Who knew a Droid could be so nice?

I think I dropped my pink Samsung marvel phone one too many times, because I would be losing reception randomly and my calls would keep getting dropped. I knew it was time for a new phone, and luckily I was eligible for an upgrade 4 months prior to the end of my 2-year contract. I had my eyes set on the white iPhone 4 at first, but at $200, it was way out of my budget, so I ended up with the HTC Inspire 4G instead, and only $50 poorer

I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of an Android phone at first, and for many reasons¹:

I was already familiar and comfortable with the iPhone user interface, thanks to my iPod Touch.
There are way more iPhone apps out there.
Droid apps tend to lack the beauty of iPhone apps’ user interfaces
The iPhone came in white. There were no white Droid phones at AT&T

But to my pleasant surprise, this phone ended up winning my heart, and I’m so glad I chose it instead of the iPhone. The main reason being: the ability to customize the phone without rooting². Examples:

Looks like an iPhone lock screen, right? But it's not Customization ability courtesy of the Widget Locker app.

My lovely home screen, courtesy of Go Launcher EX app and its themes

My "assistant" screen, with my calendar/agenda widget from the Go Calendar app, and a control panel widget from SwitchPro.

However, the lack of pretty apps (well, just apps in general) in comparison to the iPhone still exists. It took forever for me to find a calendar app (not widget like you see in the photo above) to my liking, and finally I was able to find one that was satisfactory, but still had major room for improvement:

The uber-cute Canimal Diary app. If only it could sync with Google calendar and I can disable the stupid vibration-on-touch

In terms of the text messaging user interface, I wish it could be more customizable as well, but maybe I’m asking for too much…LOL

My text messaging center. Looks like the iPhone UI, but better Courtesy of Go SMS Pro app.

And for anyone interested, here is the full list of apps I’ve used to customize my phone’s UI. All are free unless otherwise stated:

GO Launcher EX – Customize the overall look of your phone using different themes.
GO Contacts – Replaces the default phone book & dialer using different themes.
GO SMS Pro – Replaces the default text messaging app using different themes.
Calendar GOwidget – Adds a calendar/agenda widget to your phone. Syncs with Google Calendar.
Canimals Diary – A super cute calendar/notebook/menstrual cycle app, but has minor glitches.
Minimalistic Text – Allows you to create text-based date/weather/time/etc. widgets.
SwitchPro Widget ($0.99)- Adds a widget so you can turn on or off your wifi, bluetooth, etc right from your home screen.
WidgetLocker Lockscreen ($1.99) – Allows you to customize the look of your lockscreen.

Does anyone else have an Android phone? If so, I’d love some app recommendations or just any tips and tricks you have to offer. It’s been 4 days with my phone, and I’m still trying to figure things out @_@Error processing request

But there was one reason that compelled me to buy a Droid phone, or more precisely, an HTC phone: supporting Taiwanese brands! ↩
Jailbreaking an iPhone = rooting an Android. ↩