Now what do you do to get this brilliant phone working for you? After activating the phone with your carrier, your first step is to get the phone charging. If you bought the phone used, then start with a master restore (navigate to Settings>About Phone>Factory Reset... or similar). At this point your phone should be asking you to go through the setup process, which is primarily signing into or creating your Google account (Google owns Android... fun fact of the day that you probably already knew). Now before you start entering contacts or setting ringtones, check that your software is updated. This is a first step because an update will remove all your information from the phone, so you might as well get the update done before you've entered your info, rather than backing the phone up to prepare for an updatae. (See post How do you find your Android version? and upcoming post about updating Android version). If you have access to Wi-Fi, connect (touch Menu, then Settings) before updating, so that you don't eat into your data plan (even if it's unlimited, you'll get throttled if you use too much), and because Wi-Fi is faster for all these updates and installs that you need to start out with.
Your phone is as updated as it can be, and you've signed into your Google account now, which will pull in all your contacts if you've had an Android before. If your contacts are not yet stored through Google, see upcoming post about getting contacts from a non-Android phone to an Android smartphone. Next, open the Play Store (on some phones it will be called the Market, until you've opened it and it automatically updates to the newer Play Store). Touch the menu button, then My Apps. Here there should be a button for Update All. While the pre-loaded apps update, you can work on adding the Apps you want. The Bible, Starbucks, Flashlight, Amazon Kindle, eBay, and Pandora are among the first apps I install.
Now, as these apps continue to update and install, open the apps that require signing in, such as Facebook and Twitter. After you've signed in, you will have options to configure notifications (the icon that pops up on the bar at the top of your screen, when there is activity in an app), including when to notify and whether to make sound (adjust volume with the buttons on the side of your phone, if you're setting anything to make sounds). If you use Gmail, your original Google sign-in set Gmail up. If you use another email program, touch the Email app, and follow the instructions to sign into your email account and receive notifications. Lastly, I recommend installing the newest version of Swype (see post How do you use the Swype keyboard?)
At this point, you're getting your emails and social network notifications, you can make calls and text, and you've installed the most important apps. Your phone has become quite functional. There's a lot more to configure and discover, such as ringtones, contact icons, real-time weather... but this is enough of a start that you're making good use of your Android.
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