48 hours with the HTC Touch

I’ve been using the HTC Touch for just over 48 hours now and I’m sold on it.

I put my primary SIM in the handset on Friday afternoon and didn’t look back. I forced myself to use it.

As I’ve previously blogged, there was no let-up for the handset. I use my primary SIM very, very regularly. Calls and texts were flying in. I was making all sorts of demands on my calendar, email and contacts.

I only just discovered how the ‘Touch’ features work at the weekend because I was so busy doing low level phone-call operations with the handset for the first 24 hours.

It is absolutely gorgeous. It’s beautiful. It’s a real feat of design. HTC have given a substantial amount of thought to the implementation.

The default styling is gorgeous and easy on the eye.

I really like the home screen’s weather application. Simple but wickedly implemented:

The Touch is very much geared to finger tapping. Touch on the home icon and you’re shown the system clock in a very funky digital display. Tap the other button and you’re presented with some preset and configurable shortcuts.

Here’s the Comm Manager screen which is linked from the shortcuts:

Previously, managing all this on Windows Mobile was a total bitch. Switching on WiFi with the Touch is now a piece of simplicity. Turning the ringer to vibrate… well, it’s just a touch 😉

The best bit — the HTC Touch party piece — is the fancy navigation. It is very similar to the Apple iPhone’s much touted finger controls. I’m going to take a video of that working later. It really is show-off gold.

Now, to ponce-value: The HTC Touch is quite probably (in a positive sense) one of the most poncy handsets available at the moment. So I get on very well with it. 😉

I have been seeing how people react to it. Surprise, generally. Surprise that it’s a Windows Mobile handset. Surprise that it actually looks good. Surprise that you can navigate around the menus without apologising to people for the wait.
Surprise that it actually works when I put the phone to my ear and engage in a conversation.

I tell you what’s really pleasing about the handset: It’s small, it’s good looking and it does everything I need in one device:

– Phone
– Texting
– Camera (2 megapixel)
– Real time access to my exchange mail

For the first time ever, I’ve been able to go out in the evening ‘with everything’. I haven’t had to make a choice between the E61i or the N95 — I just left them at home. The E61i is a lovely handset but it’s just too big to be arsing around with when you’re going out for dinner.

Can the HTC Touch manage with my business lifestyle day to day? Yes.

I rely heavily on email however. So whilst the Touch is a perfect all-rounder — I do actually have to do a lot of replying on-the-go, ergo the lack of physical keyboard is a slight issue for me. The on-screen keyboard is perfectly fine though.

I really could use this as my primary day-to-day handset, I reckon. I would buy this phone. I might actually go and buy one (it’s under 300 quid at Handtec’s store).

Battery has been excellent too.

A final point on Windows Mobile: The HTC Touch is using Windows Mobile 6.0 which appears vastly improved over the versions I’ve been exposed to. Far less of a wind-up.

I’m going to keep using the handset for the next week or so to really give it a work-out. Then I plan to ask Ben Harvey, our resident normob (“normal mobile user”) to try it out for a week. If you’ve any questions about the device, just ask.

Update: Also, check out Cyclist’s HTC Touch review.