The last phone I bought was a Legend...and I'm still rocking it. It's my daily use, so it's been dropped, forgotten places, thrown around, banged around, kidnapped by a dog, you name it. Sure, the specs are dated and it's only running 2.2. But I walk around with my laptop, so all I need my phone for is calling, texting, emailing and tethering, which it does easily. The styling has even held up; it gets a look or two from iPhone users and their ubiquitous rectangle.
All this is to say, I'm in the market for a new phone and haven't really come across anything that makes me want to retire this thing. Mostly too big, too "cheap" feeling, too expensive; just too much going on in general. But based on my experience with this phone, if HTC can do something impressive with the software, I'll buy again. Hell, having a decent DSP is enough.
/end infomercial?
When I first held an iPhone 4, I was completely unimpressed by how it feels. It felt like I'm holding a glass in my hand, and I'd better not drop it or it will smash into many pieces. The Legend feels a whole lot better in hand and more solid. Even the LG Optimus Black feels more solid, and it's made out of plastic. But I'm hoping more manufacturers will start using metal or some very solid material in their phones, because it will be hard for me to use something that feels significantly weaker and cheap.
That being said, the Legend is the worst HTC phone from that period, software wise. It's one of the most locked down phones ever. It took me like 7 hours to get to root it and install a custom ROM on it, because I had to jump over a ton of hoops to be able to do it and the process was very complicated. It only took about an hour to root and put a custom ROM on an LG Optimus One, considering these both times are the first time I've ever rooted a phone.
You need a phone that you LOVE so much that you will never:
-drop -forget -throw around -bang around -have it kidnapped by animals
You need a phone you love so much that you feel an urge to make sweet and passionate love with it every single day.
Look. I care for my phone (Bionic), but there's a reason it has a case around it, and there's a reason I have insurance. Accidents happen. With a rugged phone, those accidents csn be less detrimental.
My point wasn't that this phone was superior to any other phone in that regard. Just that I haven't been able to kill it yet, and I certainly don't baby it.
Now, if you want to unlock the phone instead of just swiping down on the screen, you have to put your finger over a "ring" and drag this up past a certain point on the screen and then let go. At this point your homescreen will come into view by doing a 360 degree spin which last about 2 seconds (there is no way to skip it).
Then once you have unlocked it if you want to navigate between screens you have a compiz cube style effect which seems to really slow the interface down.
Not to mention that when you get an incoming call you are back to the "ring" interface and you must drag and drop the ring onto answer or reject. Of course if you want to reject a call and you drop the ring even a millimeter shy of the reject button it will answer the call.
Oh, and there's no way to turn these features off or go back to the previous version of sense..
The problem can be mitigated somewhat by installed the "widgetlocker" program, but the answer issue can't as far as I can tell.
I really have no idea why they would decide to ruin the UI like this! If they hadn't messed this up I would quite happily have bought another HTC when I was looking for a new phone, but after this there is just no way I could recommend one.
Luckily though HTC does provide bootloader unlocking tools on its developer site so that you can install your own build of Android on the phone (and get rid of Sense).
I think the real headline should actually say "It's time to stop submitting articles from Extreme Tech."
Their headlines never say the true intent of their article, and their article never comes to the conclusion that has been set up through the arguments. There is extreme bias and non sequiturs riddling the entire site.
It's a difficult read because of the logic errors, and everytime an article is posted from Extreme Tech, it seems everyone comes away with a different opinion of what was really meant. This isn't creative literature class. This is not a good way to run a website.
We'll have to wait and see, but I think every major manufacturer is going to to try and build a platform/ecosystem similar to what Amazon and B&N have done.
If they make $20 net revenue per phone sold just imagine if they can make another $20 net from revenue shares by way of Dropbox, LogMeIn, and other ancillary bundled services.
That secondary $20 would double their net per phone which would be transformative for their business.
Additionally, services create data and service lock-in as users move from older devices to newer devices if their platform makes migration within the HTC brand seamless.
http://pxldot.com/post/18281312362/android-measuring-stick
I'm not sure Google expected that there would be so many phones stuck on 1.5/1.6 or 2.1 - I wouldn't be surprised if you can still buy a new phone running a really non-representative version of Android. Can't be good for the platform reputation in terms of UX or security.
