Review: HTC Droid Incredible
The Incredible runs the newest version of HTC's Sense user interface overlay. Sense offers 7 main screens on which to stuff content. The basic menu architecture of Android itself hasn't changed, and HTC hasn't made too many obvious improvements to the underlying menus.
The central home screen hosts HTC's clock and weather widget. Below the time, there are some applications, such as the browser, email, messaging, etc. All of these can be deleted, re-arranged, moved, etc. HTC has improved its "Favorites" widget a bit, which lets users see a number of their favorite contacts on one of the home screens, along with pictures and such.
There are three permanent software buttons at the bottom edge of the screen. The left button opens the main menu, the middle button opens the phone app, and the last button is used for adding widgets, apps, or shortcuts to the home screens. It is nice that these three buttons follow you from screen to screen. It means you can always get at the phone and main menu, no matter which of the 7 home screens you happen to be looking at.
The other nifty trick offered by this version of Sense is a way to jump through those 7 screens quickly. Double-tap the home button or pinch the screen, and all 7 screens zoom out in a manner similar to Apple's Expose tool. You can easily see all 7 screens at once. Find the one you want to jump to, tap it, and voila, there you go. This is nice because it lets you jump from screen to screen quickly, instead of scrolling and scrolling and scrolling.
The 4 capacitive touch buttons below the display quickly take you home, open the alternative menu, jump back, or open the search app. Each Android device treats these functions differently. After using the Droid for several months, I am used to the way they work, but some might prefer physical buttons over these capacitive keys.
One of the other neat features of Sense is that it offers a number of different "Scenes." Each Scene is basically a completely different set of configurations for the home screens. For example, the "Work" Scene prioritizes work email, calendar, and so on. All the screens are rearranged with different applications, widgets and shortcuts to reflect this. Even the wallpapers change from Scene to Scene. Some of the other Scenes are Social, HTC, Verizon, Play, Travel, and Clean Slate. Each can be customized, meaning that users have an infinite way to arrange apps and content on their device.
As far as performance goes, this is the fastest Android device I have interacted with. No hiccups, pauses, or other weird speed bumps slowing the Incredible down. The 1GHz Snapdragon processor is doing its job well.
Verizon Wireless Launches New Droid, HTC Droid Incredible
HTC Droid Incredible
