New User/Startup Guide

[ivybat]

Hi all,
Pending some contract shuffling on my family plan, I'm going to go Android within the next few days. I'm going to start with a hand-me-down Eris, and decide whether to upgrade after a nice trial run.

One thing I haven't been able to find on the internet is a good Android startup guide. I've heard things like "beware Google dumping all of your contacts on your phone" or "don't trust built in facebook apps," but I haven't seen a good list of MUST DOs and MUST DON'Ts for those who are just turning on their phone.

I am already familiar with the Android OS, so I'm not looking for that type of newbie guide. Rather, do you have any tips that roughly fit into these categories?

1. Common setup pitfalls and how to avoid them
2. Settings/apps/etc. that you really must set/install with your new phone
3. Good layouts for your home screens

Thanks again for your help

 

[dragozoid]

Well the first thing you'll have to do is set up a gmail account as that's what your apps & other data will be linked to. After that, your phone should take you to the homescreen where you can start customizing.

IMO, the best launcher is LauncherPro. I haven't tried every launcher but this seems to be the most popular one and it works very well. I strongly recommend downloading it. It's free in the Market.

 

[cr3amy]

I'm still stuck at Android 1.6, so I'm just gonna give you the quick rundown of what I believe transcends version numbers (and what's actually coming to my mind right now):


HandCent will offer you tons of customization of your SMS (text messages), and really show you the full capability of customization that's possible in Android. I never even use the built-in SMS app anymore.

Update Google Maps to ensure you have Navigation.

Look for the Visual Voicemail app for your provider (not sure the exact app name with Sprint, with T-Mo it's just called Visual Voicemail)

Look into Task Managers/Application Killers. There's great walkthroughs on this site regarding that, so I won't get into much detail. Here's a link to a helpful article.

Air Control Lite is a pretty sweet free game. Titres is a pretty good Tetris knockoff, but you'll have to install it from outside the Marketplace, since Tetris knockoffs all receive DMCAs (Cease and Desist letters).

Some sort of Quick Settings app. They allow you to turn on/off Wifi, Bluetooth, 3G/4G, etc without having to delve into the Settings menus. Hopefully someone in this thread can recommend a good one to you, since I'm still using Toggle Settings, but I believe better ones have come around.

 

[ivybat]

Have you guys had the contact dumping problem from gmail? Is there an easy way to avoid that, or should I just sync to gmail before transferring contacts, and then delete everyone out after?

 

[cr3amy]

Have you guys had the contact dumping problem from gmail? Is there an easy way to avoid that, or should I just sync to gmail before transferring contacts, and then delete everyone out after?

I hope someone else can help you with this, because I've never run into any issues. Bear in mind though, that the G1 is vanilla Android and I never had any BB contacts or anything.

I was able to load up my contacts from my SIM Card from my last phone, this all went into my contacts correctly formatted and everything, then got uploaded to my Gmail account next time it synced. I've never run into issues with my contacts...

Except for one time, on an airplane (in airplane mode) I was cleaning out phone numbers and accidentally deleted an important number which would have been hard to find again. I just cleared the data in Manage Applications > Contacts and myFaves Storage, so next time it synced it just downloaded my last backup.