Didn't get a chance to play with the phone as much as I wanted today. But a quick note, I love the phone. Phone feels really nice in my hand, the screen is absolutely beautiful, and Android 4 is cool.

I still don't get what the big deal with rooting the phone is. All the rooting reasons I have seen are generally "um ya ok whatever".

 

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There are two apps I mostly do it for.

Adblocker is an OS level ad blocking tool, helps filter out a lot of the annoying ads in apps.
Titanium Backup Pro lets me backup apps and settings and move them between phones and a lot more.

Your difficulties were due to you over-complicating the process. You need only ADB / Fastboot drivers. Once in Fastboot, you connect the device. Then you press 7, verify the serial and then press 7 again. Then it goes on until the device requires the basic android setup. Then you turn on USB-Debugging and reboot. Done and done.

It is a hell of a lot simpler than actually going through Fastboot, unlocking, using tinyterm for Root and loading SU App and then pushing CWM via Rom Manager.

I had zero issues with the drivers on a few PCs. I think on the 2nd attempt I would've sourced the drivers elsewhere. I didn't use the included drivers.

I am loving this phone. Think I'm happy with the decision to go with a Nexus phone.

Love the feel and look of the phone. The matte body doesn't leave finger prints or slip like my glossy Vibrant did. And the textured back is a nice touch. Looks very elegant and sleek.

Screen is so beautiful, I love Super AMOLED, nice being able to read my phone in direct sunlight and the pixel density is great for reading the web or mangas on my phone.

Being a Nexus phone is the main reason I got this over a Galaxy Note or something else. T-Mobile gave my Vibrant the Android 2.2 update about 10 months after it was released and then never gave us Android 2.3. They pretty much EOL'ed the phone after I only had it 5 months. Custom ROMs helped extend the life of my Vibrant, but those come with their share of problems too. So I feel much more comfortable having a Nexus phone now, having a bloat free experience, and getting prompt updates. With this phone I'm almost certain to get Android Jelly Bean, I wouldn't bet any money on the Galaxy S II, Note or Rezound getting that, Android ICS is probably still months away for them.

Really impressed with how fast the wifi is on the phone. Easily maxes out my 25Mbps Internet connection. My Vibrant capped out at 12Mbps. GPS also seems to be pretty quick and accurate.

My HSPA+ speeds are piss poor. 180ms latency and around 2 to 4Mbps. With my 3G Vibrant I had about 70ms latency and 2 to 3Mbps download speeds. So more latency and only slightly faster speeds. Also my upload speeds are slower on the Galaxy Nexus than Vibrant. I got a second SIM card on the way and I'll test this more. I'm suspecting this is more T-Mobile than the phone though.

No micro SD kinda disappoints me. I think I want this more for comfort than necessity though. I actually never filled up my 16GB Vibrant or really used the micro SD slot much. So I'll probably be fine without the SD. It's just nice having it in case you do need it.

Camera is mediocre, but this is on par for Samsung. It seems good enough for my needs though, so I'm not disappointed.


I know there'll be some quad core uber phones announced in less than 4 weeks at MWC. But I imagine most probably won't launch until summer time or later. So I think I can at least feel good about my Galaxy Nexus for a few months.

I eagerly await the phone release with my carrier! I too come from a Vibrant, which i love but i do need/want a bigger screen because web browsing is 90% of my phone usage.

Of course mere hours after I ordered my Galaxy Nexus a few days ago rumors start coming out of an improved Galaxy Nexus. A faster processor, possibly a better SGX544 GPU, maybe even better camera.
http://androidcommunity.com/new-galaxy-nexus-spotted-in-benchmark-tests-20120130/
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1473055

I'm gonna say I'm very skeptical. And the evidence is pretty weak. But if it does happen, I sure hope some concrete info on it happens before my 30 day return period. Because I would hari-kari if 31 days later a better Galaxy Nexus does come out.

We got the HTC Radar from tmobile as our first smart phones. So far, they've been enjoyable.

I bit today and picked up my own Nexus. I am not too concerned about a new one coming out in the short term because it will probably have an increased price and I was hating even spending the $300 that this one is.

Remember when we used to get cell phones for free basically?

 

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It's $99 from Amazon Wireless. Buying directly in-store is robbery.