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I recently had to get a new phone because of work---or moreso, I could no longer use my work number as my primary number. Fortunately, I still kept the same number that I've had for 10 years; however, with it now being my primary number, it got me interested in checking out a non Windows Mobile device for the sake of just being familiar with what else is out there. I'm in a contract with T-Mobile so that limited my choice of phones. I at first decided to go with the MyTouch 3G, which is all the rage at TMo right now. This is actually the HTC Magic, a version of the Android that comes without a slide out keyboard, is smaller and pretty slick. Software wise, it's not much different than anyone else running Cupcake (latest version of Android). I personally really liked the hardware and thought it was slick...but I found it annoying to not have a native Exchange calendar app (only supported Email) and I'd been staring for weeks at the HTC Hero, the new, slicker, fancier cousin of the HTC Magic. I knew I could get the Hero through Expansys but at the expense of it being 2G (being a world phone, it's not on the same frequency as any US-carrier 3G network) and it costing a bit more....but I finally bit the bullet, purchased it and returned my MyTouch today. I thought I'd share my initial impressions of the phone to you. Now, being that I'm a Contacts PM, I'll probably make note of a lot of the features in Contacts which I find interesting. There are tons and tons of reviews out there from your favorite gadget blogs which talk at length about hardware, the homescreen, navigation, etc.... I could talk about it, but I won't just because you can read up about that everywhere. Instead, I'll focus on the software that I find interesting.
Before beginning, I just want to say I find it fascinating how much HTC has changed on top of the Android platform -- just shows the amount of extensibility and skinning that can be done. So much has changed that this is not even a Google branded phone -- simply an HTC one, and I believe that's one of the reasons it's possible that it natively supports Exchange Mail, Contacts and Calendar (woo hoo for me).
What I have set up: Exchange Mail, Contacts, and Calendar; Google Mail and Calendar; Social networking integration for Facebook, Flickr and Twitter; a number of apps.
The features of this particular phone that made me pick it over other standard, Android devices:
- social networking integration
- Sense UI
- 5mp camera
- standard 3.5mm headphone jack
- browser supports flash
- multi-touch in a number of apps, including email and browser (not in the maps app, boo)
- support of Exchange calendar, contacts and e-mail natively
The social networking integration within the contacts app is interesting -- the app itself has been overhauled such that it doesn't look at all like the standard Android Contacts app. Upon opening the app, some standout features:
Facebook and Flickr integration in the contact card
Whenever I look at a contact card, I can see the Facebook picture and birthday for that person (I can choose not to). I can also see the most recent status message and all of their Facebook and Flickr photo albums. In addition to that, it will show any text messages, e-mails (but only through my Exchange account--weak) and phone calls I've shared with the person. Too bad there isn't Twitter integration--seems like an opportunity miss, especially since I'd signed into the phone with my Twitter account. (fyi, the only use of that is to sign into the native Twitter app "Peep" that HTC includes in the phone)
I'm at the top of the list
Because I've signed into Facebook, it immediately detected my profile and put myself at the top of my contacts list. There's not much there except for my photo and birthday but I can add some add'l information for myself--- I actually already have a contact card for myself but I can't connect it with "my" Facebook card because the dialog they use to connect your device contacts to your Facebook contacts is limited to only your Facebook friends.....and...well, I'm not my own friend on Facebook. Get it? Again, a slight miss...but the thought is there.
Contacts list
The main contacts list has the following views:
- Alphabetical list of contacts
- All of your "favorites"--which will be synced from Google contacts. There is also a Favorites widget that can be added to the homescreen.
- Contact groups --- from Google, these are the groups you create. From exchange, it's just the categories of contacts.
- Updates and Events. This is probably the most interesting screen. At the very top, it detects if there are any contacts that match your Facebook contacts -- if so, there will be a notification to say that there are "links detected"---if you give it a blessing, it'll connect the matching contacts. By doing this, it doesn't sync down all of your Facebook contacts--it will only connect Facebook information to those contacts you already have on your phone. In the middle are events -- any noted birthdays or anniversaries of your friends. Finally, at the bottom are various "updates" which seem to consist mainly of status messges and photo updates.
There were initial complaints about this phone when it was first released, mainly being that the UI was too slick for the hardware, negatively affecting performance; however, last month HTC released a patch that really improved the performance. I have to say that it's like night and day and the device is really usable now.
There ARE some notable bugs that I haven't had time to really check out. Not a major huge deal but annoying when I do care, namely:
- MMS seems broken. I have yet to receive or send a MMS despite it looking like an option.
- Downloading ANY attachments in Exchange e-mail flat out doesn't work. My workaround, sadly, is to forward to my Gmail account where I can easily do so.
- The native Peeps (Twitter) app sometimes just stops refreshing and won't retrieve any more tweets. I have to log out and then log back in to get it to work. It fortunately hasn't happened too much...but I've found it frustrating when it has.
Other than that, the device works just spiffy. I've been pretty happy with it so far!
