What is the difference between Nexus One and Droid?

Today, Google introduced Nexus One, which generated a lot of excitement. I like to see the competition in smart phone market, which speeds up smart phone innovation and benefits consumers.

On October 30, 2009, Verizon released Droid. There is still a lot of commercial to promote Droid, even when I watched NFL game this past weekend. Droid is probably the most discussed Android OS-based cell phone before the release of Nexus One and is still hot in the market. Thus it is natural to ask what is the difference between between Droid and the newly released Nexus One. Here is some difference.

1) Branding: Nexus One is designed by Google directly (manufactured by HTC); Droid is designed by Motorola.

2) CPU: Nexus One uses 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor; Droid uses Texas Instruments' TI OMAP 3430 processor, which runs at 600MHz .

3) Keyboard and Trackball: Nexus One does not have physical keyboard. It has touch-screen soft keyboard; Droid has one physical slide-out keyboard and touch-screen soft keyboard. Nexus One has a trackball; Droid does not. Instead Droid has panel to move around.

5) Software: Nexus One runs on Android 2.1 version; Droid runs on 2.0.1 version. There are some difference, but not significant. Both OSes can be upgraded continuously.

6) Carrier: Nexus One is unlocked. You can use whatever network you like. Currently it has only GSM version. So it can be run on T-mobile or ATT network. A CDMA version Nexus One will be released this spring, which can be run on Verizon and Sprint network; Droid is the locked phone and is exclusively run on Verizon network.

It is exciting to see the release of Nexus One. It's interesting to see how consumers react to Nexus One. Overall, I think 2010 is the key year for Android-base cell phone.

BTW, if you want to buy Nexus One, you can buy from Google website directly.