Ok fella's, the Desire is a fantastic phone, probably the best on the market at time of writing, a truly desirable device!
This guide will be split up into the different logical segments of the phone, offering hints, tips and general know-how to ensure you get the most out of your new phone.
As always please either message me here, Rachid (le3ky) on Twitter or leave a comment at the source if you have a tip to add or wish to clarify something I have written here.
Android is a multitasking operating system. It is very smart at self-managing its memory and applications. You may hear talk of using a task killer, or another memory management tool, but this is NOT necesarry. Android will manage this task itself. You may have the question "How do I close this app?". With android this question does not need to be asked as android will take care of it in the background.
Turn off WiFi and GPS if you are not using them. They can cause the battery to drain much quicker than if you turned them off. Toggling between these settings is easy via the default HTC widgets.
To add a new photo album, just mount the phone via USB to a PC, create a new folder and give it a name. Add your pictures to this folder. Now browse to the “Albums” in your phone and it will automatically create an album with the folder name you specified containing the pictures you added.
Calibrate your keyboard!!! You will find using the keyboard waaay better. Do this via:
Settings > Language and Keyboard > Touch Input > Text Input > Calibration Tool
There are 3 types of keyboard available for the Desire built in “full QWERTY”, “Phone keypad” and Compact QWERTY”. Give them a try, one may suit you better. To change do the following:
Settings > Language and Keyboard > Touch Input > Keyboard Type
A Class 6 micro sd card is preffered.
If you have both WiFi and data connections turned on, your phone will default to using the WiFi connection as long as you are connected to a WiFi network. So no need to turn mobile data off using home WiFi.
just something to add while iv been working with android from day 1, and work with it everyday, if you are setting up email account(s) and the screen gets stuck on "trying to locate google server" and after 5 mins it fails, there is only one way this can be fixed, and you have to factory reset, because when you get the phone brand new, its supposed to be made that you set up your accounts there and then, but some people dont, then realise they cant access the market, then create a gmail account, and cant get any further, this is the reason. i hope this helps people out.
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Dont use a live theme
Use a dark wallpaper
Turn off wi-fi & bluetooth when not in use
Stop friendstream, facebook & peep updating every 5mins. Set mine to manual.
Set email app to manual
Set screen brightness to auto or 40% (lower if you can put up with it).
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Running applications tip:
Press and hold the home button. You will see the six last active applications for you to easily switch back to. Can be handy if you have to go through to another home screen just to go back to what you were doing before.
Last edited by Ten10; April 8th, 2010 at 05:16 PM.
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Added:
Quote:
Long press on the search key to bring up the search by voice command. Say "Call <name>" to automatically call the person called that name in your address book
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lekky you mention the ability to add your own mp3's to the alerts notifications
but when i attach my Desire to my pc it just shows as any other external drive
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Quote:
Originally Posted by eske
lekky you mention the ability to add your own mp3's to the alerts notifications
but when i attach my Desire to my pc it just shows as any other external drive
Quick question relating to the Navigation, well, 2 actually.
I can't find the 'modified maps' to download, so downloaded from the above link. I then placed this on to the SD card. First question, have I done this right?
Next question, after downloadong & installing astro, I can browse to new folder called mapsbrut on the SD card, but can't open the app manager. I presume this is because I don't seem to have the apk file it talks about?
Sorry for the dumb questions, but I'm new to Android & am struggling with it some what still.
Hang on, found the answer to that I think...
Windows seems to rename the file as .zip file. Remaned the .zip to .apk & it seems to have installed it.
I'll let you know how it goes..... need to download a text to speech or something now.......
EDIT
Now working. Thank you very much.
Last edited by lekky; April 18th, 2010 at 12:35 PM.
Reason: merged posts
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Newth
Hi Lekky, thanks for the tips.
Quick question relating to the Navigation, well, 2 actually.
I can't find the 'modified maps' to download, so downloaded from the above link. I then placed this on to the SD card. First question, have I done this right?
Next question, after downloadong & installing astro, I can browse to new folder called mapsbrut on the SD card, but can't open the app manager. I presume this is because I don't seem to have the apk file it talks about?
Sorry for the dumb questions, but I'm new to Android & am struggling with it some what still.
Hang on, found the answer to that I think...
Windows seems to rename the file as .zip file. Remaned the .zip to .apk & it seems to have installed it.
I'll let you know how it goes..... need to download a text to speech or something now.......
EDIT
Now working. Thank you very much.
I guess you are using internet explorer? It does this, and adds one more reason as to why I hate it. Use a real browser like Chrome or Firefox!!!
If a contact has more than one phone number, you can change which one of them should act as the primary phone number by holding down your finger on the one you'd like to set as the primary one.
If the facebook link button isn't available:
If there is no facebook link button in the upper right corner of your friends contact info, then you need to import all your contacts from your SIM card into your phone. The facebook link functionality is not available for SIM card contacts.
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Finally, a way for me to add my Tron light cycle start up mp3 as my notification. I almost cried when I found there wasn't an option in the Desire settings for custom notification sounds.
Thanks lekky.
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This gives you a simple bar with 5 buttons that allow you to toggle on or off your Wireless / Bluetooth / GPS / Synch / Brightness - Brightness one has 3 settings that you achieve by simply pressing the button - DIM (Great at night for me) / Medium / Bright - Love it.
Regards
Ken................
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This gives you a simple bar with 5 buttons that allow you to toggle on or off your Wireless / Bluetooth / GPS / Synch / Brightness - Brightness one has 3 settings that you achieve by simply pressing the button - DIM (Great at night for me) / Medium / Bright - Love it.
Regards
Ken................
Without a doubt the best program I have found for stuff like this is tasker
When I plug my phone into car charger bluetooth is turned on and when I take it off car charger bluetooth is turn off. Also screen is on full brightness and no screen sleep when on car charger. I need this otherwise when I'm in a customer's house and phone rings, calls still would go through to car bluetooth speaker.
When I reach my home my WIFI is turned on automatically (it's based around cell phone location rather than GPS).
It's seems very versatile, is free at the moment (although I would be more than happy to pay).
It's the one program that has made my very early days from winmo to Android seem like a step in the right direction.
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It may be worth adding to your initial post that on an Orange branded handset it shows the legend '3G+' when connected to HSPA, not the H - I assume purely to tie it in with the way Orange refer to it in all their literature etc.
If someone can tell me how to take a screenshot I'd gladly oblige if you feel it's needed, although it is pretty self explanatory!
Please can you tell me where I can find this Power Control Widget
Thanks
Its on your phone already - Just hit + at the bottom right of any of your screens and then choose widget and then scroll down to Power Control (Android).
Regards
Ken................
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Quote:
Originally Posted by miasma
It may be worth adding to your initial post that on an Orange branded handset it shows the legend '3G+' when connected to HSPA, not the H - I assume purely to tie it in with the way Orange refer to it in all their literature etc.
If someone can tell me how to take a screenshot I'd gladly oblige if you feel it's needed, although it is pretty self explanatory!
Really? They didn't do this on the Hero. Why do they insist on doing these things!!
Hi, do you know how to switch 2G/3G manually on desire?
I found a problem that my desire use 2G even when I am on the 3G coverage area, in which cause my internet connection to be slow.. It sometimes switch to 3G automatically and then often back to use 2G again.
Hi, do you know how to switch 2G/3G manually on desire?
I found a problem that my desire use 2G even when I am on the 3G coverage area, in which cause my internet connection to be slow.. It sometimes switch to 3G automatically and then often back to use 2G again.
Hi all
Just joined up, as I recently bought a Desire, my first Android phone.
Anyway, two applications relating to extending battery life that I've found to be very useful:
1) JuiceDefender (+ UltimateJuice)
This allows you to control when 3G/Wifi is turned on, based on rules such as:
- schedule (eg 3 mins every 15 mins, 5 mins every hour, etc etc)
- night-time window (turn off 3g/wifi during a time period of your choice)
- battery - turn disable 3g/wifi if battery below a certain %age
- traffic - leave 3g/wifi enabled if data traffic is above a certain rate (eg during a download)
- charger connection - you can turn on 3g/wifi automatically if charger is connected
- screen on - turn on 3g/wifi whenever screen is on (ie you're using the phone)
- location - disable wifi if you're not near a known wifi network
- timeout - turn off screen after a period of inactivity, lock phone after further period
Also includes a 1x1 widget that estimates how much your current settings will extend your battery life by (mine currently reckons by 3.7x).
All works really well, has extended my battery life considerably.
Some of the options require you to pay a small amount for UltimateJuice, which you download after the free JuiceDefender. It's only roughly £2 (€3 / $4) and IMO well worth the money.
2) JuicePlotter
A free app from the same company as JuiceDefender.
It plots your battery life over time, and annotates the graph with different colours to show when 3g, wifi, screen etc was active - so you can see what's causing your battery usage and when. Also monitors battery temperature.
I find it really really useful, helps to work out your best settings for JuiceDefender. I've found wifi is the biggest killer by a long way (until I got it under control with JuiceDefender!).
Also includes a 1x1 widget that estimates your remaining battery life (along with %age accuracy indication).
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one more question about desire, wonder if anybody knows the answer.
This morning when I was trying to download an application via market, I got a message that said that my phone memory is getting low. Is it means that everytime I install applications, it always install in phone memory?
How can I configure so that I can install it in my micro sd card?
Because I want to keep many applications, and usually good game/applications required a lot of space.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by pelawaks
one more question about desire, wonder if anybody knows the answer.
This morning when I was trying to download an application via market, I got a message that said that my phone memory is getting low. Is it means that everytime I install applications, it always install in phone memory?
How can I configure so that I can install it in my micro sd card?
Because I want to keep many applications, and usually good game/applications required a lot of space.
You can only make it store apps to sdcard by rooting your phone, otherwise it only installs to phone mmeory.
Are the contacts in the phone as google contacts? That's what made it work when I was on the Orange ROM (now rooted and debranded). It DOES work on Orange though, provided your contacts are google contacts.
Also, try 'dial <person's name>' that should work too!
It makes sense that voice dialing only works when the contacts are stored as Google contacts. I had considered starting to use voice dialing, but won't be storing my contacts as Google contacts until Google gets around to replacing the "name" field with "first name" and "surname" fields like Yahoo! and Hotmail do.
HTC Desire Tips & Tricks [READ ME]
