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Nathan's blog

Impressions of the HTC Touch (Sprint)

Posted November 26, 2007 - 11:37pm by Nathan

I stopped by the Sprint store yesterday to check out the HTC Touch and thought I'd post my thoughts.

1) The form factor is EXCELLENT! It's much smaller than my Treo with curves and soft-touch paint that make it feel really good in the hand. I was shocked at how small it was. This is something I could forget about in my pocket.

2) The screen was bigger than my Treo's screen, and I liked it. However, it did pick up a lot of glare; but this could probably be fixed with the right screen protector.

3) There are hardly any buttons on this device so you are literally expected to operate it with your "touch." I'm not sure how well Windows Mobile 6 is set up for this. The screen is flush with the front instead of recessed like other touchscreen devices so that should help. I didn't get to use it long enough to get a good feel for the screen sensitivity. It was certainly fine with the stylus.

4) I am just unsure of using a device like this without a physical keyboard. I didn't like the on-screen keyboards that HTC had included. Perhaps a 3rd-party solution like http://www.cootek.com/ might make it more usable. Just hard to say without using it for awhile.

I'd love to test drive a device like this for awhile. It certainly made me realize how much of a brick my Treo really is. The Touch is new, stylish, and compact. The Treo looks very dated next to it. I can't wait to see what else is released in the next few months. I think this device is on track but I'd like to have a physical keyboard, WiFi, and GPS as well. The HTC Touch Dual will at least add a keypad.

UPDATE: I stopped by the store again to have another look. I still love the form factor; however, I really don't know that I could get used to a virtual keyboard. I played with it some and even installed TouchPal from Cootek.com and just wasn't happy at all. Perhaps if I forced myself to use a virtual keyboard for a couple weeks I might adjust. It just seems to rely too much on predictive text and that makes a lot of mistakes.

Also, the screen has issues. It is very reflective and can be hard to see in the glare. Also, I noticed that it has trouble with the vertical angle which gives that negative image look. Therefore, when you use the landscape mode you can get a bit of a double-vision look to the screen. I liked the screen on the Mogul much more.

Treo 700wx Today Screen

Posted September 5, 2007 - 3:38pm by Nathan

I've been working on my Today screen on my Treo 700wx and thought I'd share what I finally came up with. The Windows Mobile Today screen can almost be too customizable. There are so many 3rd party software options that it can be a bit overwhelming. I wanted to create something that was relatively simple, didn't require multiple pages, and focused on phone information. Here's what I came up with for now. It certainly won't stay this way forever. :)

Today screen on Treo 700wx

The Today plugins are standard except for 2.
1) PhoneAlarm with a skin from Malatesta which I modified to fit my needs.
2) PocketWeather

TomTom on Treo 700wx

Posted August 28, 2007 - 11:24pm by Nathan

I am running TomTom Navigator 6 on a Treo 700wx and compared it to a TomTom ONE XL. Although the ONE XL is a dedicated unit, it seems to be a bit underpowered. The software performs better on the Treo. I noticed this in 2 areas.

1) Navigation animation - The position is updated much more frequently on the 700wx. This makes it look a bit like a video since the position is more smoothly updating.

2) Route calculation - There's not a huge difference here, but the 700wx did calculate a route of moderate length(Maryland to North Carolina) 1-2 seconds faster.

Despite losing the nice large screen of the ONE XL, I prefer to use TomTom on my Treo. It runs better, and it's just more convenient. I can just leave my bluetooth GPS receiver in the car, and the Treo is always ready to go. No need to worry about bringing along another device.

GPS on Treo - Convergence

Posted August 25, 2007 - 12:01pm by Nathan

Earlier this summer I did a lot of research and shopping for a standalone GPS unit. A lot of what I learned appeared here at BrothersOnTech. My GPS shopping started because I switched to a Treo 700p. Prior to that, I was running TomTom Navigator 6 software on my Treo 700w. It worked great and allowed me to have a phone, PDA, and GPS unit in one device that I always carried. Of course, for GPS functionality I needed a bluetooth GPS receiver too, but I could just keep that in the glove box of my car. No big deal, and very convenient. However, the 700p could not handle running TomTom well. It ran slowly and did not allow me to use a bluetooth headset and the GPS receiver simultaneously. This led me to start shopping for a separate GPS unit. I finally settled on a TomTom ONE XL. After using it some, I discovered that I really missed the convenience of using my Treo. I didn't feel comfortable leaving the ONE XL in my car because of possible theft and also because of the temperature extremes in the car. I was afraid this could damage the unit. Because of this, I had one more device to manage and to remember to bring along when I might use it. So after considering this some I decided the best thing for me was to move back to a Windows Mobile based Treo, the 700wx. It has more memory than my 700w did which will allow for better multitasking with TomTom. It can also handle simultaneous bluetooth connections without a problem. Sure, using TomTom one the Treo means I'll have to sacrifice the large screen of the ONE XL; however this is more than worth it for convenience. I don't use GPS terribly often anyway. Not to mention I don't have the extra cost of a separate GPS system when I already owned the software.

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