Help Few Questions

[Sawka]

Being new to Android and all, a few features I expected as default aren't. Please ignore my bad grammar and offer up some solutions:

1) Password. There isn't a default password locking my phone, just a scroll anyone can imitate. I would like a "lock" code or swype; largely I'm concerned with loosing sensitive information stored in Gmail or FB if I misplace my phone, but mostly I'm concerned about friends and coworkers generally messing with my phone and settings and photos
2) microSD. I just bought a microSD 16gb, but my "phone storage space is getting low" notification message is persistant. How can I best move over as much as possible to the external storage?
2b) Swype. As a follow-on, Swype won't install because my phone's too low on memory. Arrr
3) Browser. Not sure if the default browser is the best, but it feels kind of laggy. Perhaps it's just the slow specs of my Eris, but would Firefox or Chrome or some alternative offer a "better" solution? What browsers do you use and recommend?
4) Bookmarks. How can I import my IE bookmarks over to my Droid? Or my Firefox bookmarks? Perhaps Ubunbtu One. Whats the best widget to use?
5) I haven't rooted or ROM'ed my phone yet because I wanted to give stock settings a few weeks trial before rejecting them completely. If some of my problems are easily alleviated by just using a known solution, let me know and I'll jump on it.

 

[metlcat]

1) I don't remember with stock if you can set anything but the pattern lock, but with custom ROMs you can have other options.

2) Apps are not installed to the sdcard, they are installed to the phone's internal memory. Having a bigger sdcard only allows more pictures, music, etc on stock eris. If you root and install a 2.2 or 2.3 you can move apps to the sdcard.

3) I believe the stock browser is considered pretty good by most people, but I use Dolphin Mini because I like the gestures and ability to close the browser completely.

4) Not sure about this one. I believe if you use chrome you can use chrome to phone to access them (I think).

5) For some people, stock is sufficient, but it gets frustrating when it slows down and gets extremely laggy. I rooted for the ability to remove the bloatware and to get rid of the lag. There was a thread posted today that listed a bunch of reasons to root. Check that one out.

 

[Sawka]

If that's true, seems like ROM-ing is my best option. I definately need the capability of storing apps on my microSD card and if that's not possible with stock settings I'll have to ROM. My Eris was purchased off eBay so I'm not worried about voiding any warranties anyways. I haven't started researching ROMs yet, which would you recommend?

 

[doogald]

Get started with xtrSENSE, which has a feature called cache2cache (which should alleviate your out of memory errors) but otherwise looks and feels stock. You may want to graduate to something like GSB later on.

FWIW, Chrome to phone is Froyo and above only. What I really want is phone2chrome, because I'd rather send links from my phone to my laptop for viewing later on a real browser. Saying that, my favorite third-party browser is Dolphin HD, which is much faster than stock but still a "real" browser and not something that is merely displaying content stored on a remote server, which is actually doing the browsing for you.

Oh, and stock browser on 2.1 is not that great, really.

I happen to hate Swype, so somebody else will have to help you with that.

The pattern lock can be replaced with a PIN number or a password on CM Froyo and GB ROMs.