UPDATED: We have refreshed the list below! Click here.
The specificity of the G1 is it merely is an operating system with a few basic features (along with the basic Google products). When I got the phone, I didn’t want to rush in the app market and download like a fool. No, I wanted to figure out what was already on the phone, and then build my library of apps step-by-step.
A lot of apps sound very promising, but a good majority lack stability, which is a no-no for my mobile experience. Hence a short list of ten useful and stable apps for your G1.
– Can’t go anywhere without the Skype Beta. The app is 75% stable, it is more reliable than iskout, but unfortunately there is no notifications in my status bar when someone pings me. We all need Skype on our mobile.
– The Power Manager: this app lets you set different energy-consuming settings according to the battery level. For example, when the battery is low, disable wifi and bluetooth to save some ac juice. A smart app.
– Another smart app is the aTrackDog. This one simply checks new updates for all the applications that sit in your app library. Useful. Lets you download an app you think will have some merit in the future and effectively keep an eye on it.
– The Voice Recorder is quite simple: Use the voice recorder to save a voice message that you can send directly via Gmail. While I don’t think I will use this app very often, it is the only one that has a ‘send via gmail’ feature, something I thought would be more recurrent in the G1 app market.
– Locale is a location-based mobile device manager (well kinda). For 5 different condition variables (battery, calendar, contact, location, time), Locale allows you to custom 7 different settings: display, network, notification, ringer volume, ringtone, twitter, wallpaper. A long set up, but obvious benefits.
– Bookmarker is ideal to reorder (and add/delete) the bookmarks in the default web browser.
– PicPush is an excellent app to post your mobile pics on Facebook, Flickr, Picasa, or send them via gmail. It’s easy to use, except that it will ask for your login credentials too many times.
– The most simple for the end, the AK Notepad: write a note, set a reminding time, and at that time, the phone ill notify you with that not. It’s so dumb but so useful for our every day little things.
Of course there is plenty more apps in the Android market, and probably some that would shoot the ones above dead. I’ve went through install/uninstall so many times that I think it’s time to share what we know online.
What’s your favorite app in the G1?