Comments on: Review of HTC Desire as alternative to Apple iPhone

By: Patrick

Patrick — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 20:05:56 +0000

I’ve a Desire, not had an iPhone. I have enjoyed the Desire until recently when the difficulties with text messaging (adding an S to words needlessly, keys too small to use in portrait mode, autosuggesting rubbish – who uses “view” more frequently than “they”?) and making calls (randomly leaving the phone to hang when trying to call out, not hanging up when tapped, generally poor connectivity) have started to peeve. In fact, as a phone it is pretty useless but as a mobile web device, provided you have a signal, it works well. Battery life is so-so – I expected it to be worse than it is. Apps are slowly improving but there is a tonne of crap out there.

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 08:58:54 +0000

What apps are so compelling that Apple is stopping you getting them? I understand the future potential of a more open platform, but is it really worth suffering now for? If ever there is something important to miss out on I’d say apple will catch up in openness to compete like htc will try to catch up in hardware.

By: Olivier

Olivier — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 08:57:54 +0000

Interesting review. I’m looking into the HTC HD2 instead of the Desire. The very large screen (4.3″) sounds interesting, Winmob 6.5 is not as evil as iPnone nor Winmob 7, and the reviews are good. There’s even thicker batteies, that ruin the HD2 looks a bit, but allows for much more time between charges. BTW, you did not mention if your did your battery tests with BT and Wifi off or on, or if there is any way to schedule them off during the night.

By: Sander

Sander — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 08:51:26 +0000

3G networking eats up your battery and since most apps try to sync as much as possible this is the most likely reason for your battery draining at night. The easiest way to solve this is to use the juicedefender app which manages the 3g connections, letting apps access the internet every 15 minutes (customizable) when the phone is not actively in use.

The screen can be a pain in full on daylight but the hint of using a toggle widget to easily change the brightness helps a lot.

By: Jim Whitehead

Jim Whitehead — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 08:48:12 +0000

I would seriously consider the Nexus One, although you can’t go into a store and play with one yet. The Nexus One is roughly the same hardware as the Desire, but built and designed by Google in partner with HTC. I’ve found that not having Sense UI (the HTC proprietary interface) makes the phone much smoother and things ‘just work’. It very well may be a good alternative to the Desire, and I’m very happy with mine.

By: Jon

Jon — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 07:25:29 +0000

Like the photo setup, very nice.

As for the Desire, I just got myself a Nexus One (very similar hardware) and had similar feelings. I definitely had a problem with the screen in daylight. I dont remember the iPhone being much better but I also don’t remember it being that much of a problem – I’ll have to check it tomorrow.

The main thing I’ve noticed is that Android really lacks the spit and polish that the iPhone OS has. Hopefully in time, they’ll get it polished up nicely. In the mean time, still running the Nexus One over the iPhone.

By: Mike

Mike — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 06:56:06 +0000

See, I have HTC Legend, and I was thinking about switching to Desire, but from what you’ve written, Desire is much much worse phone. Legend’s display works quite well in bright sunlight (a pal of mine has IPhone, so we checked – it’s almost the same). Flash is working flawlessly, my battery lasts little above two days (I don’t use the phone much on the wireless) and I’ve never ever accidentaly hung up on people while in call.
For me, HTC Legend is much much better phone than the IPhone.

By: Myoukochou

Myoukochou — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 06:23:21 +0000

First of all, if you turn the screen brightness off automatic and up, that makes it better in sunlight—not great, but at least a little better. (Turning it away from the sunlight has a pretty major impact too, but I imagine you noticed that.)

Secondly, battery life can be poor because all those widgets are set to auto–update frequently by default. Remove some of them or throttle that down, turn off the things you’re not using, and the battery life can shoot up.

Thirdly, official Facebook for Android has been available for some time now (it’s not fantastic, however, but several unofficial ones are available and very good) — https://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=74769995908

Try calibrating the touchscreen in settings. You’ll find that makes it less sensitive. And, the colour looks fine to me alongside a reference.

That’s not to say it’s perfect, it’s not, but it does what *I* need—and an iPhone never would.

By: John

John — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 09:10:37 +0000

Interestingly, I’ve not experienced many (if any) of the problems you mention with my Desire. Battery lasts at least a day even with the most intensive use. Very rarely need to use trackpad but haven’t encountered any issues when I do. Screen brightness is only a problem in the brightest sunlight and even then if set to 100% (use a quick settings app and keep it in the system tray for quick access) its still perfectly usable. I find the on-screen keyboard really easy to use. Maybe it takes a while to adjust from using a different one? And personally I’ve not felt using a physical menu button makes things disjointed. Maybe more to do with the transition from another device again? For me the Desire is just about perfect.