(Touch) Smartphone show down

Yeah Sergei is pretty cute
 
Just canceled my order on an Omnia:

This is supposed to be here by Christmas

htctouchhd1.jpg

htctouchhd2.jpg


he HTC Touch HD has a huge screen, which looks to be about 3.8 inches, is WVGA at 800?480 pixels and is only 12mm thick. It does however finally feature a 3.5 mm headphone jack (finally!) and is an otherwise well specified modern WM Professional device, with HSDPA, GPS, 256 MB ram and 512 MB Flash ROM, microSD slot and a 528 Mhz Qualcomm processor. In addition is has a 5 megapixel camera with no flash. It is a full-screen device, with no D-pad and only 4 buttons: Phone, Answer, Home and Return.

The device is 115mm x 62.8mm x 12mm big, and has a 1350 mAh battery. The informant has said the device should be in stores by Christmas this year.
 
I don't like Windows Mobile. As soon as you go in a bit deeper under the cool skin you're back in the world of Win 3.1 graphics...
 
I don't like Windows Mobile. As soon as you go in a bit deeper under the cool skin you're back in the world of Win 3.1 graphics...

Yep, TouchFlo does not go as deep but it's being patched both by HTC and xda-developers, by Christmas it's going to be 100%
 
Nice choice. Looks like you have more patience than me :p The Touch HD should be an awesome phone. Agreed that the current Winmo sucks but the interfaces the manufacturers provide help and new phones including Diamond, Omnia and Touch HD (i think) have 3D drivers and motion detectors which should be compatible with the new version of WinMo.

Just to update you guys on my Omnia, just flashed it with the latest ROM and I'm loving it even more. Comes with a pretty cool "business card" reader that users the camera to take a picture of the card and with OCR it adds the details straight to the contacts, pretty useful for my work. Can do the same with documents too, but that takes longer to process.
 
I've been following this topic closely myself on other websites, and I've been eyeing the Omnia specifically for a few weeks now.

The forthcoming HTC Touch HD looks pretty good, but I'm not going to wait for it because even if I had the choice between the HD and Omnia right now, I'd probably go Omnia. For one, I think the HD tries a little too hard to compete head on with the iPhone... Apple fanboys have been complaining for ages that all touch smartphones are iPhone ripoffs, but the HD truly is given it looks exactly like the iPhone. In fact I think any phone that tries to be the 'iPhone killer' will be pointless.

Second, as much as it tries to be an iPhone killer, it's not because it still comes with a stylus which means the screen is merely resistive... so it's going to be the same touchscreen shortcomings as all other WinMo phones.

Then there's the camera which is missing a flash and can't record 120fps video like the Omnia, lack of any sort of d-pad and probably smaller storage space than offered on rival phones. Plus I hear of far too many people with problematic batteries in their HTC phones.

The Omnia only falls short in the screen area, and that's not as big a deal as people claim... at least it's 16:9 which should play movies awesomely with it's built-in DivX capabilities. If I could be certain WinMo 7 will somehow become available on the Omnia, I would buy it in a heartbeat.

Unless you're waiting for WinMo 7 devices, I think you're wasting your time. Plus if I've learned anything in my years of mobile phone hobbyism, it's that you'll always be disappointed by waiting for something to be relesed. Because they're never released on time, and when they do come out it's always missing some of the specs you were hoping for and is probably not the price you thought it would be.

And Ice, I don't get your argument because there's no other solutions. You can pick the iPhone, which makes great eye candy of the basic features it provides, or you can go WinMo which looks almost as good as the iPhone in basic things but can also do advanced things and be customized a million different ways. And that's where WinMo shines... you don't like the Samsung widget home screen? You can install HTC's TochFlo on it, or one of myriad of other Today screen options. I guess there's Symbian as well, but they've never done that well with touchscreen so far as I'm concerned.
 
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HH has no real problems with windows mobile, I quite like the fact that if I need anything I can quickly belt out a visual basic.net project for it
 
^ True, whatever it isn't, at least it lives up to its name by actually being Windows in mobile format.

And everyone thinks Apple's new App Store is awesome with a 1,000 or so apps. Have you guys looked at most of these apps? Most of them are outright useless, with maybe 5 that you'd actually download and use. But for WinMo, any programmers out there can write what they want and put it out. Last PocketPC I had was 2005 and even then I had a dozen good apps, and most of them weren't even free.
 
I think the HD tries a little too hard to compete head on with the iPhone... Apple fanboys have been complaining for ages that all touch smartphones are iPhone ripoffs, but the HD truly is given it looks exactly like the iPhone. In fact I think any phone that tries to be the 'iPhone killer' will be pointless.

Oh no! A manufacturer aiming for the top selling product! In all respects the Touch HD is what every Apple fanboy wishes the iPhone was, the early reviews of pre production models already agree that it's much, much better then the iphone.

Second, as much as it tries to be an iPhone killer, it's not because it still comes with a stylus which means the screen is merely resistive... so it's going to be the same touchscreen shortcomings as all other WinMo phones.

Testers are all commenting on how the resistive screen is much more sensitive than the one on the Diamond and feels just as good as a captive.

The screen is huge! You won't need a stylus but it's there, built in for when you choose to.

cnettouchhd1.jpg

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htc_touch_hd_33.jpg


lol iPhone 'camera'
htc_touch_hd_16.jpg
 
You don't need to sell me on Windows Mobile or the Touch HD, I like 'em.

But personally I went with the i900. I don't watch that many movies so I'd rather have a smaller form factor, and to be honest I think the Touch HD is a little ugly, looks cheap. Looks matter to me when I'm shelling out the better part of $1,000 for a phone.
 
Biggest reason i went with the HD is xda-developers, there is no community like that around any other phone, too bad really.
 
You went with the HD as in decided on getting it, right? Or did you magically acquire one already?

I agree about the xda-devs thing, nothing like that exists for the Omnia or any other phone... which is a little weird, seeing as how the OS and much of the hardware is similar. None of the accelerometer games made for the Diamond work on the Omnia for example.

I just had some cash that was burning a hole in my pocket, and I know no phone's ever gonna tick all my requirements.

For now I'm loving the Omnia though as it does everything imaginable... from live geotracking to FM radio with RDS and recording function, and with the help of some nifty freewares I even made the interface look quite cool. No iPhone-ey stuff though, don't get people who opt to buy a WinMo device and then go about giving it an Apple GUI. If anybody is interested I'd be happy to share some good apps I've found.

Oh, and the battery on the Omnia is un-freaking-believable. My previous Samsung dumbphone got like 1/3 of the battery life of this mini-computer.
 
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You're gonna have to add $100 or so to your pot me thinks for the Touch HD. :D

Have you guys been following the Xperia X1 launch at all? The initial impressions I have read are mostly negative. Can't say I'm surprised, I never got the big deal with the X1 other than Sony forcing content down your throat when you buy it.
 
The HTC Dream that will run on Android will be out for TMobile in the next few days so in the next month or 2 I'm going to get my hands on one. Need to upgrade cause my Moto Rizer Z3 feels old :p
 
Biggest reason i went with the HD is xda-developers, there is no community like that around any other phone, too bad really.

Agreed. With my O2 Atom, I had a WM6.1 installed on it when the latest "official" ROM for that was WM5. xda-developers really rock.

... I agree about the xda-devs thing, nothing like that exists for the Omnia or any other phone... which is a little weird, seeing as how the OS and much of the hardware is similar. None of the accelerometer games made for the Diamond work on the Omnia for example.

............

For now I'm loving the Omnia though as it does everything imaginable... from live geotracking to FM radio with RDS and recording function, and with the help of some nifty freewares I even made the interface look quite cool. No iPhone-ey stuff though, don't get people who opt to buy a WinMo device and then go about giving it an Apple GUI. If anybody is interested I'd be happy to share some good apps I've found.

Oh, and the battery on the Omnia is un-freaking-believable. My previous Samsung dumbphone got like 1/3 of the battery life of this mini-computer.

Yup, it's pretty strange, even though there are so many users. But I think it's just a matter of porting apps to the Omnia with the correct drivers and resolution, hopefully not too much of a problem for developers. Modaco has a decent section for the Omnia but it is no where as comprehensive as xda-developers. Only game I managed to find for the Omnia was a dice game which uses the sensor to "roll" the dice. Cool but useless.

I just updated the ROM to the latest HI1 and the battery life and speed of it has improved.

....Have you guys been following the Xperia X1 launch at all? The initial impressions I have read are mostly negative. Can't say I'm surprised, I never got the big deal with the X1 other than Sony forcing content down your throat when you buy it.

Not sure how true it is, but apprently HTC are the manufacturers of the Xperia so I'm sure there'll be plenty of support for it at xda-developers. Looks like we poor Omnia users still have to wait for those ports :(
 
You went with the HD as in decided on getting it, right? Or did you magically acquire one already?

I agree about the xda-devs thing, nothing like that exists for the Omnia or any other phone... which is a little weird, seeing as how the OS and much of the hardware is similar. None of the accelerometer games made for the Diamond work on the Omnia for example.

I just had some cash that was burning a hole in my pocket, and I know no phone's ever gonna tick all my requirements.

For now I'm loving the Omnia though as it does everything imaginable... from live geotracking to FM radio with RDS and recording function, and with the help of some nifty freewares I even made the interface look quite cool. No iPhone-ey stuff though, don't get people who opt to buy a WinMo device and then go about giving it an Apple GUI. If anybody is interested I'd be happy to share some good apps I've found.

Oh, and the battery on the Omnia is un-freaking-believable. My previous Samsung dumbphone got like 1/3 of the battery life of this mini-computer.

My pov sony ericsson w800i had RDS :p
 
I just updated the ROM to the latest HI1 and the battery life and speed of it has improved.

I've been trying to flash DXHI1 but I can't get it to work, even though I flashed HH1 last week. I even re-installed XP on my laptop to no avail. But then I read that HI1 had broken geotagging so I just decided to stick with HH1 for now... I get good battery life with HH1.



Not sure how true it is, but apprently HTC are the manufacturers of the Xperia so I'm sure there'll be plenty of support for it at xda-developers. Looks like we poor Omnia users still have to wait for those ports :(

Whatever, I'm happy with Samsung. HTC let me down big time when I bought a Magician in 2005, and even now I don't understand why their phones are missing so much crap. The HTC HD which is supposedly the be-all-end-all of touch screen mobiles, still has no flash on the camera, nor any decent built-in storage.


My pov sony ericsson w800i had RDS :p

So did my old Samsung slider, and it's not as if there's widespread RDS support on North American radio stations anyway. I was mainly excited by the recording feature, and that iPhone's lack of FM radio. ;)
 
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