it's an OS problem.

EMAIL : For corp email, we have Lotus Notes. The net result is I have not found any push email solution. Im hoping for a Notes Traveler solution sometime soon.

Ive managed to sync contacts and calendar through Companionlink (to Google Calendar), but have noted some issues especially with calendar. Repeating notices dont seem to always work correctly, especially for notices that originated on an outlook system. CompanionLink has announced a wired solution, I think Ill actually be moving to that when it comes out as I think it takes the Google Calendar out of the mix.

I also have Gmail syncing, as well as a POP account. Works fine.

Call Quality : On my end, the sound quality has been exceptional, on the phone, on speaker, and on my Bluetooth headset. Ive had the Droid for almost two weeks now, and I learned yesterday that there was a significant echo on the other end... once I started asking people about it, I found that it was pretty pervasive (not always, but nearly so). I found a trick here that Ive validated which is to switch the call to the speaker, and back to the handset - I tested with several people today, and it always solved the problem. Not ideal, but until the OTA update comes its fine.

Battery : Ive read more here on this subject than I ever wanted to know. I use the power control widget, and generally keep everything off, and the screen brightness to the minimum most of the time - but turn on all of the above whenever I would be actively using them.

During the first week, I could not get a full day out of the battery. At all. No matter what I did.

Over the past several days, I have noted a SIGNIFICANT improvement in battery life. True, Ive not been browsing as MUCH (novelty has started to wear off). I read yesterday that while cycling the battery is NOT necessary for the droid, that a full cycle (deep discharge followed by full charge a couple of times) can help "calibrate" the sensor. I did that - cant say with full confidence that was the solution, but the timing at least lines up.

As a data point, the About phone app reports is been off the charger for 15 hours and 40 mins, and the battery is still at 40%. Ive had heavy call usage today, BT has been on MOST of the day, wifi probably at least 5 hours... GPS was on for a couple, sync was on all day. Display was lowest setting all day. I probably browsed about 1.5 hours, and on for games, apps etc otherwise for another 2. I would characterize that as MORE than acceptable battery performance. Overall, a good day for the Droid... YMMV.

jc

 

[atlharry]

Yeah if you want to become a puppet to Google. I never understood the fascination with becoming a slave to one organization. But whatever is easier I guess right? Just like neocolonialism....the illusion exists --but you become dependent on the hands of the few.

LordKastle, do you work in IT? In IT, simplicity is King of the Kastle (sorry, i couldn't resist... again sorry... it was lame). I'm a healthcare IT consultant and I help hospital systems make all (or at least a majority) of their apps play nice with each other. Even with standards and inter-vendor cooperation, it's a MESS. We welcome simplicity and single vendor solutions whenever possible.

To me, a google apps and android phone solution for small businesses is a match made in heaven! I can't speak for large corps because I haven't read the white papers, ROI studies, etc, but it sounds like it would be the perfect solution for the OP who probably doesn't have the time or will to mess around with such mundane things as IT. Like he says, he just wants it to work. That's what GMAIL and DROID do. They just work.

 

[moparharn]

I tried to get Google to send me my other mail accounts.

I went to the settings area on my laptop and set up all of my email accounts, Google told me that they were all set up successfully and that it could take up to two days to receive my mail, and that it had downloaded the existing messages. All email accounts were on the set up screen. After two days a few emails here and there from some of the accounts showed up and then eventually nothing. All tests from all accounts resulted in nothing being sent to my phone. I set up the sync between google calander and my outlook, it worked great right up until it did not work great. It just stopped syncing recently. I want all of my email and their attachments, I want good call quality, and I want my calander and contacts to sync. Everything else I can deal with. Verizon has no promise of when this will be fixed. They WILL NOT confirm a Decmeber 11th OTA fix or any other fix. Google has offices in Ann Arbor and I would be willing to go there and pay someone to help me. I am not technically proficient enough to figure this out on my own which is why Blackberry and Iphone are appealing because they offer a READY product (at least at this point). I WANT TO KEEP MY DROID. I will try to exchange it today, but what then? I will have no luck in changing the corporate email just to satisfy one phone. Everyone else has blackberry and they have no issues. I went out on a limb to go Droid and I am getting my ass handed to me, not to mention I risk pissed off customers if I cannot forward their atttachemts. DOES TOUCHDOWN WORK FOR NON EXCHANGE MAIL? IS THERE AN APP THAT CAN FIX THIS FOR ME? THANKS FOR ANY HELP YOU MIGHT GIVE ME AND PLEASE SPARE ME HOMER "I AM FINE ,YOU SUCK" NONSENSE. I HAVE NO DOG IN THIS FIGHT I ONLY WANT WHAT I HAVE STATED. THANKS!
Our corp email is on "SITE FIVE " email host. I do not think we have exchange. I can log onto to squirrel mail and retrieve email from any computer.