02:48
iphone3
The HTC Inspire 4G is AT&T's first foray into 4G data, and the carrier picked a very nice package for the debut. The Inspire is beautifully constructed with high-grade materials, and it shows the world that the Captivate wasn't just a fluke -- AT&T is seeing the light and getting on board with Android in a big way.But like everything else, it's not perfect. Hit the break and see my impressions of the HTC Inspire 4G after using it for a week, and decide if you like what you're seeing.When we first got the Inspire 4G Phil had a look at it and gives us a bit of a walkthrough. You can read about that here, and the video itself is below
The Hardware the Inspire 4G makes a very good first impression. It's basically the same phone as the Desire HD, which is a very good thing to be. Its aluminum unibody construction -- as in a single piece of metal -- is sleek, and it gives everything a solid look and feel. But because of the unibody shell, the battery door and SIM card cover are difficult to remove. As in VERY difficult. Having a device with a removable battery, then designing things so removing the cover is as hard as a Chinese puzzle, is a pet peeve of mine, so please, allow me to rant just a bit. And yes -- it is that hard.Battery door battery door removed battery cover in place.
Everything else about the phone's design is very well done. The camera lens does protrude a bit, much like the Evo 4G, so you'll want to watch for scratches. But the placement of things like the microphones (there are two for noise-cancellation), the earpiece speaker, the volume rocker and the power button (thanks for putting that on top where it belongs HTC) are all easy to reach while holding the phone. And they extend away from the phone's body just enough to find them by feel, but not enough to constantly get "bumped" accidentally.I can't seem to grab some phones without hitting the volume rocker or power button (hello, Nexus S), and there's none of that with the Inspire. The only other thing I can say I'm not feeling is the 3.5 mm headphone jack placement on the bottom of the phone. That's starting to become a trend, and my guess is it's a conspiracy by Bluetooth manufacturers to force me to stop using wired headphones. Or possibly that's where it fits best -- I'm sure it's one of the two.
Camera bottom
buttons earpiece
power button USB port
volume switch
The pictures really don't do the Inspire justice. This is one you need to hold in your hand to appreciate the design, and I'm sure a salesman at your local AT&T store would be happy to oblige.
That leaves us with one last thing about the build of the phone to discuss -- the size. The Inspire is a big phone. It's 4.84 inches in height, 2.68 inches in width, and 0.46 inches thick (123 x 68 x 12 mm) and weighs 5.78 oz (164 g). It's really no bigger (and in some areas it's not as big) as the Evo 4G but size still may be an issue for you. I'll say right here that I think the Inspire is a great phone, and one of the nicest I've used -- but I couldn't use it as my daily device simply because of the size. You may feel different, and sales numbers from the Evo and the Droid X tell me that many of you do. I simply want to remind anyone considering this one to think about it, and decide if you can deal with a phone this big.full frontal rear high light.In the specs department, the Inspire 4G is no slouch. It's not the game machine that some other phones will be, but for those who don't need an Xbox 360 in their pocket, the Inspire proves, that great software on top of good hardware can make for a better user experience than raw horsepower can.
Under the hood you have essentially the same hardware that the MyTouch 4G debuted:
Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8255 @ 1 GHz
768 MB RAM
4 GB ROM, 1 GB available for applications
4.3 inch capacitive LCD display @ 480x800
8 MP (rear) camera with 720p video capture
Android 2.2.1
Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR
802.11b, 802.11g, 802.11n WiFi
FM radio (87.5-108MHz) with RDS
AGPS
1230 mAh removable (good luck with that) battery
GSM 850, 900, 1800, 1900MHz
UMTS 850, 1900
HSPDA, HSUPA*, HSPA+
Technically, the Inspire 4G is fully HSUPA compliant, but AT&T has said the Inspire 4G is incapable of HSUPA. This is a software limitation.And the benchmarks:The Inspire has the second generation of the Snapdragon processor, and it's very good hardware. Unless you're interested in the future of gaming on Android, this hardware will do everything you need. I know we're all tired of hearing and seeing Dungeon Hunter come up, but the Inspire 4G handles it just fine. Of course if you want extreme performance, you might want to rethink and buy the Atrix. It's going to do animation and 3D better than the Inspire 4G will.
What I liked most about the hardware:
The construction materials. Use Aluminum, manufacturers -- learn this please. Hold an OG Droid, or a Nexus One, or the Inspire 4G. It feels good. Then hold my Nexus S.
The camera. I liked it enough to have it's own section below.
The "protrusion length" of the controls. The barely there thing works well.
768 MB RAM. HTC realizes 512 isn't enough when applications are pushing things to the max. It's the PC hardware race all over again.Where I feel it's lacking:
No front facing camera. To me, it's a gimmick I'll never use, but for many it's a great addition, and one they should have the option of using. On the flipside, AT&T knows more than anyone what happens when you overload a network. See below.
No HSUPA. Queue Keyshawn Johnson -- "Come on, man!" Hey, AT&T: It's your network, and I really do understand what you're afraid of, but you did advertise this one as being 4G. Most of us don't care what technology it is, or what you call it, as long as it's fast. When you cut it in half and advertise it as fast, we get cranky.
The headphone jack is on the bottom of the phone. This just bugs me when the phone's so big, and they still couldn't find a way to put it up top. Yes it works fine, and I'm probably being nit-picky, but that's what I'm supposed to do -- find the little things that you might not while holding the display unit.
The battery cover. I'm thinking it has to be such a tight (and solid) fit for normal operation, because of the contacts. With a tight fit, the battery won't be sliding back and forth fiddling around with the power. If you break the contacts, the phone won't power up. If the battery door isn't tight, the contacts won't mate. Whatever the reason, they should have engineered it just a bit more. Maybe that was a Friday project.The hardware works as it should. Phone calls are clear on both ends, WiFi is strong and solid, the FM radio works as well as the clock radio on my nightstand does, and there were no showstopping bugs from anything during my time with it. Battery life is relatively poor, but you should expect that with a small battery and a big screen. The location and method of holding the battery is going to make an extended model a bit of a trick, and swapping batteries is never going to be fun with the way the battery cover fits. Stay close to a charger.
The Hardware the Inspire 4G makes a very good first impression. It's basically the same phone as the Desire HD, which is a very good thing to be. Its aluminum unibody construction -- as in a single piece of metal -- is sleek, and it gives everything a solid look and feel. But because of the unibody shell, the battery door and SIM card cover are difficult to remove. As in VERY difficult. Having a device with a removable battery, then designing things so removing the cover is as hard as a Chinese puzzle, is a pet peeve of mine, so please, allow me to rant just a bit. And yes -- it is that hard.Battery door battery door removed battery cover in place.
Everything else about the phone's design is very well done. The camera lens does protrude a bit, much like the Evo 4G, so you'll want to watch for scratches. But the placement of things like the microphones (there are two for noise-cancellation), the earpiece speaker, the volume rocker and the power button (thanks for putting that on top where it belongs HTC) are all easy to reach while holding the phone. And they extend away from the phone's body just enough to find them by feel, but not enough to constantly get "bumped" accidentally.I can't seem to grab some phones without hitting the volume rocker or power button (hello, Nexus S), and there's none of that with the Inspire. The only other thing I can say I'm not feeling is the 3.5 mm headphone jack placement on the bottom of the phone. That's starting to become a trend, and my guess is it's a conspiracy by Bluetooth manufacturers to force me to stop using wired headphones. Or possibly that's where it fits best -- I'm sure it's one of the two.
Camera bottom
buttons earpiece
power button USB port
volume switch
The pictures really don't do the Inspire justice. This is one you need to hold in your hand to appreciate the design, and I'm sure a salesman at your local AT&T store would be happy to oblige.
That leaves us with one last thing about the build of the phone to discuss -- the size. The Inspire is a big phone. It's 4.84 inches in height, 2.68 inches in width, and 0.46 inches thick (123 x 68 x 12 mm) and weighs 5.78 oz (164 g). It's really no bigger (and in some areas it's not as big) as the Evo 4G but size still may be an issue for you. I'll say right here that I think the Inspire is a great phone, and one of the nicest I've used -- but I couldn't use it as my daily device simply because of the size. You may feel different, and sales numbers from the Evo and the Droid X tell me that many of you do. I simply want to remind anyone considering this one to think about it, and decide if you can deal with a phone this big.full frontal rear high light.In the specs department, the Inspire 4G is no slouch. It's not the game machine that some other phones will be, but for those who don't need an Xbox 360 in their pocket, the Inspire proves, that great software on top of good hardware can make for a better user experience than raw horsepower can.
Under the hood you have essentially the same hardware that the MyTouch 4G debuted:
Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8255 @ 1 GHz
768 MB RAM
4 GB ROM, 1 GB available for applications
4.3 inch capacitive LCD display @ 480x800
8 MP (rear) camera with 720p video capture
Android 2.2.1
Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR
802.11b, 802.11g, 802.11n WiFi
FM radio (87.5-108MHz) with RDS
AGPS
1230 mAh removable (good luck with that) battery
GSM 850, 900, 1800, 1900MHz
UMTS 850, 1900
HSPDA, HSUPA*, HSPA+
Technically, the Inspire 4G is fully HSUPA compliant, but AT&T has said the Inspire 4G is incapable of HSUPA. This is a software limitation.And the benchmarks:The Inspire has the second generation of the Snapdragon processor, and it's very good hardware. Unless you're interested in the future of gaming on Android, this hardware will do everything you need. I know we're all tired of hearing and seeing Dungeon Hunter come up, but the Inspire 4G handles it just fine. Of course if you want extreme performance, you might want to rethink and buy the Atrix. It's going to do animation and 3D better than the Inspire 4G will.
What I liked most about the hardware:
The construction materials. Use Aluminum, manufacturers -- learn this please. Hold an OG Droid, or a Nexus One, or the Inspire 4G. It feels good. Then hold my Nexus S.
The camera. I liked it enough to have it's own section below.
The "protrusion length" of the controls. The barely there thing works well.
768 MB RAM. HTC realizes 512 isn't enough when applications are pushing things to the max. It's the PC hardware race all over again.Where I feel it's lacking:
No front facing camera. To me, it's a gimmick I'll never use, but for many it's a great addition, and one they should have the option of using. On the flipside, AT&T knows more than anyone what happens when you overload a network. See below.
No HSUPA. Queue Keyshawn Johnson -- "Come on, man!" Hey, AT&T: It's your network, and I really do understand what you're afraid of, but you did advertise this one as being 4G. Most of us don't care what technology it is, or what you call it, as long as it's fast. When you cut it in half and advertise it as fast, we get cranky.
The headphone jack is on the bottom of the phone. This just bugs me when the phone's so big, and they still couldn't find a way to put it up top. Yes it works fine, and I'm probably being nit-picky, but that's what I'm supposed to do -- find the little things that you might not while holding the display unit.
The battery cover. I'm thinking it has to be such a tight (and solid) fit for normal operation, because of the contacts. With a tight fit, the battery won't be sliding back and forth fiddling around with the power. If you break the contacts, the phone won't power up. If the battery door isn't tight, the contacts won't mate. Whatever the reason, they should have engineered it just a bit more. Maybe that was a Friday project.The hardware works as it should. Phone calls are clear on both ends, WiFi is strong and solid, the FM radio works as well as the clock radio on my nightstand does, and there were no showstopping bugs from anything during my time with it. Battery life is relatively poor, but you should expect that with a small battery and a big screen. The location and method of holding the battery is going to make an extended model a bit of a trick, and swapping batteries is never going to be fun with the way the battery cover fits. Stay close to a charger.
Posted in: htc 4g concepts,htc 4g designs,htc 4g features,htc 4g reviews
0 comments:
Post a Comment