WHAT: DROID Incredible by HTC
PRICE: $200 w/ $100 Mail-In-Rebate from Verizon Wireless.
FUN FACT: HTC built the official Google phone, the Nexus One.
WHY COMPLEX IS CO-SIGNING: Until last year, if you were looking for a phone running Google's Android operating system, your options were pretty limited. There was only a handful of handsets offered from only two carriers: Sprint or T-Mobile. Well, now all that's changing. Handset makers have been churning out models that are full featured, fast and greatly designed. Google released their own phone, the Nexus One. AT&T and Verizon have started pushing their own models—one of them, the Motorola Droid, is one of the best smart phones on the market. Now, we've think we've come across what may be the best Android phone on the market: HTC's upcoming Verizon phone, the DROID Incredible.
DOPE!:
• Clean design. HTC went for a very minimalist, unassuming design. Unless the phone is in use, you would never notice the four touch buttons located beneath the screen, or even the optical joystick found beneath those. But it's far from boring. HTC added some red trim—similar to the Samsung Touch of Color TVs—in discrete places like the ear speaker and camera bezel. Pop the battery case, and you'll notice the entire undercarriage is a rich red.
• It's fast. Like the Google Nexus One, the Incredible uses the 1GHz Snapdragon processor which makes transitions seamless and makes programs open very quickly. There's no lag or wait time for an app to open.
• Good storage options. The Incredible comes with 8 GB of internal storage which should be plenty if you're not using it as your primary music or video player. But if you do need more space, they've included a microSD slot that supports cards with up to 32GB.
• Beautiful screen. The 480 x 800 AMOLED capacitive touchscreen is amazing. Some say the colors are too bright and too saturated, but we felt they looked, well, great. When we played videos on YouTube or ones we uploaded ourselves, they colors seemed to be accurately represented. Same went with photos.
• Responsive screen. Many early HTC phones suffered from having a horribly unresponsive screen. Those troubles seem to be all but resolved as we had no problem navigating with the touchscreen.
• It's about the same size as an iPhone: height, width and thickness.
• Amazingly featured camera and video camera. Besides the Sony Ericsson C905 camera we tested, the Incredible boasted some of the most robust camera options in any phone. From the menu there's six ISO settings, flicker settings, seven image effects; for video you can adjust the encoding type (MPEG 4 or H.263) and your resolution, which can go all the way to 800 x 480.
• Android 2.1 and HTC Sense. Using Android 2.1 and using an original build is like night and day. Paired with HTC's Sense UI, it's one of the best smart phone experiences on the market. Transitions have been made smoother, it's more responsive as a whole. Our favorite new feature of the UI is the Leap feature which lets you open up all the seven screens your apps and other programs are spread out across. Want to see all the windows, spread your fingers. Want to pick and app? Either tap it or pinch it. Pretty cool.
• Good battery life. Off of one charge we were able to go through the entire work day, and a night out. When we left the club at 2 am, it was on its last bar, but still rockin'. Pretty damn good.
• Loud and clear audio. And the speakerphone was actually that: a loud speakerphone.
NOT SO DOPE:
• We kept hitting the optical buttons at the button of the screen. Maybe we're just not used to it, but we kept pressing, or swiping, the back button accidentally.
• Using the screen in direct sunlight is a FAIL. You won't be able to see anything.
• A dedicated camera button would have been great
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