Don’t be hasty wait until the second generation

http://ii.alatest.com/product/600x400/6/f/HTC-Dream-0.jpg

I believe it to be human nature that when a shiny new product of any kind comes on the market, consumers everywhere, flock to the nearest shopping center to purchase it without considering the flaw that a first generation product may bring. By first generation I mean a product that is brand new and nothing before it has been on the market. People will continuously buy the new products year after year, pay check after pay check, in order to satisfy the empty void of the “new and shinny”. Considering the following, when we buy we tend to over look the negatives and focus more on the positives such as the looks, or the fact that it produced by a popular company. Clearly we are bugs to a light bulb, when it comes to cutting edge technology, but why are we so like this, is it for the feeling for new innovations or maybe it is because we all want to seem cool to our peers with the latest things? If I may, I would like to shed some light on the whole technology bonanza with my own past hasty decision to purchase the HTC Dream G1 when it first arrived on the shelves back in 2009.

Like I said my decision to purchase was very impulsive of me to do. I tend to think I am a smart shopper only waiting for sales to arrive at the store and only then will I buy what I need, but when it comes to phones I break down. I had recently upgraded my Samsung flip phone to the next generation which looked completely the same and I grew tired of the look so I decided to purchase the HTC Dream Android phone on the Rogers website for eighty dollars and I was ecstatic to receive it. A few days later it came in the mail and it was exactly what I pictured. It had a white plastic body with a slider screen that when operated swung open to show a raised keyboard. It was a pretty impressive design and even to the day I had it, people still commented on the way it looked and opened. The only issue I had with the design is that a few weeks after I got it I went looking for protective case online and it seemed that within the month of it coming to the shelves it had new button settings on the front of the phone. from a large attached group of buttons it now had four separated buttons. This to me meant that they had upgraded the phone, maybe they fixed a few bugs that they were receiving complaints for. I am just guessing but either way I was left with the outdated version. If I would have waited a bit longer I would have gotten to newer generation but being impetuous i needed it now and not later.

The problems did not stop there. There were issues with the phone from day two, the battery life was pathetic lasting only a few hours if left on, it would sometimes not send outgoing text messages, it was very slow and would freeze time to time, it did not connect to my computer, and necessary updates were a pain because of it, that is just to name a few issues. Oh, I almost forgot after a year in order to fully turn it off you had to remove the battery because it would turn on again if not. Overall this phone was a pain and unreliable for the most part. I give it a 2 out of 5 because at times it did work and it did help out in a few circumstances, but unfortunately a “few” in this world is nothing. I should have waited for the next generation that graciously appeared a couple of weeks after mine. Today you cannot purchase the phone, it is no longer made, I wonder why(note the internet sarcasm)?

There you have it kids, or rather the entire consumer public, from my experience when considering to buy a new product fresh off the industrial counter, don’t–wait until several months pass and they fix the bugs, this will guarantee that you get a much better phone for your buck. Now not everything will be fixed, we are still talking about technology here, so stay calm and carry on with the second, third, fourth, or even fifth generation. Though I still would like to ask why they changed the phone so quickly, why it didn’t connect to my computer, and why did I have the phone for a year and a half.

– Evin Lachance