- Average user rating: 3.5 stars out of 151 reviews Back to product review
- My rating: 0 stars
Full user review
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4 out of 16 people found this review helpful
3.0 stars
"Counterpoint: it's still Android on a slow CPU"
Pros: Android itself offers many advantages, primarily around an open-ish platform and a burgeoning marketplace for apps. The headphone jack is a major plus, as is the accessibility of the microSD cards.
Cons: It's still capacitive, which is a major failure in UI despite reports of glowing praise. Tiny icons and small details are regularly missed with adult-sized digits. The Android UI is sub-optimal for primary app access to picking up calls.
Summary: Look, it's an improvement but by no means a compelling reason to switch. You cannot do any non-trivial work on a capacitive screen device, such as editing a spreadsheet or highlighting random text. You need a stylus -- it's a simple matter of physics. Your finger is much much larger than the 12 pixels you are attempting to hit.
The lag that is alluded to is being downplayed -- when an incoming call arrives and your device is locked (timed-out), you will be pushing the answer button repeatedly to pick up the call. Repeatedly. Once to wakeup the screen, then to unlock, the to pick up, and the UI lags at each step. It's astonishing how little is made of the tremendous lag you experience day-to-day using Android on these underpowered platforms.
Android is a Java-variant, and Java is an interpreted language for the most part. It's not a truly compiled bytecode set of binaries like Sybian or Microsoft CE, and it has lots of lag issues as the pseudo-JVMs struggle to handle your UI requests. Context-switching is laughably bad. Android is nice, but unless they start putting call functions into C++ sections, this will never be a great phone platform.
I mean, you think the iPhone is a winner purely on design? Design has been copied, but its OS is optimized and faster. Period.
-Remo
Updated on Dec 21, 20091) People review items they do not own all the time. If you rent a car from Avis, can you review the car? Sure. If you operate a phone at BestBuy or a Sprint store, can you evaluate its merits? Of course you can. Take your silliness home to Mommie.
2) I'm a G1 owner. I own an iPod Classic 160. I do not own a Mac. I write software for AIX platforms. Not a shill for iPhones, not my first rodeo.
3) Carrying around a stylus is as easy as carrying a pen. Devices that use stylii tend to even have a slot for carrying it. The argument *against* a stylus is a weak one: you can lose it, it's too small, I have to use it instead of my finger. Well, when you grow up and get an adult-sized body, your finger might be too big for a 3" screen with 12-pixel buttons.
Hey, thanks for reading.
- 11 replies to this review
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I own the HTC Hero and I am taking it back today. I'll stick with my Instinct until a more powerful HTC phone is released. I agree with everything this reviewer has stated, even if he doesn't own the phone (except the thing about answering a call... although difficult, it doesn't take 3 steps, it takes 1. But there is till lag in that 1 step and I find myself sliding my finger in an attempt to answer multiple times).
Those of you who say the phone is fine are obviously very patient people who accept the flaws this phone has. That is fine, but for people like me who expect my email app to open instantly, not a full 7 seconds after I click the icon, it just doesn't work. -
Remo, it is pretty clear you never touched the Heor. Your comments on iphone crack me up since a lot of us are COMING from iPhone! There is LESS lag on HERO on day to day task then on iPhone and the screen on HERO is more responsive and more accurate!
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It's obvious that Remo_Williams has never actually used the Sprint HTC Hero. Maybe he's a shill for crApple or.. ?
First, a phone call can be answered with one click or swipe even if the phone is locked.
Capacitive touch isn't as accurate as a stylus for sure, but carrying around a stylus with a phone doesn't make sense. It'd have to be tiny to fit into the phone and would get easily lost. The iPhone has the same issues with accuracy. IMHO HTC has done a fine job tailoring the UI for touch input.
There is occasional lag but overall doesn't detract from the user experience. From what I understand, HTC made some big improvements with the latest firmware (my phone came with it so I don't have the old one to compare to). -
Wow, how can you review a phone you don't own, what an idiot. Make sure you buy it before you talk trash about it. BTW all the lag form the EUROPEAN version has been fixed and comes pre-installed on the Sprint version. I know because i got it on Oct. 9th.
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As a former owner of a MyTouch I would have wriiten the same information in a review. Most people using an Android based phone are locked into contracts and have to like the phone whether or not they actually do. This leads to strong bias. I am out of my contract and I like to test phones, I have had about 6 phones in the last 18 months. I'm sorry Android folks, but the phone is slow and it's laggy. If you are running more than a couple of apps good luck. I have had the phone in my hand ringing and by the time I was able to get to the phone app the caller when to voicemail. It was a freshly reset device and I was runnng Google Maps, Battery Manager, and Touch Down, all apps that I need to keep the phone running the way I like it to. No big frills here folks. It was at best poor in the performance department. I don't care if you're talking Cliq, MyTouch, or Hero, and Android OS is an Andoid OS and it seems to be a poor mulitasking OS. The battery life is very poor too.
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you dont have the Sprint HTC Hero. Why would you leave a user review? If you dont have THIS EXACT PHONE, dont leave a review. This phone is not released yet. your review is void. BTW, the Iphone will be a thing of the past in 2 years.
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I own a mytouch, which obviously is pretty similar. I am not experiencing any noticeable lag while making calls. It's actually a very solid performing phone. I'm not sure what you are expecting, but the only lag I've ever experienced is running the Pandora app at the same time as I was inadvertently running another large app. I killed the task, and moved on. I can't imagine you own a phone that's not out on the market, so I'm not sure where your info is coming from. On the other hand, I can only go by the very similar phone running Android I have and make mention of the fact that your claims seem to be unfounded.
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After the HTC ROM updates lag is no longer a worry. I currently have the HTC magic running the updated ROM and it's fast. UI is whatever you want to make it too
I've installed aHome as my desktop and I have unlimited screens, programmable buttons (jump to custom home screen etc), customize transparencies of pull out panels. All without lag.
By default you just hold down the home button and you can switch between running apps, like pressing alt-tab on your pc. You can pull down the notification menu and get instant info on running apps without leaving the app you are presently in.
I was an owner of the iPhone 3g. I have to say, the Magic/Android platform is much more customizable than the iPhone. Not even a comparison.
Don't get me wrong either. The iPhone 3gs is a beast and is currently worthy of it's king of the hill status, but your statements about UI sluggishness aren't based in reality. At least not since the current 2.17 build of Android. -
Do you own this phone? Because it sure doesn't seem like you do. So how could you write a review about a phone that isn't even out yet; except to PROFESSIONALS that review devices such as this. So if you had that privilege, you would be writing your worthless review on your own website.
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Thanks for the review. As I was reading Bonnie's review, I was looking for a compelling reason to jump from my Instinct while at the same time having concerns of sluggishness with multmedia and UI dancing in my head; but unfortunately you have confirmed those - but I didn't expect it to be as bad as you pointed out.
As you have aptly pointed out JAVA (although extremely popular) is slow. Android provides flexibility and openness, but lacks in performance in some areas.
As consumers who want everything in a little box, what should we expect next and how long will it take to get here? If only the iPhone were offered to other carriers than AT&T -
WOW. What a troll!
Where to buy
HTC Hero (Sprint):
$179.99 - $599.99
| store | price | in stock? | rating |
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$179.99 | Yes |
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$459.99 | Yes |
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Best Buy
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$599.99 | See Site |
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