At CTIA 2010 in San Francisco yesterday, I had the pleasure of playing with the new Droid Pro. At first, we all thought Droid Pro was going to be a Droid 2 World phone but it turns out the Droid Pro is actually a different type of animal, it features a vertical QWERTY keyboard and it “feels” very similar to my old Blackberry.
Obviously this new Droid Pro is aimed at Blackberry users who want to switch to an Android smartphone but won’t because of the keyboard they are used to. Well, no more worries, the Droid Pro’s Blackberry-like keyboard feels great on your hands and you should have no more excuses to keep using Blackberry’s outdated OS.
Of course, the Droid Pro isn’t just all about the keyboard and the Blackberry-like form factor, it possesses enterprise powers like being able to read/edit Word documents (QuickOffice), dual-band on both CDMA/GSM (yes, you can use your SIM card when you go out of the country!), full push-email capabilities, and a whole lot more.
I remember when I had a Blackberry 8830, I loved the fact that it could roam when I am traveling out of the country. Well, the Droid Pro does that and even more!
Here’s the stickyness of Droid Pro over Blackberry World editions. Most Blackberries sold on Verizon only support SIM cards out of the US. GSM carriers in the U.S. like T-Mobile and AT&T use 850/1900Mhz band frequencies while rest of the world uses 900/1800Mhz. Blackberries sold on Verizon/Sprint only support the 900/1800Mhz frequencies for competitive reasons, they don’t want customers switching to T-Mobile nor AT&T.
But yes, the Droid Pro does all 850/900/1800/1900 MHz, it is quite possible that you should be able to switch between your T-Mobile/AT&T to Verizon. I have seen the need for this, especially in some locations 3G speeds are faster on a certain network. I carry at least two Android smartphones from two different networks for this very reason when I travel for business but Droid Pro might just solve those problems. (Although I have found Verizon and Sprint to be most reliable/fastest. GSM networks simply suck at getting signal inside buildings.)
Anyhow, that is one feature that is really cool about the Droid Pro, it’s a truly a “world” Android smartphone, perhaps one of the first of its kind.
On top of that, Motorola did the right job of not watering down on anything else, the Droid Pro is power-packed with a 1GHz OMAP 3620 processor, Android 2.2 Froyo, Flash Player 10.1, Mobile Hotspot app, and ability to go 3G on both HSDPA/EDVO.
Should I switch from Blackberry to Droid Pro?
In my opinion, most definitely. It’s time that you have started doing something about the fact that RIM is not really doing anything to improve their Blackberries. Don’t get me wrong, I used to love my Blackberry but the smartphone market is moving super fast and Blackberry is clearly falling behind. The only thing keeping them alive are RIM’s proprietary enterprise e-mail/messaging.
The Droid Pro does solve most of those problems for a Blackberry user. (You know what I “really” think, RIM should just make a Blackberry Android app and make money off that, maybe even make a Blackberry with Android on it. They are just too afraid of that but that could be a ton of revenue for them.)
Anyhow, I will leave the “switch” up to you but I do highly recommend this Droid Pro, it’s a truly world-class Android smartphone that packs everything Android has with the power of Blackberry.
See a hands-on review video I made of the new Droid Pro:
And more close-up photos of the Droid Pro:
