Best Android Phone for Development? [closed]

Question

I am interested in starting Android development, I have significant experience with .NET and WP7 development with several applications on the WP7 Marketplace and a couple on the iPhone App Store. What is the best Android (and cheapest) device to get so that I can test my Android applications on, I realize there is an emulator but in my experience its a pretty big difference from emulator to device when testing comes and performance.

I also understand there is some fragmenetation concerns around Android, is there any guidance around how to programatically handle these issues? Such as tips/tricks?

Update: I forgot to mention to the phone needs to be unlocked.

Thanks everyone!

Answer 1

Google Nexus is the most developer friendly phone

If you want more than one and a representative handset of most of the major groupings these phones should help

Google Nexus - vanilla Android has access to the latest APIs quickest - large screen

HTC Hero - HTC Sense UI and medium sized screen

Sony X10 / mini - Has Sonys Rachael ui, timescape and mediascape, mini has a small size screen

Motorola Droid - Very popular in the US, hardware keyboard

Also take a look at Cyanogenmod

For knowing which api to target keep an eye on this http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/platform-versions.html and for screen sizes http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/screens.html

Answer 2

The Nexus S is worth the investment. It is the only Android phone with new sensors including: 3 axis GYROSCOPE, Near Field Communication (NFC), Gingerbread Android 2.3, Proximity Sensor, Light Sensor.

It is officially endorsed by Google. The Nexus One was an excellent phone, so its likely that the Nexus S will be too.

As for fragmentation, the Android market collects bug reports, but they fail to gather machine level data about which device is causing the bug. For this, I recommend http://code.google.com/p/android-remote-stacktrace/