Technology Htc evo 4g

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xanthomondo said:
What's the difference between it and the Droid Incredible? (other than the 4g thing)

I can't imagine anything being good on Sprint. I'm not really a huge Android OS fan. It's a very clunky operating system.
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Besides the 4g like you mentioned the Evo also has a front face camera which the Droid doesn't and the screen is bigger on Evo. There are other differences but those are 3 big ones for me. Sprint also has a decent payment plan with it.
 
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xanthomondo said:
What's the difference between it and the Droid Incredible? (other than the 4g thing)

I can't imagine anything being good on Sprint. I'm not really a huge Android OS fan. It's a very clunky operating system.
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Sprint service is actually pretty good and competitive with pricing. I hear a lot of complaining about AT&T in my area and I have service a lot of places where folks with AT&T don't.
 
TMP-SMX said:
I saw an evo today. It's huge. For women with purses, ok fine. Guys in your pocket? Takes up a lot of space.
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If our defense, as medical students we are surely far from unfamiliar with having lots of extraneous stuff in our pockets all the time. 0.8 inches more than an iPhone isn't too bad, though it is a lot heavier.
 
I've never had an iPhone, but I did get an Evo. It is awesome. It may seem large to look at the specs or pick it up & play with it, but it doesn't seem that way after a few days of use.

The only downside so far has been the need to take the time and tweak various settings for battery life, but that is no different than any other modern day smartphone. I am now getting about 15 hours battery life with moderate use.

On the app side, most of the more popular clinical apps are cross-platform with the iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad, so you have access to almost all of those (except Medscape....hurry up dammit).
 
pianoman511 said:
I've never had an iPhone, but I did get an Evo. It is awesome. It may seem large to look at the specs or pick it up & play with it, but it doesn't seem that way after a few days of use.

The only downside so far has been the need to take the time and tweak various settings for battery life, but that is no different than any other modern day smartphone. I am now getting about 15 hours battery life with moderate use.

On the app side, most of the more popular clinical apps are cross-platform with the iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad, so you have access to almost all of those (except Medscape....hurry up dammit).
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I have the EVO as well. Can you tell me what you did to "tweak" the phone to obtain 15 hours of battery life. Thanks.
 
No problem. When I first got the phone I was lucky to get enough battery life to last from 7a-1p every day. Initially, I had installed Advanced Task Killer and was judiciously killing apps that were running that I wasn't using. I had also tried a ton of power saving tips that I found on all the android forums. I was still getting only 6 hours of battery life. So....I did a hard reset and it solved the problem. The only downside is that it got rid of all my user data, but it was worth it.

I would try the power saving tips first. Install the power bar (it's a widget that's already on your phone). Basically it allows you to turn on and off the GPS, WiFi, bluetooth, and turn up and down the brightness with one touch. Next, keep the GPS off (unless you need it).

Also, keep the brightness at a lower setting (the power bar has three - super low, medium - which I use, and high).

Also, if you have access to WiFi, use it instead of the mobile network because the WiFi chip uses a lot less power than the 3G. Otherwise, keep WiFi and bluetooth off if you're not using them.

Other things that work well are to change the update frequency for all your apps - I don't use the news & stocks apps at all so I turned that off, I changed the weather to every 12 hours, and the same for facebook (Settings - Accounts & Sync). Also for facebook, either delete the "friendstream" from your "scene" or create a new one without it since it updates regularly. You can also tone down the animations by changing it to "some animations".

Another good habit to get in to is to hit the power button when you're done using the phone. Alternatively, change the screen timeout frequency to the lowest bearable setting.

The last thing to do is get rid of task killers. There is some debate about how they affect battery life, but since I got rid of mine (and reset), it has been working fine.

I would recommend getting System Panel Pro. It costs a few bucks, but it will track your battery life throughout the day and you can see how your changes affect your battery life. If none of this works, then do a system reset. Turn off your phone. Then, while holding the volume down button, turn it back on. You should get to a white screen with the android icon. Follow the prompts using the volume rocker to select 'clear storage' (i think that was the option) and then confirm. After I did this I am getting awesome battery life. If nothing else works, you may have a dud battery so you can always check with Sprint.

Lemme know how it works out !
 
pianoman511 said:
No problem. When I first got the phone I was lucky to get enough battery life to last from 7a-1p every day. Initially, I had installed Advanced Task Killer and was judiciously killing apps that were running that I wasn't using. I had also tried a ton of power saving tips that I found on all the android forums. I was still getting only 6 hours of battery life. So....I did a hard reset and it solved the problem. The only downside is that it got rid of all my user data, but it was worth it.

I would try the power saving tips first. Install the power bar (it's a widget that's already on your phone). Basically it allows you to turn on and off the GPS, WiFi, bluetooth, and turn up and down the brightness with one touch. Next, keep the GPS off (unless you need it).

Also, keep the brightness at a lower setting (the power bar has three - super low, medium - which I use, and high).

Also, if you have access to WiFi, use it instead of the mobile network because the WiFi chip uses a lot less power than the 3G. Otherwise, keep WiFi and bluetooth off if you're not using them.

Other things that work well are to change the update frequency for all your apps - I don't use the news & stocks apps at all so I turned that off, I changed the weather to every 12 hours, and the same for facebook (Settings - Accounts & Sync). Also for facebook, either delete the "friendstream" from your "scene" or create a new one without it since it updates regularly. You can also tone down the animations by changing it to "some animations".

Another good habit to get in to is to hit the power button when you're done using the phone. Alternatively, change the screen timeout frequency to the lowest bearable setting.

The last thing to do is get rid of task killers. There is some debate about how they affect battery life, but since I got rid of mine (and reset), it has been working fine.

I would recommend getting System Panel Pro. It costs a few bucks, but it will track your battery life throughout the day and you can see how your changes affect your battery life. If none of this works, then do a system reset. Turn off your phone. Then, while holding the volume down button, turn it back on. You should get to a white screen with the android icon. Follow the prompts using the volume rocker to select 'clear storage' (i think that was the option) and then confirm. After I did this I am getting awesome battery life. If nothing else works, you may have a dud battery so you can always check with Sprint.

Lemme know how it works out !
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Wow, that allot of work just to get the battery life up.
 
Thanks for the tips! I did just that and my battery life has significantly increased. I'm gonna check out that application tonight.
 
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Slevin said:
Wow, that allot of work just to get the battery life up.
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I agree that HTC should have set most of this as default since the typical user really does want the phone to last all day and will forgo high-level multitasking to do it, but less than one hour of work to get good battery life on a phone you will use for two years isn't too bad. On the other hand, figuring out what you have to do is the hard part.

Oh Apple, why oh why do you have to make me choose between phone quality and network quality (at least where I am). The new iPhone looks to have an amazing battery, though I will still probably end up with the Evo. Thankfully, it seems like acceptable battery life is possible if you dig through enough menus.
 
pianoman511 said:
Well...let's see what happens with the iPhone & "multi-tasking". Battery life may become an issue. ;)
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I'm running iOS 4 for the past few months and I get though the day just fine. New iPhone has better battey life (so Apple says, typically Apple low balls their battery life performance if you checked the reviews on the iPad)

Multi-tasking on the iOS 4, isn't true multitasking. While some apps will run in the background (Pandora, tom-tom to name two) most probably won't because there isn't a need to have most apps continuously running. What happens is that the iOS will save the state of the application, basically put it in suspended animation (if the app developer designs their app like that) so that the app doesn't lose its place but it does save battery power by not using CPU cycles. But when you relaunch the app, it goes right back to where you left it. And you've played with the iPad, you've seen how fast that responds, well the iPhone 4 has the same CPU in it so it'll run pretty fast. It's easy to quit an app also if you no longer want it to be running in the background, just hold the icon down till it jiggles and then hit the red minus sign.

JacobSilge said:
Oh Apple, why oh why do you have to make me choose between phone quality and network quality (at least where I am). The new iPhone looks to have an amazing battery, though I will still probably end up with the Evo. Thankfully, it seems like acceptable battery life is possible if you dig through enough menus.
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Verizon had the chance to have the iPhone, they turned it down because Apple didn't want to cede control of it which is good because it just tells the Cell phone providers they are nothing more than a conduit, like an ISP provider.
 
pianoman511 said:
Initially, I had installed Advanced Task Killer and was judiciously killing apps that were running that I wasn't using...The last thing to do is get rid of task killers. There is some debate about how they affect battery life, but since I got rid of mine (and reset), it has been working fine.
Click to expand...

My Dad just got an Android phone, and I've been helping him get it set up. What's the deal with these "task killers?" Are they really necessary? Isn't this functionality built into the OS somehow? What kind of tasks need "killing?" Most of the apps seem to quit when you close them from what I've seen.

I was still getting only 6 hours of battery life. So....I did a hard reset and it solved the problem. The only downside is that it got rid of all my user data, but it was worth it.
Click to expand...

I'll bet it won't be worth it after you've been using your phone for a while. :scared:

Install the power bar...it allows you to turn on and off the GPS, WiFi, bluetooth, and turn up and down the brightness with one touch. Next, keep the GPS off (unless you need it)...Also, if you have access to WiFi, use it instead of the mobile network because the WiFi chip uses a lot less power than the 3G. Otherwise, keep WiFi and bluetooth off if you're not using them.
Click to expand...

If you use Wi-Fi at home and work, it's a pain to constantly have to toggle it on and off, especially if you spend most of your time either at home or at work. If you use a Bluetooth headset or have a car with built-in Bluetooth connectivity, you don't want to have to toggle Bluetooth on and off all the time, either. It totally defeats the convenience of Bluetooth. Turning GPS off "when you don't need it" also sounds great in theory, but if you use apps like Where and Maps a lot, it's a pain to have to remember to toggle it on every time you want to use one of these apps.

Also, keep the brightness at a lower setting (the power bar has three - super low, medium - which I use, and high).
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We set the screen brightness to "Automatic." Seems to work fine.

change the update frequency for all your apps
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This one is definitely a good idea. I've done the same thing on my iPad and my Pre.

hit the power button when you're done using the phone. Alternatively, change the screen timeout frequency to the lowest bearable setting.
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Yep. 30 seconds seems to suffice.
 
In terms of task killers, it seems that Android is natively good at memory management. It saves most programs in a suspended or background state which doesn't use too much memory. In addition, I found that most of the programs that the task killer killed were actually not running, but in a background state which wasn't using much (if any) resources. In short, I see a performance boost without it. If I see a program running that I didn't exit from then I can kill it using System Panel, but I haven't had to yet.

In terms of backing up data - my school email is done through an exchange server, so all of my calendar data, contacts, and email isn't saved on my phone so it isn't a huge deal to hard reset (not that it's great to have to customize everything - but I don't see that I will have to do it again any time soon).
 
pianoman511 said:
In terms of task killers, it seems that Android is natively good at memory management. It saves most programs in a suspended or background state which doesn't use too much memory. In addition, I found that most of the programs that the task killer killed were actually not running, but in a background state which wasn't using much (if any) resources. In short, I see a performance boost without it. If I see a program running that I didn't exit from then I can kill it using System Panel, but I haven't had to yet.

In terms of backing up data - my school email is done through an exchange server, so all of my calendar data, contacts, and email isn't saved on my phone so it isn't a huge deal to hard reset (not that it's great to have to customize everything - but I don't see that I will have to do it again any time soon).
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My data syncs with MobileMe over the air and if I didn't have MobileMe it would sync with my desktop every time I plug my computer in. If I ever have to wipe the device or install a software update everything is backed up to my computer every time I plug my iPhone in. I can also sync my exchange account data for school to school servers

Since it is An android device, shouldn't you be able to sync at least the gmail. contacts and calendars to your linked google account? I thought integration like that should be build in
 
Slevin said:
BlueDog

If you use an RSS reader on your iPad I highly suggest Reeder App. It is amazing.
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I use NetNewsWire on my Mac and iPad, and Scoop on my Pre. All of them sync through Google News, so I never have to read the same news item twice. :)
 
Blue Dog said:
I use NetNewsWire on my Mac and iPad, and Scoop on my Pre. All of them sync through Google News, so I never have to read the same news item twice. :)
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I tried netnewswire and I found it lacking so I used Newsrack for a bit until Reeder came out because I use reeder on my iPhone, you should really take a look at it, its high a quality app, I just wish the developer would come out with a Mac version so I can get away from Netnewswire. I previously used NewsFire but it doesn't sync with google reeder so I'm stuck with NetNewsWire

But I tried them all Pulse, NetNewsWire, The Morning Edition, Feeder, etc.
 
Slevin said:
My data syncs with MobileMe over the air and if I didn't have MobileMe it would sync with my desktop every time I plug my computer in. If I ever have to wipe the device or install a software update everything is backed up to my computer every time I plug my iPhone in. I can also sync my exchange account data for school to school servers

Since it is An android device, shouldn't you be able to sync at least the gmail. contacts and calendars to your linked google account? I thought integration like that should be build in
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Yes, you can sync everything through google if you wish.
 
David Pogue from the NYTs on the Sprint EVO

Best part of the article

After two days of fiddling, downloading and uninstalling apps, manually force-quitting programs and waiting for servers to be upgraded, I finally got video calling to work — sort of. Sometimes there was only audio and a black screen, sometimes only a freeze-frame; at best, the video was blocky and the audio delay absurd.

To make video calling work, you have to install an app yourself: either Fring or Qik. But we never did get Fring to work, and Qik requires people you call to press a Talk button when they want to speak. The whole thing is confusing and, to use the technical term, iffy.
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Also wanting to use it as a WiFi hotspot costs and extra 30/month and will drain the battery in less than an hour, you pay an extra $10/month for 4G service even if you don't live in a 4G service area

Apple would never ship a device that you need to fiddle with in order to get to work, if a consumer buys a device it should work out of the box flawlessly anything less than that then the company failed the consumer.

Edit:
He's the tech writer for the NYTimes, so it's not like he's some schmuck off the street that doesn't know squat about electronics
 
 
JacobSilge said:
Then, by that logic Apple should not allow the iPhone to be sold in several major metropolitan areas where you can't make a phone call without a relatively high risk of being disconnected. Unfortunately, if forced to choose between a phone I will have to fiddle with to make some features work and to get decent battery life and a phone I cannot do anything to fix the reception on, I'm going to pick the one I have a fighting chance of fixing.
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Well, when I lived in NYC using my iPhone roaming around the city as part of my job it was rare that I got dropped calls. Remember for every one person who complains there probably at least 20 who don't have a problem. People are more apt to complain when there is a problem than offer praise when things go right. For several years now the iPhone has topped consumer satisfaction usually by more than 5% to its closest competitor. Besides if the iPhone was offered on other networks the Android platform would be peanuts, I bet there are tons of customers on Verizon who are only with an android phone because the iPhone isn't available.

This article is a great piece about the difference between the two camps. The crux of the article

Here's the test. Take some normal people, where by "normal" I mean people who have never heard of TechCrunch or Daring Fireball. Give them brand new still-in-the-box iPhone 4's and HTC Evos. Now ask them to make a video call to one another. With the iPhone 4, they're going to be able to do it. The only thing that's technically confusing about FaceTime is that it only works via Wi-Fi (I think many people have little understanding of the difference between Wi-Fi and 3G data — at least insofar as why a feature would work over one but not the other). Otherwise, FaceTime is as easy to use as making a regular voice call. There is no such thing as a "FaceTime account" you need to create or log in to. It doesn't require the installation of any third-party apps. All you need to know is that the iPhone 4 can make video calls, and that the feature is called "FaceTime". And I'll bet the little instructional card inside the iPhone 4 box will make that perfectly clear.

How many normal people even know that Qik and Fring exist? Are Android users supposed to install both apps, so they can make video calls to people who've only installed one or the other?

It's not that there's anything wrong with Qik or Fring in and of themselves. Nor is it to say that Android doesn't have its own first-to-do-right features, like, say, the ability to dictate text-to-speech in any text field. It's about the mindset of the companies that made the phones. Do you include the half-baked stuff, or hold it until it's fully-baked? Apple wasn't going to include a front-facing camera until they had software that made it useful in an iPhone-caliber way. HTC is happy to include a front-facing camera and leave its utility (and user experience) in the hands of third-party developers.

Android and iPhone fans will read the preceding paragraph very differently. Android fans will read it and say, "Exactly — give us the hardware and let developers figure out what to do with it." iPhone fans will read it and say, "I can't wait to get an iPhone 4."
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And that's the real challenge, people who are technologically advanced will be able to figure out how to get the most out of the EVO but the vast majority of consumers won't because they aren't that technologically capable. Apple puts out products that work right out of the box for the regular consumer, the android platform doesn't.
 
Slevin said:
Besides if the iPhone was offered on other networks the Android platform would be peanuts, I bet there are tons of customers on Verizon who are only with an android phone because the iPhone isn't available.
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I fully agree with you on everything you said. However, I have noticed a number of dropped calls to people using AT&T in certain areas (this is absolutely not specific to the iPhone). What I don't understand is how you can say that Android wouldn't even be competition if the iPhone were on Verizon, but then defend Apple for continuing exclusivity with AT&T. It just isn't making good business sense to limit your product like that. I can't wait for the Verizon iPhone forever - sooner or later I'm going to give up and take the time to learn how to use Android.
 
JacobSilge said:
I fully agree with you on everything you said. However, I have noticed a number of dropped calls to people using AT&T in certain areas (this is absolutely not specific to the iPhone). What I don't understand is how you can say that Android wouldn't even be competition if the iPhone were on Verizon, but then defend Apple for continuing exclusivity with AT&T. It just isn't making good business sense to limit your product like that. I can't wait for the Verizon iPhone forever - sooner or later I'm going to give up and take the time to learn how to use Android.
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I can say that there wouldn't be really be an Android platform or one that even matches its current state because something like 50% of Verizon smartphone customers said they would get an iPhone if it was available on Verizon.

I can defend AT&T and Apple because AT&T (well Cingular but then AT&T bought them up) took a risk on the iPhone sight unseen and let Apple have complete control of the device and its content. In 2007 that was unheard of, it still is unheard of today with the exception of the iPhone. AT&T deserves to be rewarded for its risk taking, they took the iPhone when Verizon said no to it. When the iPhone came out no one used as much data on a mobile phone and no one could have predicted the pace at which the iPhone adoption would occur. If the iPhone had gone to Verizon they would have been caught with their pants down as well.

Does AT&T's network need to be expanded? Yes, but they are expanding it as fast as they can go. This year they are spending 18-19 Billion on capital improvements and that's 2 billion more than last year. I would say that is moving in the right direction but it takes time to build up a network it doesn't happen over night. Compounding the problem is that every day AT&T adds more and more iPhone users to its network, with the iPhone 4 selling more than 10X this year than the last on the first day you can bet that AT&T will see millions more consumers jumping on their network and that will require more expansion.

Now if the iPhone was exclusive to Verizon would Verizon have this problem? I don't know, I would assume so because they too would be adding millions of users every year and they are limited by the same constraints that AT&T has when expanding their network.

In the end, it doesn't really matter because consumers will decide what they want and where their dollars go and Apple doesn't care about market share, they care about making a good product that makes them money, market share is irrelevant just ask BMW. Worldwide the iPhone trumps the Android platform, why? Because in most other countries it exists on multiple carriers and it's the device that more people want.
 
If you take the iPhone as an isolated product, of course it's the best thing out there.

Your n=1 experience of AT&T not sucking in New York != AT&T not sucking other places. I live in the 4th largest city in the country and AT&T sucks here. People get other service to be able to have reception at all the hospitals. WiFi doesn't cut it at all facilities that we work at either. The County health system doesn't have WiFi. Friends have dropped calls on AT&T and I've never had one single experience on Sprint since moving here.

I'm personally willing to accept a less than perfect device to be able to have good service. I'm also not willing to pay extra for unlimited data. Where I live Sprint has good 4G service coverage.

I understand that not everyone feels this way, but the device doesn't exist in isolation. I'll be getting an Evo when I'm up for an upgrade later this year.
 
If Verizon got the iPhone there would not be as much of a concern with service. In addition to their network, Verizon & Sprint provide each other with free roaming so you essentially get the benefits of both networks (the whole LTE vs. Wimax discussion notwithstanding). Right now 4G is in limited markets, but regardless of which standard is most widely adopted, it will be spreading like wildfire.

The only provider right now who has unlimited data is Sprint - and I am all about paying much less for unlimited data as a student who accesses internet based resources on my phone much more regularly than the average person.

In regards to Apple, I think Steve Jobs may be seeing the error of his ways in terms of exclusivity with AT&T. In fact, the biggest criticisms of the iPhone to date have not been with the phone, but the network it's on. You can see AT&T introducing Android phones as we speak as a precursor to losing the exclusivity contract with Apple and I can see their subscriber base narrowing considerably when that happens. Apple can certainly learn from HTC on this one - look at the Droid Eris/HTC Hero and the amount of sales they both had (and they're the same phone on two different providers).

In regards to the Evo, right now some tinkering is required once it's out of the box and for someone like myself who likes tinkering/customization that's okay. For the average person, maybe that isn't so and that is the appeal of all the Apple products. That is, however, the whole reason to buy in to Android. As a relatively new open source product, there is so much you can do with it. Already there are 10+ different custom ROMs which you can experiment with until you find one you like. Nearly every aspect of the OS can be changed to fit your needs and I love that aspect of it. Bottom line - I love the phone so far, and it definitely meets my needs (plus it's larger than the iPhone - so I can really say mine's bigger than yours :cool: ).
 
If there's so much customisation possible with ROMs for android phones, then someone should customize an Android ROM for medical use! ;) Doctor ROM, Pharmacist ROM, Nurse ROM...
 
tungsten87 said:
apparently there are issues with the Evo's touch screen responsiveness in certain contexts...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8U2amlgb1M

supposedly the HTC incredible is having the same issues.
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Eh, they should have done the test without the invisible shield on it. It would make it more accurate. It might be a real issue but if they were going to do a controlled study they would have done it on a regular screen not one with a plastic covering on it
 
ghent96 said:
If there's so much customisation possible with ROMs for android phones, then someone should customize an Android ROM for medical use! ;) Doctor ROM, Pharmacist ROM, Nurse ROM...
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That doesn't make any sense. I'm guessing you don't really understand what a piece of ROM is.
 
So, after deciding to choose a network first and a phone second and getting off of the waiting list for the EVO on Friday, I finally picked up the phone and have been using it over the weekend. And I have to say that I am VERY pleased with the device so far.

The first thing I have to say is that I cannot for the life of me understand how so many very knowledgeable tech reviewers could have maligned the phone so much. Especially regarding the battery life, I was horrified about stories of the battery draining within 6-8 hours with little if any use. However, then I was reassured by reviews like this

http://jkontherun.com/2010/06/09/jkontherun-review-htc-evo-4g-superphone/

"I was concerned about battery life based on accounts I’d seen on the web prior to using the EVO. Those concerns were unfounded, as I find the battery lasts all day with fairly heavy usage."

I also saw a great many online articles about crazy tips and strategies to save battery life, and in the end I have just realized that just one very simple rule can lead to excellent battery life on this phone - if you aren't using it, don't keep it on in the background. This one simple rule has allowed me to take the EVO off of the charger at 9:30 am and now, at 12:30, have 49% of the battery remaining. And this was after a day of moderate usage (calls, texts, web browsing, a few youtube videos, lots of push e-mail, personal information management). So what were my super complicated power saving tricks? First - using the radio toggle widgets that were preloaded on the left home screen and adding the power management widget that lets you adjust screen brightness, auto sync (never turned this one off), wifi, etc, I made sure to turn off 4g (not currently in a 4g area), bluetooth (don't use it), and GPS (only as needed for location services). I also keep WiFi off when I'm not around a network (seems pretty reasonable) and turned off the WiFi and 4g notifications (I look for service myself if I want it - no need to have the phone doing that in the background). The other key - don't keep services running in the background that you don't use. Luckily, this happens to be fairly easy to do. Basically, set anything you don't care too much about to update manually, not automatically. For instance, the weather - I really only need it when I'm about to go outside, so I might as well just press on it manually, get my up to date weather forecast in 2 seconds. Likewise, I really don't need up to the minute facebook updates - manual updates are fine, especially since it updates very quickly on 3g with one tap on the screen. No need to disable background data or automatic syncing or anything like that. And e-mail accounts push to me beautifully!

Only two things were not particularly intuitive. The phone has you automatically signed in to google talk - you have to manually set it to not automatically sign you in and when you are done using it to sign out. The other less intuitive thing is that this "Sprint Updater" program runs in the background whenever I start up the phone. But feat not, for no exogenous task killers are required! Rather, just make a shortcut for "running services" in the settings menu and press one button to make it stop. Then only the things you need multitasking are using the battery at idle, and battery life will be more than adequate. Daily charging will be needed, but so far mid-day charging hasn't been an issue, with a little under half the battery left after a day's use.

A note on task killers - these really are a remnant of the pre-Android 2.0 era when there wasn't an easy way to manage running services. Unfortunately, due to the fragmentation, this isn't a total non-issue at this point. However, it seems like HTC is at least on the ball with all of its devices currently on Android 2.1. Regardless, being able to specifically monitor services that run in the background alleviates any need for a task killer, as most of the things you see in the background are really just saved states in the RAM that actually save power since you don't have to repeatedly restart apps. These states are deleted if more RAM is needed. This is actually fairly elegant programming and works well, albeit rather differently than windows.

Anyway, I have had a great experience regarding battery life. I didn't test with the 4g, but with 4g off, I can at least say that the battery should be adequate for a normal day of moderate usage. Unfortunately, I am going to be a doctor and that means my life isn't exactly going to be very normal. In the end, I think that the battery will probably be right on the cusp of just dying by the end of a 30 hour shift, but since I'll probably have at least 30 minutes to charge while writing notes most nights, it should work out even on call nights. It wasn't all the most intuitive experience, but none of it was as excessively complicated as I had feared.

Above all, I wonder why I, a marginally tech-savvy consumer managed to figure all this out while so many tech reviewers who are surely far more knowledgeable than I am talk about the battery dying after 8 hours with the screen off. More non-battery related comments to follow.
 
And people wonder why the Apple likes to screen apps in the app store. I have lots of personal data on my device, I don't want to worry that I installed an app that can steal my data. You just need to download the wrong app and poof your private data is gone. When google first opened up the app store and allowed users to regulate what the safety of apps they said these things would be caught but with almost 20% of the Apps in the Android Marketplace apparently this strategy failed.

IDG News
"As many as 20% of applications on Android Market let third parties access private or sensitive information, according to a report from security vendor SMobile Systems," Mikael Ricknäs reports for IDG News Service.

"In addition, some 5% of Android apps can be used to place a call to any number, and 2% of applications can send an SMS to an unknown premium number, in both cases without user involvement," Ricknäs reports.
Click to expand...

CNET

Elinor Mills reports for CNET, "Dozens of apps were found to have the same type of access to sensitive information as known spyware does, including access to the content of e-mails and text messages, phone call information, and device location, said Dan Hoffman, chief technology officer at SMobile Systems."

Mills reports, "For those who want to download apps without having to worry there is antispyware software from SMobile Systems and others. 'There are known spyware apps that are on the market,' Hoffman said. 'It's a growing problem.'"
Click to expand...
 
Slevin said:
And people wonder why the Apple likes to screen apps in the app store. I have lots of personal data on my device, I don't want to worry that I installed an app that can steal my data. You just need to download the wrong app and poof your private data is gone. When google first opened up the app store and allowed users to regulate what the safety of apps they said these things would be caught but with almost 20% of the Apps in the Android Marketplace apparently this strategy failed.
Click to expand...

Slevin, have you ever used the Android Marketplace? Sure, some percentage of Apps CAN do those things, but the capabilities of these apps to access data are listed on the screen prior to your decision to download it. If you don't want to risk it, don't click Install.

The bigger problem is that you don't know which apps are going to prevent your phone from sleeping causing the horrendous battery life you read about in all the reviews. I do wish that the Marketplace were closed like the app store with quality controls, while retaining the ability to circumvent the Marketplace and directly load apps - that would probably be the best of both worlds.
 
JacobSilge said:
Slevin, have you ever used the Android Marketplace? Sure, some percentage of Apps CAN do those things, but the capabilities of these apps to access data are listed on the screen prior to your decision to download it. If you don't want to risk it, don't click Install.

The bigger problem is that you don't know which apps are going to prevent your phone from sleeping causing the horrendous battery life you read about in all the reviews. I do wish that the Marketplace were closed like the app store with quality controls, while retaining the ability to circumvent the Marketplace and directly load apps - that would probably be the best of both worlds.
Click to expand...
I haven't used the Android Marketplace (AM) but my question is this. Who verifies that the description of the App is correct within the AM because if no one verifies that the information is correct who is to say that an App that doesn't list the fact that it can access your data isn't accessing your data. Could be here is a free game and in the background it's taking your info and sending it to some guy in eastern Europe? Without someone checking this (and the ability for google to remotely disable an App) who is to say that the free PDF reader you got isn't showing your data to a 3rd party.
 
Slevin said:
I haven't used the Android Marketplace (AM) but my question is this. Who verifies that the description of the App is correct within the AM because if no one verifies that the information is correct who is to say that an App that doesn't list the fact that it can access your data isn't accessing your data. Could be here is a free game and in the background it's taking your info and sending it to some guy in eastern Europe? Without someone checking this (and the ability for google to remotely disable an App) who is to say that the free PDF reader you got isn't showing your data to a 3rd party.
Click to expand...

The process of making those lists is automated through google's servers. Because linux is by default far more secure than Windows (no unified registry), a program needs to ask for permissions for different classes of information prior to the installation process. Google's servers then publish the list of those requests for each app on the Marketplace. I know this isn't ideal - maybe it is theoretically possible to disguise these requests as something else. Then again, it would require continuously staying one step ahead of google who has been faulted for innovating the OS too frequently, along with dealing with the idiosyncracies that HTC, Motorola, et. al. put into the phones.

Besides, the 20%/5% numbers for malware are probably pretty overstated.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/06/23/android_security/

"The more perceptive reader will have noticed a flaw in such an analysis – it might be true that 20 per cent of Marketplace applications request access to personal information, but if those applications are social-networking-integration apps then they're going to need access to that data.
Similarly, five per cent apparently request access to the phone dialler, which SMobile points out can be used "to place a call to any number without interaction or authority from the user": but if those applications are shell replacements then that's entirely appropriate."
 
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