The user interface is poorly designed to the point of being unusable. If not for it having a keyboard and arrow keys it wouldn’t work. It can’t be used with just the finger and requires the stylus for about everything. It lacks scroll bars in critical places and you have to flick the screen to scroll. If you don’t flick it just right, you either select the wrong thing or you flip past what you want.
I have the Verizon version. The first thing I noticed when un-boxing it was a large area of paint missing off the back of the rear speaker grill. Turns out it wasn’t paint missing but a map of the world. A really bad map. If I can find the right color of black paint I’m going to paint over it.
When I first turned it on, it dialed *228 to talk to Verizon and program itself. But it only got to the main menu and didn’t dial the option “1” to actually start the programming. The volume was initially low so I didn’t hear what it was doing until it looped and failed about four times.
The interface was cluttered and non-intuitive. Basically you have to fight every step of the way to do anything. Eventually you learn its quirks and you can get it to be barely usable. Many of the applications were probably written for phones with 4-way selectors that work like arrow keys and therefore there is no way to step one by one through the menus.
The operating system itself seems solid. I’m downloading some free apps to try to get the thing up to usable. I think if I replace enough of the interface with free stuff and some purchased apps I’ll eventually like this phone. And Mobile 6.5 is coming and it will hopefully be better. But the bottom line is that if you are coming from the PalmOS world to Windows Mobile you will be shocked as to how bad the interface is. I’m sure the iPhone folks can really laugh.
On the good side you do get full real multitasking so the email app is still running while I’m online with Putty checking my servers and using the browser. When connecting the USB cable to the computer it mounts the phone like an external hard drive so I can drag and drop files between my laptop and the phone. I also bought an app that turns the phone into a wifi hotspot so I may be able to drop my tethering charge I’m paying Verizon.
I’m looking at adding more apps. Considering something called SPB Mobile Shell which replaces most of the user interface. Downloaded iDialer to replace the dialing app. Looking for a contact manager that will allow me to import from Yahoo Address book (or at least a CSV file). The contact manager has NO import options. Comes with Opera but not very impressed with that either. You would think that you could tap on a link and go there. NOOOOO! You have to change the text size with the zoom bar before the links work.
My conclusion: I would bet that whoever designed the interface doesn’t actually use it themselves. It looks like the designers didn’t even own cell phones. My expectations for this phone were high but I’m really disappointed. Maybe you all can point me to the right apps to make me happy.
I’m looking for:
- Way to import contacts.
- Opinions on SPB Shell
- Want a launch icon for Mobile Putty (SSH)
- Replacement for Outlook Mobile
Welcome to the world of Windows Mobile. If you don’t like this version wait until the update. It’s guaranteed to use up all of the memory on your phone to the point only a WAP page is downloadable.
As a betting man that I am, I would put money down on that as you get use to the Winmo oddities you will start to really like this phone. You will be able to customize it to fit your needs and thats one of the big reasons I have stayed with windows mobile. I would recommend you visiting forum.xda-developers.com and forum.ppcgeeks.com/.
Once you go Mac (iPhone) you never go back! I was happy with my iPhone from the begining, coming from a Treo 650p. The iPhone didn’t have apps at the time, I bought it on the faith that it would, and it came though in spades.
Holy cow!! A full page of whining about this piece of crap?!? Do us all a favor and return the damn thing and get something that works.
I’ve had many similar experiences with my Samsung Omnia – a good piece of hardware suffering from WinMobile. Early reports are Win 6.5 isn’t much better and may be worse. Anyway, one suggestion: I’ve found Opera to be a nasty browser on my phone. Download Skyfire – free – and enjoy built-in support for Flash and a much better overall browsing experience.
I hate WinMob so much that after only about 6 months with this phone I’m thinking seriously of buying the HTC Android phone (Hero) when it comes out next month. And I’m paying full price here in SE Asia.
Let us know what you think of 6.5 when it comes out – if it doesn’t brick you phone trying to upgrade.
You all will really bum out PeeDrool.
>>Basically you have to fight every step of the way to do anything.
ROLF! Thats exactly the way my windows mobile turd was. I bought an Iphone and like it.
My windows mobile phone now serves as my alarm clock. It almost never crashes, and has enough battery to coast past a power bump.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=479 😉
What a whiner. If your fat fingers can’t work then the pos must suck for everyone. It works great for me and I never need a stylus.
The smart phone buyer’s dilemma – a good device with a bad OS, or a piece of plastic junk with a good OS? Both are the same price. The iPhone, as much as I detest it and the App Store, is currently the only sensible option. At least, until the Chinese begin pushing out Android MIDs for $100 a pop.
Try SPB Mobile Shell it is a nice interface. I used it on the Samsung omnia and liked it. The mobile shell allows you to add shortcuts to apps on any of the home screens
The only way I know how to OTA sync your address book with Yahoo is using Plaxo and NuevaSync. It is a little bit of a setup but once done it will always keep you address book updated.
You can also use Outlook on the desktop to sync you address book to the phone.
RELEASED PRODUCTS SHOULD NOT BE BETA!!!
I will NOT be a BETA TESTER!!..
I WILL GIVE everything 1 year…ONLY. AFTER introduction..TO WORK. Then I will THINK about buying CRAP.
sENCE 2000, EVERYTHING that comes out WORKS, but is still BETA..
Yeah – did the SPB mobile shell. Much better!
Give it a few days, and get rid of the touch stuff and I think the phone will work great with just winmob. Spb shell is good as it lets you add shortcuts to your “Desktop” on your phone.
I bought the Palm Pro, yes PRO not Pre, with winmob 6.1. It works great. Its a Quad Band GSM phone that works anywhere in the world. Has BT, WIFI, UMTS/HSDPA/EDGE/GPRS. MicroSDHC card, Built in GPS, POP3/IMAP email with Yahoo, Gmail, AOL, etc… It supports Exchange email with Direct Push Tech. It has a 3.5mm stereo headphone jack. Most importantly for me it has a hardware keyboard. The keys are smaller than previous Palm products but you get used to it’s tactile feel after a few days. It has a good 2MP camera that does video too. Also comes in the Dual Band CDMA2000 EvDO Rev A version with Sprint.
Winmob 6.1 works great for email, games, Google Apps, Calendar, Messaging(IM, SMS, MMS). Has a decent Alarm function that lets you set multiple alarms. Terminal services, PCAnywhere, and other remote services work great too. Lots of apps and games for winmob. Check out handango.com.
I switched from Palm OS cos they didnt have any new phones. So, I decided to switch to newer palm phones with winmob. It was worth it.
I think if I replace every app with one that works I’ll be fairly happy.
I’ve also got an Omnia (on Verizon)…. Obviously, the engineers who created this mess never used it….
But, once I got used to it (from a Moto Razr), not bad….
Being able to turn it into a hotspot would _really_ be useful, though.
I tried a Storm, and my nephew’s iPhone…. The former really needs a stylus at times, but won’t work with one (or wouldn’t for me). The latter just wasn’t “right” by my needs….
This thing replaced my HP Ipaq and the Razr, which is nice from a “bulging pockets” standpoint, but the tradeoff isn’t quite there.
Regards
WM is garbage. They are so far behind the other players that it is laughable. WM is typical MS. Just like IE, MS let it languish to the point that it is basically a POS.
The HTC Pro 2 has a few issues, but overall it’s a pretty decent phone with a lot of features. At least it’s not a damn Iphone and is not on AT&T’s crappy network. (get of of my lawn.. bah..)
I used a Palm Treo for years. It was good. I used BlackBerry’s for more years and they were very good. Then the BB Storm, which was very bad. Then the Windows Mobile, Samsung, TERRIBLE! I lasted a week. Now I have an iPhone and it is the best phone by a wide margin. Why is it only Apple can make great products? Really?
putting aside all the other above suggestions..
which i will read later
i have yet to be impressed by a cellphone.. alway too clunky.. always too, gotta get used to it.. too intuitive you can’t touch it or, not enough..
maybe if someone still made one in north america
I agree with “normal fingers” why would anyone suffer with this if you don’t like it. Return it, and get something else. I also think as someone else did that maybe your not use to the way Windows Mobile works? Because with the flicks I have had similar problems with the iPhone. You go to scroll and you end up clicking on a link or something. I think all touch phones are that way. Its one reason I don’t think touch is really that great. Its good when your in a hurry and you don’t want to have to use a stylus. But their are times when I would really prefer a stylus.
I have had WM6.5 on a Wing for a while now love it. Simple and functional. I think this may be a grandpa moment. Isn’t it a general rule of thumb to try it for a few days to get the feel of it at least ? Certainly John must appreciate the speaker/conference phone features for those crackpot calls.If your on any kind of good network and we know you are that phone should be great. Harsh review. I think some of us have drank too much of the apple Jesus juice.
Pedro, you are certainly entitled to your opinion, no matter how biased. 🙂
I will cease with the name calling!
Ed, Special
15 day trial on SPB Mobile Shell 3.0. You won’t be sorry. Telco’s should include this program with all winmo phones.
To use Winmo you have to give up thinking it’s competing with the iphone, I have both and the Winmo alows me to do anything I want. I download any size file or picture. to sync your contacts get Microsoft’s myphone it’s a small program that will sync all your mail texts docs contacts notes, whatever you want. It does take looking and there is a learning curve, you can hook you phone to the TV and watch your downloaded videos or use the web with only a needed cable. You can do everything with Winmo just not as parity as iphone. also the new 6.5 might fix the finger friendly stuff but it will still be winmo, and harder to use.
I’m afraid that is exactly why I have an iPhone! I tried just about every phone I could think of to do what I wanted – responsive device, email, decent browser in the main. I resisted the iPhone as much as I could, even having an HTC with slide out keyboard, which I sold after 2 weeks of frustration, tried loads of other phones (buying 2nd hand from eBay and selling them back again!) but couldn’t find anything that did what I wanted, or should I say, did it well.
I had bought my gf an iPhone last Christmas because she thought it was ‘cute’, which I then decided to borrow for a while just to see what it was like, rather than totally ignore it “because it was an iPhone.” as many people seem to do. It was so good that I as soon I could I went and bought one for myself – the release of the 3GS tied in nicely with the end of my previous contract, which really is even better than the 3G! Unlike in the US, we don’t get screwed on data/call plans here in France – €50 pcm and I get unlimited data, unlimited email, free calls, free SMS/MMS and free access to all of Orange’s Wifi hotspots.
It does 99% of what I want to do, and does it all with little fuss, quickly and easily – even the touch keypad is amazingly easy to use, and surprisingly accurate (one reason I avoided the iPhone in the first place) – if you have tried other software keyboards and been put off, I’d suggest you try the iPhone one as it is much better than anything else out there.
My contacts, email accounts, tasks etc. all sync well, and the web browser is so good that I don’t need to take my PC out with me most of the time now. OK, you can’t configure every last setting like you can on Windows Mobile, but when it works as well as it does out of the box, you don’t need to! Now that 3.1 software is out, I’m getting a much better battery life – 2 days of my normal use is easily possible, 4 or 5 of light use – and lets face it, how many people are away from a power socket for much longer than that? Multitasking isn’t really an issue for me – you only use one thing at a time, right?! and when I go back to email/browser/etc from whatever else I was doing, it is still in the same state I left it, you don’t have to relaunched the program from scratch. I suppose the only time it might be really useful was loading a webpage on a slow connection whilst popping out to check your email, but certainly not a deal breaker in my book.
Don’t knock the iPhone until you’ve tried the competition, and then tried one for yourself for at least a couple of weeks – you begin to appreciate how good it is. What a poor state of affairs when nobody can come up with anything else as good.
Pedro -do you work for HTC?
#29 I wondered why you had heard my complaints before. You must patrol all the HTC review sites. What a dismal job that must be, defending garbage and the most ridiculous and unusable user interface ever.
When our cell dealer replaced all of our HTC phones after months of complaints, we asked her what to do with the old phones. She said they didn’t want them back. I smashed mine with a hammer, which I have been wanting to do since the week after I got it. At lunch that day eight others came into the office parking lot and smashed theirs as well. If I can post the photo of all the smashed HTC’s. Most of us got Blackberrys which doesn’t pretend to be anything than a smart phone that actually works.
THIS ARTICAL SUCKS. MARK its a damn phone.
YOU ARE A DUMB ASS YOU DONT NEED TO BUY ANY APPS
((When connecting the USB cable to the computer it mounts the phone like an external hard drive so I can drag and drop files between my laptop and the phone. I also bought an app that turns the phone into a wifi hotspot so I may be able to drop my tethering charge)) I’m paying Verizon.
YOU GET THIS FREE AT ANT WM SITE
GET A IPHONE-FOR PEOPLE THAT BITCH.
For some of you here who are dumb fucks, this is a review. Sometimes I say good things and sometimes I don’t. A review is how things turn out. So if you don’t like the review there’s a whole internet to read and there’s always someone who will say anything you want to hear.