HTC Evo: Two Days In

Jun 6 2010, 1:14pm CDT | by Robert Evans

I bought my Evo on launch day and have been using it pretty heavily all weekend. Here's what I've found;

The Battery: Sucks. I thought the Nexus One was power-hungry, but the Evo takes battery inefficiency to new heights of ridiculous. With some discipline and power optimization, I expect the Evo could survive a full day the office with heavy texting / moderate browsing. But just barely.

That said, the Evo's battery life isn't as bad as reviewers make it out to sound. On a practical level, it means you'll probably need to charge once a day or once every other day, depending on your usage. Keep 4G, WiFi & GPS turned off until needed. The 1 GHz processor makes enabling any one of these things take just a second or two.

The Screen: Is the best I have ever had the pleasure of using (tied with the HD2). The larger display makes the on-screen keyboard much more enjoyable to use than it is on smaller Android phones. The Evo's large screen provides one of the most pleasant long-term browsing/reading experiences I've had on a smartphone.

The Power: The Evo is a mighty phone, with 512 MB of RAM and the famed 1 GHz Snapdragon processor driving it forward. Apps launch instantly (or near to it) and multi-tasking is just as much of a breeze with the Evo as it is with the Nexus One.

Design: There is no right answer here. The Evo is either huge and cumbersome or solid-feeling and comfortable, depending on the size of your hands. I have huge mits, and the Evo fits well in my monster hands. I'd recommend going to a Sprint store in person and fondling one for a while before you decide.

4G: Sprint's 4G network is a revolution. Pages just load. After two years of wading through T-Mobile's often-laggy network, 4G is mind-blowing. Yesterday I turned on the Hotspot feature and had a friend hook into the WiFi with me. We browsed, chatted and streamed YouTube videos for several hours with little appreciable lag.

Should I Buy One? That depends on what you want out of a phone. If you travel a great deal and want a great wireless hotspot that doubles as a pretty great phone, the Evo is your best solution. If you work a desk job and just want something you can browse/chat/game with and not be seen by your network admin, the Evo is also probably your best choice.

But if you work 8-10 hour shifts at a retail / food service type place that keeps you on your feet constantly with little-to-no chances to charge up, you're better off going for a more practical device.

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Robert Evans
The excitement about new smartphones, tablets and anything mobile drive Robert to unearth the latest rumors and developments in this fast moving space. He adopted 4G as soon as it become available and knows where the mobile market is going.
Robert can be contacted directly at robert@i4u.com.