Firstly, the phone is fast. We mean blazingly fast. Not only that, but the animations, touch response and general framerate on everything seems to be cranked closer to the vicinity of the iPhone 4. Not too surprising since the two share the same 1GHz Cortex A8-based Hummingbird processor core. What that means is that the experience of zipping around on the handset feels fluid and natural, with little of that Android-lag we've seen on earlier devices. If Froyo was a spit shine, this is a complete hot wax treatment.
The UI has also been nipped and tucked all over the place, with icons and navigational elements taking on more of a buffed glass feel. Menus now sport a slight bit of transparency, and there are thoughtful little details, like an orange glow that puffs up along the bottom or top of the screen when you reach the end of a scrollable list. When the phone goes to sleep, there's an effect of an old cathode ray TV being switched off, and even something as innocuous as the phone dialer has been refined. Google has made big improvements to the keyboard, copy / paste, and text selection options, bringing the on-screen QWERTY and its associated components much closer to parity with iOS 4.
