Sprint Unveils HTC Evo 4G Super Phone 284
adeelarshad82 writes "Sprint dropped a bombshell on the CTIA Wireless trade show by unveiling the most powerful Google Android smartphone ever seen in the USA, the WiMAX-powered Evo 4G. The phone runs Android 2.1 on a 1-GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon QSD8650 chipset along with a helpful 1GB of built-in memory and 512MB of RAM, which is assisted by a MicroSD slot supporting up to 32GB cards. It swaps between EVDO Rev. A, WiMAX and Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g on demand. The phone is dominated by a 4.3-inch, 800-by-480 65,000-color TFT LCD capacitive touch screen. There's an 8-megapixel camera on the back and a 1.3-megapixel unit on the front. The camera also records 720p, high-def video, which it can play through an HDMI out jack on the bottom. The Evo 4G weighs 170g and measures 120.5 mm by 67 mm by 13 mm. It's expected to hit the market in the summer."
Voice? (Score:3, Interesting)
"It swaps between EVDO Rev. A, WiMAX and Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g on demand"
Does this apply to calls as well as data? If so it is even more awesome than I originally thought.
Battery life? (Score:4, Interesting)
Game Changer! (Score:4, Interesting)
to put it simply, it's a game changer for Sprint.
Two very important points missing: (Score:4, Interesting)
2. What is the price.
I'm slightly concerned that this will be like those Japanese or European phones that have a huge laundry list of features, but skimp out on basic usability and essentials like good radio paths and battery life; plus half of the features don't work properly (camera has a lot of pixels, but a worthless lens; screen is dim or difficult to read; interface requires 15 button presses to do anything; front camera can't be used for teleconferencing because the carrier disabled that feature, etc...). There's a definite concern that this will be priced at the "enthusiast" level as well, meaning almost nobody can afford it or the plan required to drive it.
The ball is in your court Sprint. What are you going to do with it?
The *best* feature: (Score:4, Interesting)
FTA:
"It works as a Wi-Fi hotspot, supporting up to 8 devices;"
Wow! That's insane, considering that laptop wireless sharing is only now just becoming mainstream.
How many people will buy this phone, and ditch dsl, cable, etc? Smaller than any dsl or cable box, uses less power too I'd bet.
Re:It's a TELEPHONE (Score:2, Interesting)
Front Camera nice (Score:3, Interesting)
It is nice to see phones that are adding front cameras. Asian phones have had this for years allowing for video chatting with the handset.
Re:HDMI jack? (Score:4, Interesting)
Along with the fact that if you can download at over 8Mb/s (I've seen 4G sprint wimax equipment do that) then why the heck not watch hulu on your big tv, using your phone...
Re:HDMI jack? (Score:4, Interesting)
Along with the fact that if you can download at over 8Mb/s (I've seen 4G sprint wimax equipment do that) then why the heck not watch hulu on your big tv, using your phone...
During the demo at the announcement yesterday, they used it as a Roku box. Crazy times we live in. I just wish the thing was shipping NOW. *sigh* 'summer'? Lame.
Re:Voice? (Score:3, Interesting)
"It swaps between EVDO Rev. A, WiMAX and Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g on demand"
Does this apply to calls as well as data? If so it is even more awesome than I originally thought.
Well, android 2.1 and on (maybe earlier too?) does have the built-in capability to make calls with google voice, which would then be able to use the data connection.
I've got my Nexus One to use google voice only for voicemail and international calls. With the voicemail, it records the message, transcribes the voice to text, and can text or email you the text, or you can use the free google voice app to both see the text, click any phone numbers as links, and listen to the message a-la Visual Voicemail (by just clicking play, rather than having to dial voicemail).
The fact that it transcribes messages to text, and the fact that its all built-in to the OS (something like Settings>Call Settings> Voicemail) literally blew my mind.
Android is seriously getting amazing.
-Taylor
Re:can you install more than 5 apps to it? (Score:3, Interesting)
I think you're making excuses for an engineering problem.
Odd, I could say the same thing about your comment.
You seem emotionally invested in this discussion. Your comment doesn't even make any sense. I didn't make excuses for any engineering flaw in anything because I was not defending any engineering, just pointing out a well known problem.
So enforcing uniform standards is a bad thing?
This is a straw man argument.
Every OS and it's dog has a recommended way of doing things which always scatters things across the file system.
That is the case with legacy OS's and versions of some OS's but it is not good engineering. OS X, for example, stores entire apps in a single, special folder. The only thing outside that folder are shared frameworks and config files (which are cascading and needed for upgrading and remote applications. One of the hardest parts of using SE Linux is that Linux application in general don't have a simple location all the time, so allowing them to modify their own files but not anything else can take significant expertise.
What Google has done in this case is introduce a limitation that exacerbates that problem even more.
Linux and OSX have similar systems.
You clearly aren't familiar with OS X and some Linux variants that have been more recently engineered to have more sane practices.
Applications as single bundles have many advantages including simplicity for the sake of security.
This I think is where you misunderstood me. You can distribute as a single package but what you should be doing is creating a proper install for Android rather then just dumping it wherever (I.E. putting your large art assets into /SDCard/YourGame).
Applications should be distributed as single bundles and stored as single bundles. This makes it much much easier to transfer applications, run applications remotely, install and uninstall applications cleanly, upgrade applications cleanly, restrict applications for security purposes, and backup applications. Android not only did not provide a cleaner and more compact installation that the average Linux distro, but actually made the install messier with limitations on where apps can be run from, resulting in applications being spread out more. Now you can have applications fail to run if either of two storage types fails.
It's a flaw and Google knows it's a flaw and people are working on fixing the flaw. I don't see how anyone can rationally conclude otherwise.