HTC Droid Incredible Review

I have been testing the HTC Droid Incredible for over a month. And while testing it, the Droid X was shoved into my hand. The good news is that the Incredible can hold it’s own against the Droid X. It is still a full featured Android device and perfect for those that prefer a smaller phone. The HTC Droid Incredible is an awesome Android based phone packed full of goodies in a small size.

The Incredible features HTC Sense which delivers instant access to your Home screen based on widgets. It’s cool to see what is going on on your social networks all on one screen.

There were a couple of things that I did not like too much about this phone which I will get into below. Overall it is a great phone though. From my experience every single smartphone out there has 1 or 2 things (sometimes more) that someone does not like. The issues listed below under “Problems” are certainly NOT a deal breaker when purchasing this phone.

 

Physical Attributes:

The Incredible is a nice sized small phone perfect for girls that like small phones, or those that don’t want to fill up their whole pocket with just a phone. 🙂

• Dimensions (LxWxT): 4.63 x 2.30 x 0.47 inches (117.5 x 58.5 x 11.9 mm)
• Weight: 4.6 ounces (130 grams) with battery
• Display: 3.7-inch AMOLED touch-sensitive screen with 480 X 800 WVGA resolution
• Optical Joystick

 

 

The Incredible has flat Touch enabled buttons on the front bottom (home, menu, back, and search) as well as a optical joystick/button that I honestly don’t use too much because just about everything can be done on the touch screen.  The right slide is completely smooth and includes no buttons. The left side holds the micro USB port, and the volume rocker. The top holds the power button and headphone jack.

 

 

Specifications

• CPU Speed: Qualcomm QSD8650, 1GHz Snapdragon™
• Platform: Android™ 2.1 (Éclair) with HTC Sense™
• Memory: Flash 8GB + 512MB/RAM 512MB
• GPS: Internal GPS antenna

Sensors:

• G-Sensor
• Digital compass
• Proximity sensor
• Ambient light sensor

Connectivity:

• Bluetooth^® 2.1 with FTP/OPP for file transfer
• A2DP for wireless stereo headsets, and PBAP for phonebook access from the car kit
• Wi-Fi^®: IEEE 802.11 b/g
• 3.5mm stereo audio jack
• micro-USB (12-pin micro-USB 2.0)

 

Camera

• 8-megapixel color camera with auto focus and flash
• 2 LED Flash

There are many options for changing the camera settings. You can adjust Brightness, Contrast, Saturation, Sharpness, Effects (Grayscale, Sephia, Negative, Solarize, Posterize, and Aqua). Many other settings include changing the White Balance, ISO, Encoding Type, Recording Length, Metering Mode, and more.

Pictures are actually pretty decent. As with most cameras, shots are much better in daylight than low light. I love the detail in the below shot. The depth of field was good, the color is good, and the water droplets are very distinct. Not bad at all.

 

 

Here are more photos taken with the Incredible:

[flickr-gallery mode=”photoset” photoset=”72157624391681603″]

Video Capture

The video capture on the Incredible is pretty decent. It’s not HD, but does offer a bit better quality than most phones. The top resolution is WVGA (800 x 480), and it also offers VGA (640 x 480), CIF (352 x 288), and QVGA (320 x 240).

One nice feature is that the storage can be changed to save on the SD Card, this will save a lot of space on your phone and may keep the “Phone storage low on memory” error from occurring (see below under “Problems”). The below video was shot at 640 x 480.

 

Email & Syncing

Email on the HTC Incredible has a great interface. GMail, Exchange, and other IMAP, and POP accounts are easy to setup by Settings–>Accounts & Sync.  Like I said in the Droid X review, what I love so much about these devices is the flawless Google integration. It’s the same on the Incredible. You can star, delete, report as spam, etc. just like in the GMail browser client. The contacts and calendar have a great interface as well. Calendars are color coded so you can tell if an appt is on your default calendar, work calendar, etc. The contacts interface is called “People” on the Incredible. It can sync your contacts with your Facebook account and provide a way to see what they are up to in one window

Tethering

One very cool thing about this little unit the the ability to tether your phone to your laptop to be used as a modem without much hassle. You simply have to download the VZAccess Manager for your model to obtain the driver. Once that is done, connecting it easy. Of course be aware that you may be charged for excess usage via an additional plan subscription.

Battery

• Rechargeable Lithium-ion battery
• Capacity: 1300 mAh
• Talk time: Up to 313 minutes
• Standby time: Up to 146 hours
• (The above are subject to network and phone usage.)

The battery life on this phone is actually not too terrible. That’s not saying much since my main phone is an iPhone 3Gs which we know drains fast :). Perhaps the smaller size of the Incredible makes it suck less juice than the larger units… it can sit all day without use and still have a fairly high battery level. Of course using it affects the battery life. I have not done any real tests to see how long it has gone with heavy use, but I am convinced that it make it farther into the afternoon than my other phones. But, still keep the charger with you.

Problems

1. The Android OS seems to have an issue correctly dealing with storage. Newer phones have been maxed out on storage now including 8gb internal on some models, but still you may get an error of “Phone storage space is getting low”. Apparently this is because in version 2.1 and prior of Android, there is no way to force apps to install on the SD card without jumping through hoops, so they install to the internal phone memory which in this case is only 512MB RAM. The rumor is that this issue will be fixed in the next version of the OS. I can’t wait to see that problem go away. It really limits the amount of apps that can be installed. Luckily, I did find that changing the setting mentioned above in the camera can help by insuring that photos and videos are saved to the SD card.

2. Shiny back HTC letters were apparently not adhered very well. 2 of the 3 are gone already, of course this is not a big deal. You can still see that is says HTC, but the bling was a nice touch.

 

 

Pricing

The HTC Incredible is $199 from Verizon with a 2-year service plan. I am actually a bit shocked that the price of this was kept at $199 with the Droid X also coming out with $199. Yes, they are two different phones, but I would think that Incredible price should be a bit lower now, perhaps $149.  I see that they are back-ordered on Verizon’s site. One ordered now would be shipping by 8/3.

Voice plans start at $39.99. Unlimited data is $29.99.

Summary

In closing, the HTC Incredible is a great phone that I think will really shine when the next version of the Android OS (2.2) is released and fixes storage issues. It is a full featured phone that will not disappoint on what it can do. It packs a lot into a small package and it very easy to use.

Find this phone and many more Verizon cell phones on LetsTalk.com.

 

Disclosure: I was invited to review the HTC Droid Incredible for Verizon Wireless. I received service on a trial basis, and when the review is over I get to keep the device.