| HTC Touch DUAL |
| Friday, 16 November 2007 13:04 | ||||||||
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Review by Dmitriy Ryabinin (smape.com) The Microsoft company has went through a good deal of preliminary inquiry to get to know what the ideal balance of ergonomics is. The conclusion looked exactly like a 3.5" QVGA (320x240) display which found a wide implementation in many of their PDAs based off the Windows Mobile software platform. Over the course of time pureblood PDAs got to lose their market importance, so most manufacturers switched their priorities to PDA phones. One of the most important development tasks was to minimize the device dimensions. The first module to suffer was the screen. It squeezed from the usual PDA dimensions down to 2,8" or sometimes even 2,6" or 2,4". Some of the manufacturers were quick enough to make a real hype out of their VGA-standard matrices which let the PDA screens become smaller. This, quite expectedly, shattered the ergonomics concept developed by Microsoft. Aggravated by the awkwardness of the Windows Mobile interface, this misbalance is exactly the thing that keeps the WM OS lagging behind Symbian-based solutions. The HTC company, the absolute leader of this market sector, doesn't seem to be proud of their marketing achievements at all (unlike others, e.g. E-TEN) which mean little to nothing when there are more close-to-life and way more serious issues to solve. Without setting up much ado, the company have developed their brand new customization system to sort out some of the hackneyed Windows Mobile OS issues, following the trend started by Samsung (just think of the latest F700). The foundation was laid by the appearance of the Touch series, now HTC presents their new Touch Dual device (also known as Nike). The new device sports a lot of software improvements, but is mainly focused on the old and well-known goal - minimizing the use of stylus to the limit in frequently used applications, quite a contrary to what E-TEN and the rest of VGA-preachers are trying to shape as the world PDA phone design standard.   Sporting a full-surface soft-touch coating, the Touch PDA phone has a feel similar to the PEBL U6 folder phone by Motorola, which proved a complete failure in spite of the several interesting solutions like the Hinge passive servo-motor. What reasons lie behind this gap between the success and the failure of the two if both share in common a lot of design elements? The explanation is quite simple - the Motorola company already had a range of stylish folders based on the RAZR platform imbued with a powerful ¡¥image charge' and securely backed up by the slim build by the time PEBL U6 was released, which just drained the new solution's popularity because the customers already were more than satisfied with the existing products. HTC didn't have anything resembling Touch before the actual Touch series was launched, neither there was anything similar on the market offered by other manufacturers. The P3550 model was just a spinoff from the popular P3300, and Samsung i710 didn't even pose a decent challenge because of the lack of features, except probably for the powerful camera... yet powerful in its respective class only, though. This let Touch to occupy a totally unique niche among the rest of offerings based off the WM OS. Its slim build only further contributed to its success. The principal difference between Nike and its predecessors consists in the form factor solution - it's a regular (and not a side-slide) slider with a numeric keypad based at the same time on a QWERTY layout. This solution has never been previously implemented neither by HTC nor by any other company. Sadly enough some drawbacks took place as well - for instance, the lack of Wi-Fi and a price higher than the original Touch. This step was taken purposely in order to preserve the original model's popularity. The Touch model joins P3400 and P3300 on the podium as the three best selling PDA phones by the brand. Let's have a quick investigation on the market potential of Touch Dual... The primary goal of HTC consisted in backing up a successful solution by supplying it with a range of highly functional and versatile features as well as designing a few variants of the handset differing in design. This tasks seems to have been successfully completed. The handset design differs depending on the country. For instance, the Japanese version comes with a regular numeric keyboard similar to most types of phones. Some of the countries will receive shipments of a particular version of the device that supports Wi-Fi. Quite surprisingly, The hardware part of the gadget is closer to that of TyTN II rather than of Touch. Here come the same chipset, the same RAM and ROM specifications and so forth... In the image and likeness of Trinity, Touch II includes a GPS module, however it's not going to be activated unlike what we saw with the precursor model, most likely due to some other solutions expected to expand the Touch series in an alternate direction.   Design and Ergonomics Touch Dual shares a striking likeness with its predecessor - while folded, it looks exactly like a typical WM-based PDA phone with a touchscreen and a controls panel below, keeping the trademark Touch style. Save for a thicker and narrower body, the looks of the two models practically coincide. No wonder that Touch holds a reputation of a highly popular product along with Samsung i710, both occupying top lines on the sales chart in their class. The developers keep to the well-trodden path of their earlier bestsellers, save for a few reservations.     {mosgoogle left}The back panel now has to be opened in another direction, - namely up and not sidewise like with Touch. This approach doesn't look ideal, because the joint point isn't clearly visible, however the idea sounds and works better in comparison with the predecessor. A new implementation of the memory expansion slot is a serious step forward, it keeps with the highest of standards allowing the long-expected hot swapping support. It's simply wonderful that the HTC guys were smart enough to notice the awkwardness of the side piece hosting expansion and SIM card slots in the earlier Touch model and fixed that in Touch Dual. The display grew smaller, which is a disputable solution considering HTC's orientation towards stylusless data input. Another exterior difference is the ExtUSB slot that migrated to the left edge of the body. The original Touch model had it on the bottom edge which was way more convenient, especially when you had the phone inside the case - the new solution doesn't allow plugging in headset in such a situation due to the unusual slot location. The power button blocks the keypad just like it used to, which is rather convenient. Talking in advance, we'd also like to note that Touch Dual sports a louder speaker than the one that Touch has; headset sound output produces lower quality sound while Bluetooth offers better sound quality. While unfolded, Touch Dual looks like a vertical slider, but there's one peculiar thing about the keypad - its type varies depending on the country. The standard variant is a hybrid numerical keypad with QWERTY layout, the text input works exactly in the same way as with a casual cell phone - by pressing a numerical key for a few time until the desired letter appears or through T9. This is nearly as comfortable as SonyEricsson M600i and P1i (in spite of their full-blown QWERTY support the keys are two-position). We didn't find the idea much to our liking, for instance text input is a few times faster with a Nokia E61i.     The keyboard elements can't boast a smart design - the block of keys is framed by a thick glossy piece prone to scratching. Should it be gone, the keys would surely be larger and better segmented, which is something missing in Touch Dual. The keys give a solid feel upon stroking. The backlighting is rather dim and uneven - the left side of the panel is brighter. Some of the applications (for instance, the music player) supports extended control with numerical keys. The Touch Dual device offer the user a unique software solution for data input - the trademark virtual keyboard, being an alternative to the regular keyboard. Unlike the standard Windows Mobile keyboard, it supports stylusless text input - as long as you have at least one finger, you'll be fine with it. It's not a critical point though, provided that the device comes both with a stylus and a normal keyboaed as well. The solution could have look much more reasonable as a part of the original Touch device.   A significant improvement over touch is the heavily updated TouchFLO. Now the system behaves in a much more correct way, even an inexperienced user can easily handle the 3D HTC interface - unlike the earlier models that could confuse the novice. A number of software additions took place, we'll dwell upon it in a more detailed way in the following part of the article. There's the temptation to compare the device to iPhone, but there's still the huge difference in the concept, design and dimensions, Touch Dual being much smaller. The handset fits the hand even more comfortably than the original Touch did due to a narrower body. The slider mechanism has a smooth and pleasant feel. Let's compare the exterior design of the new device to that of its predecessor HTC Touch:       Let's dwell in detail upon the arrangement of control elements. The upper part hosts the power button and the ¡¥ear' used to fasten the wrist band, and the stylus holder as well. The latter is a bit short just like with Touch - unfortunately this hasn't been fixed.     The finger support for opening the back cover is located in the lower part of the device's body . The soft-reset socket is found underneath, which looks quite unusual. A hung or glitching Dual Touch can't be reset without having to remove the cover, but you don't have to remove the battery in this case. Anyways, it's rather an unpractical solution.   The camera button is located on the left edge of the handset's body, the right edge hosts the sound volume swing button (the original Touch had a slide button instead), the interface slot and the memory expansion slot. The SIM card slot (unlike the predecessor) is hidden under the battery cover, but that doesn't pose any real trouble since you have to turn the phone off anyway. On the whole The controls are rather scarce, additional elements like a scrolling wheel would be more than welcome, looking back at the controls of Touch Dual. Sales Package HTC Touch Dual comes with a bundling typical to most PDA phones, there are no nice extras like a memory card (unlike the abundant set of accessories that came with the original Touch and in fact had a memory card included). The decision, however, was taken under the pressure of retailers who complained of a decline in demand for independently sold memory expansion modules. The sales package also includes a USB/HTC ExtUSB data cable, a wire stereo headset (suited to fit the ExtUSB standatd), a battery, a software disk, a printed manual and a case to carry the phone in. Communications As it was mentioned earlier, Touch Dual is the closest alternative to TyTN II, so the communication part of the both has virtually the same functionality, save for the disabled GPS and missing Wi-Fi in the case of the former. The device is designed to be used in GSM 850/900/1800/1900 and UMTS 850/1900/2100 networks, it supports GPRS and EDGE, as well as HSDPA and HSUPA. Wire communication is achieved through USB2.0 that makes use of the exclusively designed ExtUSB slot (analogous to the common microUSB). The data transfer speed raises no objections. There's no support for the Mass Storage and PictPridge modes. The wireless communication of Touch Slide is represented by the Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR (Enhanced Data Rate) module. Both work quite well and give raise to no reprimands. AD2P enjoys a perfect support - the sound is of high quality and rather loud, the communication is almost never interrupted. It's a pity though that should the connection be lost, the sound doesn't stop automatically, the built-in speaker is instantly activated. Besides of it, the following profiles are supported: Document printing is also possible. There's also the Bluetooth synchronization, you just need to: . Install the Windows Mobile Media Control Centre or ActiveSync software to your PC. . Then do - Start > Programs > ActiveSync . Activate Bluetooth both on the PC and the PDA, than engage the visible mode. . On the PDA side, run - Menu > Connection - Bluetooth. . On the first run, start the Bluetooth Configuration Wizard. The software part is remarkable for the new management application including lots of small improvements like the instant ON/OFF indicator. The functionality is still on the same level, though. Memory Touch Dual has a total of 256 Mb of hard disk storage and some 128 Mb of RAM at its disposal. That's quite sufficient for basic functionality but not more than that. Unfortunately no memory card comes bundled, so it has to be purchased separately. The memory card slot is the standard microSD one, the most universal variant for the time being. You can use memory cards up to the capacity of 4 Gb. SD 2.0 is fully supported. Display The screen is powered by the TFT technology, its diagonal is 2,6" and the resolution is 320x240 quite in accordance with the QVGA standard. The color depth is 65K colors, a solution typical of Window Mobile (however the screen diagonal could have been a bit larger, even the good old Touch had some 2,8" of it). The image quality is high, yet the maximum brightness is not as high as one might want. The image dearnerss is better in comparison with the original Touch, since the screen grew smaller and the resolution stayed the same. Touch Dual also sports a better color rendering, and the view angles are much better.   The screen info stays quite legible in the sunlight, however the sun-resistance is not ideal:
Unlike the TyTN II model, Touch Dual enjoys a full-fledged TouchFLO support, including a 3D interface - almost the same with Touch, but boosted with a number of minor improvements and addition. The virtual controls block looks like a prism that can be rotated by moving the finger sideways, each of its facets acting as customizable quick call shortcuts - up to 9 frequently called contacts can be associated with them. The same facets can be used to host shortcuts to multimedia folders and PIM functions. It's hard to say how actually convenient this weird thingie is, but it goes without saying it does look cool. This function has undergone a noticeable amount of changes towards a better ergonomics. Additional functions like quick activation of the status line were added, - with a single slight move of the finger you can call up the status line. The Start menu can be made larger so it would take more screen space and, accordingly, be easier to operate with finger strokes. Contact book filtering has been improved by adding an alphabetical list to the right side of the screen. The upper line is used for displaying service indicators like the battery life meter or signal quality, the clock and the telecom protocols availability, Bluetooth visibility, GPRS/EDGE availability in the area, a 3G list of launched application. The lower line contains info about context button functions. The main part of the desktop can be varied to your liking. By default it shows current day, the service provider info, the owner personal data, messaging stats, the tasklist and schedule, and the indicator area (battery charge, display angle, wireles module manager and backlighting level). The user can customize the order in which these fields follow or remove some of them from the screen completely. Today Desktop can feature a custom picture or a photo. The extended functionality of HTC Home comes in handy. That's the brand Today screen which offers short stats. It shows the time and three sections showing new messages and missed calls, favorite contacts, weather, launcher and ringtone settings. The lower part hosts the instrument panel which allows for switching between the two components. Let's have a look at each function separately: Main menu The tab shows current day of the week, the date and local time. When you recieve messages or calls, the tab also shows the number of unread e-mails, SMS/MMS messages or missed calls. If the reminders are set, a warning symbol is also displayed here. Weather tab. This tab shows info about the current weather (through the AccuWeather sevice) and the weather forecast for the four next days. When you use this function for the first time, you have to choose the city of residense, then the phone will automatically establish an internet connection and downloads the necessary data. The weather info includes current temperature, the extremums and a weather icon (cloudy or rainy, etc.) Launcher The tab allows adding shortucts to favorite applications and set acess with a single touch. By default it contains shortcuts for comms manager, programs list, brightness adjustment, screen rotation, device blocking and ActiveSync. However everything on this tab is fully customizable. Audio The tab servers for audio profiles management and displays the selected ringtone. As we see it, the Home module is surely a winning function for the phone itself and its designers, the HTC company. The weather forecast is probably the biggest advantage offered here. You can get a detailed weather forecast with a single tap of stylus. In earlier models this function was only available through 3rd party software. Another nice feature of HTC Touch is a better support for text scrolling - you can just move you finger along the screen to do this, tapping the scrollbars with the stylus is no longer obligatory. This could be critical to people who often use public transport. Another addition to the functionality of Touch Dual is the Task Manager, displaying a list of running applications that allows to switch between them quickly or shut any running task. Unfortunately this is only available in the Home screen. There are two kinds of menus in this phone: the quick access menu and the main menu. The former is activated on pressing the Start button and essentially is a vertical list that contains 7 items, info about the 5 recently launched applications as well as grants access to the main menu and settings. The main menu is a list of applications very much similar to a regular Windows-styled window with icons and application names below them. A maximum of 12 icons per screen is allowed. Upon opening the slider, the screen displays a dialogue box offering a few possible options: It might seem a handy feature at the beginning, but over the course of time it really begins getting on your nerves, bringing up the menu every time you open the slider to check time. Moreover, there's no option to disable this. The window interface has also been changed - the elements got rearranged and mixed with a bunch of nice effects, contributing to the overall style. Now the interface looks more logical, but the functionality is almost the same (besides the above-mentioned feature of the contacts book)
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