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A few questions

Thefoodman52

Android Expert
Dec 1, 2009
2,311
329
Okay, as you look at me, you'll realize that I don't own a Hero, which clarifies my asking these questions.

For one, does this phone have any radio lockout issues like our does? Quite frankly, I'm becoming quite agitated with having to pull the battery out of my phone two our three, or even as bad as up to nine times a day. This goes hand in hand with random phone lockups and restarts.

Does this phone have any hardware issues, aside from the crap under the screen, which seems to be an issue with most HTC phones. Things like hardware buttons dieing out, trackball ceasing to function, or likewise.

Lag issues, by this I mean things like rotation delay, time to open things, and the various other CPU and program related things.

The phone's functionality while on speaker phone. My Moment, while on speaker phone, sucks. It sucks pretty hard. I almost have to shout into directly into the microphone for people to hear me. It's not quite blatant screaming, but when it is on speaker phone, I get people looking at me like I've got a problem, mainly because I'n shouting into my phone with it less than an inch from my mouth with the other person constantly saying, "What??".

Well, I'm posting while going through town, so I'll come back to edit my post later with my gripes and questions.
 
Radio lockout issues? Not that I know of. A reboot tends to fix any little issues that pop up with the Hero, and rebooting every few days will also keep lag down big time on the Hero (stock).

The only hardware issues is the paint on the end/call keys peeling, everything else seems to be great.

Very little lag. I mean, it's a second to rotate, but that's programmed in I believe, and with rooting you can really speed things up. Stock, the Hero does lag a bit, but the 2.1 update is rumored to remove virtually all lag on the phone. The dialer (actually dialing a number, not selecting a contact) was the biggest lag, but I very rarely use the dialer, and select contacts most of the time.

Speaker phone is very receptive. I know the microphone is very good at picking up on sound.

My mom has a Moment, and I've got a Hero. I've read through both forums, and do nearly every day. There's no doubt that the Moment is the better phone on paper, but with the dev community that's with the Hero, it's a whole different ballgame. Not to mention HTC actually puts a little effort into supporting the Hero and fixing the bugs in a timely matter, Samsung doesn't seem to do such a great job. However, if you're looking for a new phone, seems like you'd wait a bit and get the Evo. Guess it all depends on your personal preference though, and how long you can wait :p
 
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Hardware issues- not that I have heard of. There is a few reports of a little dust creepin under the screen though. I had my last one only a month, and just got a new one so I can't talk on long term, but have searched myself. From what I've read many people who have had theres since launch haven't experienced hardware issues. I might add though that I have seen reports of the coating covering the end button as well as the phone button wearing off. But have seen people that removing them entirely and have red and green buttons. Looks pretty cool :D

Lag issues - landscape rotation is pretty quick. Takes a moment, but not laggy. Navigating is quick for the most part. You will notice some jumpiness (if I can call that a word) when multitasking. The keyboard in landscape can be a bit laggy too, but not absolutely horrible. I have run some 2.1 roms on my phone that have sped the phone up a lot too (not sure if its simply cause all the bloatware has been removed, or if 2.1 will simply be more efficient.

Speaker phone works good on the phone. I use it quite often. The speaker is nice and has clear crisp sound. I can speak into it in a normal voice and my recipients have no problems hearing me.

This is the first time I've heard someone speak of "radio lockout". Never experienced it on the hero. Never had to pull the battery cause it was required either. Occasionally I'll pull it out for a hard reset just to start the phone off fresh. Overall, I'm happy with the Hero. Its been reliable for me since I've gotten it. The on screen keyboard is better, IMO, then stock android too. Cause remember, its got sense :D

Of course some of these answers are opinionated, and will vary depending on who responds (and what kinda phone they have :D) but if you have anymore specific questions feel free to ask :D
 
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Does Sprint/HTC have a fix for the dust under the screen issue? I mean, if you start seeing some, can one take the phone in to a Sprint repair site for resolution? I think I saw someone mention they'll remove the glass and clean it, but is there a retrofit gasket fix or something to keep it from happening again? I have a Hero on the way.
 
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Here's another; youtube. Just read the youtube thread, does everyone have that issue? I got no gripe about that on my Moment.

Ooooh here's a good one as well; how much different is the screen quality of the Hero to the Moment? I, love this screen, except in direct sunlight.

At the keyboard, I use the Swype beta, do that's a nonexistent issue.
 
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Does Sprint/HTC have a fix for the dust under the screen issue? I mean, if you start seeing some, can one take the phone in to a Sprint repair site for resolution? I think I saw someone mention they'll remove the glass and clean it, but is there a retrofit gasket fix or something to keep it from happening again? I have a Hero on the way.

some sprint stores do.. some don't. HTC knows of this issue tho. I have spoken with some tech homies. apparently there is a perm fix, but not all sprint stores know. haha



Sent from my HERO200 using Tapatalk
 
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Here's another; youtube. Just read the youtube thread, does everyone have that issue? I got no gripe about that on my Moment.

Ooooh here's a good one as well; how much different is the screen quality of the Hero to the Moment? I, love this screen, except in direct sunlight.

At the keyboard, I use the Swype beta, do that's a nonexistent issue.

no amoled. but same resolution, and has multi touch. obv that's more software related but rumor has it 2.1 won't even bring this to the moment in full.. screen is good in sunlight with auto backlight.
and what youtube issue. Sent from my HERO200 using Tapatalk
 
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Here's another question: how many times a day on average do you have to restart your phone to fix some problem(s)?

As is, I have to do it about 4 times daily on average. It's annoying.


Something else to ask, and seeing as this phone has no slide out keyboard, it seems fairly important. How laggy is the keyboard?
 
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Here's another question: how many times a day on average do you have to restart your phone to fix some problem(s)?

As is, I have to do it about 4 times daily on average. It's annoying.


Something else to ask, and seeing as this phone has no slide out keyboard, it seems fairly important. How laggy is the keyboard?

only time i have to rstart my phone is after flashing a new ad on or rom ......stock the keyboard does lag a lil but if you keep your caches clear and reboot every other day (if need when noticing lag) the lag stays away
 
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So overall, as of right now, you guys feel the Hero is a little bit better than the Moment?


-edit-
For now, I'm putting off looking at getting a Hero. The issues of the Moment make me borderline hate it, making me want the Hero. I'll wait to see if 2.1 comes out first, then if it does, see if it fixes the predominant issues with this phone making it unusable several times a day.
 
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Here's another question: how many times a day on average do you have to restart your phone to fix some problem(s)?

As is, I have to do it about 4 times daily on average. It's annoying.


Something else to ask, and seeing as this phone has no slide out keyboard, it seems fairly important. How laggy is the keyboard?

Restarting your phone 4 times a day?? Wow. That would be a deal-breaker for me. I have restarted my phone a total of 2 times since owning it.

The keyboard is not laggy at all. Whether you like virt or hardware keyboard is a personal preference. It took me about a week to get used to the virt keyboard... I had a Treo prior to my Hero and was not used to virt keyboards. Now that I got the hang of the Hero keyboard, i like it because without the hardware keyboard the phone is sleek. :)
 
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Yea, 4 times a day for me at this point is on a good day. It's all beecause of the radio lock-ups which piss me off extensively.

As far as say... trading off with someone here in town that has a Hero, in exchange for my Moment, how would that go down? If I were to go forth with that, could I put insurance on it? By insurance I mean the plan thing Sprint has where if you eff up the phone, you can get a new one for $100, and any problems not self-imposed constitute a new/refurb free of charge.


I'm seriously tempted to do this... but I just love the Moment. I like the phone itself; the hardware is great, the software glitches are shit though.
 
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So overall, as of right now, you guys feel the Hero is a little bit better than the Moment

-edit-
For now, I'm putting off looking at getting a Hero. The issues of the Moment make me borderline hate it, making me want the Hero. I'll wait to see if 2.1 comes out first, then if it does, see if it fixes the predominant issues with this phone making it unusable several times a day.

I have a custom ROM 2.1 on my hero
All I can say is it is so fast
Total different Phone
 
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Here's another question, do you guys have problems with WiFi? With our Moments, we can do every thing except for download off the market with WiFi on. Kind of annoying...

not a single problem here. I use wifi exclusively while at home due to poor service, and have downloaded probably 90% of my apps on wifi. I think people have had a few issues with some of the security on wifi, but I could be (and probably am) mistaken.

I wasn't aware that the moment couldn't download on wifi...but then again, my Mom doesn't use the thing for apps all that much.
 
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There's no doubt that the Moment is the better phone on paper,

Actually I believe there is some doubt about this. I had the Moment for almost a month before I took it back to Best Buy and got the Hero. The moment has an 800 mhz cpu, but it is an older model cpu and from what I have read it is only slightly faster than the hero's. However, my time spent with both phones has shown me that the hero is in no way slower at all and is actually faster than my moment ever was. The screen on the moment looked very nice inside and not a lot of light. However the brighter it is around you the worse the screen looked. It also was no where near as responsive as the hero with touch input. I got very used to always using the real keyboard because no matter which virtual keyboard I used it never was very accurate. The hero is very accurate, I can even use the qwerty in portrait which was something I could never so on the moment because no matter how far over I tapped a p would be an o and an l would be a k and so on.

I also experienced data lockups numerous times a day. I had to reboot at least 10 times a day with the moment, especially when tethering. I have only rebooted my hero twice now, both times because I was testing out task killers to see what I did wrong. Turns out that killing "mail" while on a scene that has the mail widget causes sense to restart. Silly me, anyway....

I wanted to love the Moment, but the only thing I ended up loving about it was Android. With my Hero, I am now more satisfied than I have ever been with a phone. I will probably end up skipping the Evo and N1 when they come to sprint since my Hero, stock, is as much as I need. I haven't even had to root it yet, and I know eventually I will and that will give me even more time before I need an upgrade. By then, who knows what will be out.
 
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Here's ANOTHER question. While on a phone call, how does the screen turn off? I looked at a Hero, and noticed a lack of proximity sensors.

It turns off after a set amount of time. Same timer that turns the screen off after any inactivity.

Most people don't seem to have any issues with hitting buttons during a call. I've only pulled the notification screen down a couple of times while on a call. Annoying, sure...but certainly not a big problem. The pain in the ass part is hitting the end call button to turn the screen on after it shuts off(I think you can hit the menu button as well). Hitting the end call button during a call if the screen is off does not end the call, just turns the screen on. Hitting it twice while the screen is off ends the call, or you can hit it once and hit "end call" on the screen. A bit counterintuitive, but it does work very well once you get used to it
 
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It turns off after a set amount of time. Same timer that turns the screen off after any inactivity.

Most people don't seem to have any issues with hitting buttons during a call. I've only pulled the notification screen down a couple of times while on a call. Annoying, sure...but certainly not a big problem. The pain in the ass part is hitting the end call button to turn the screen on after it shuts off(I think you can hit the menu button as well). Hitting the end call button during a call if the screen is off does not end the call, just turns the screen on. Hitting it twice while the screen is off ends the call, or you can hit it once and hit "end call" on the screen. A bit counterintuitive, but it does work very well once you get used to it

I use the back button, which turns on the screen, then can use the end call button on the screen. I have made a habit of always using the back button anyway, so this is intuitive.
 
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