arock

So this topic came up in the root thread and i didnt want to take that thread way off topic so i started this one. If you disable sense and run home instead, does sense still load in the background when you restart your phone even if you have home set as the default?

Caddyman

I would say no. fwiw though, I wouldnt run regular home....to plain

JrzDroid

i 2nd that

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alexhendershott

I recently switched from Sense to regular Home. I got sick of Sense. Stock Android just feels snappier and less of a battery drain IMO. When root comes along, I'm really hoping for the stock Nexus One 2.1 ROM to work well on my Eris.

Current setup:

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MOS95B

What widgets are on your home page?

alexhendershott

The clock at the top is "Digital Clock Widget".

Digital Clock Widget v1.7.6 Application for Android | Tools

Weather is "Weather from Yr/Widget" by Thomware.

Weather from Yr / Widgets v9 Application for Android | News & Weather

jkmasi

Very nice!

This is probably an easy question, but is "regular Home" an application? Or just stock android?

soulfetcher13

Hey Alexander, that volume control bar, what is that

alexhendershott

Regular home is still an application, I believe. It's the GUI that lets you manipulate everything. The only other way to have your phone be usable would be through a shell or terminal.

HTC Sense, Openhome, dxTop, etc are all home replacement applications that sit on top of the existing framework.

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, that's just my basic gist. I'm sure someone else can provide a more technical explanation.

The volume control is AudioManager Widget.

AudioManager Widget v1.0.6 Application for Android | Multimedia

jreed2560

I too have personally made the switch from Sense to home. I "seem" to get a lot less lag especially with messages. I don't miss the sense widgets at all. I use sms unread count, gmail unread count, beautiful widgets. The only thing i would like to have is the HTC calendar widget. I've come to appreciate the minimalist look of the stock android.

alexhendershott

Ditto, and I also miss the HTC calendar widget. Although I highly recommend the very customizable calendar widget I have on my 3rd screen. Theres even an HTC skin that I am using right now.

Pure Calendar Widget:

Pure Calendar widget (agenda) v1.7.1 Application for Android | Productivity

pkopalek

I think Sense UI, with its 7 home screens, sweet integrated widgets, and (slightly better) ease of use is what makes this phone comparable, UI-wise, to the iPhone.

Sense UI is part of what I'm proud of when I'm showing off my phone.

Home is great too. Android is a great OS. But 3 home screens are the same as 7. And you have to hunt for all the widgets you want. Most people find what they want. But 7 screens gives you lots of real estate to put all of those widgets. Most of your apps have to either be in folders or using Application Manager or just under the button at the bottom of the screen.

Most of my useful apps are right on my 7 home screens, so that anyone I can toss my phone to can play with it (without understanding Android).

Home requires you to understand Android a little bit. Which is great for me. But I've converted 7 people to the HTC Eris/HTC Hero already (depending on their carrier). Sense UI is part of what makes that possible. It's a little slower, yes. Laggy, yes.

But sleek and smooth looking. Yes and yes.

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ChiTownJim

I just made the switch to home, I miss the widgets now but I'm trying to find some replacements , I just haven't had time to play with it. But it's much much faster then with Sense UI, and I had a bad lag weekend so this morning i switched to Home, I'm gonna try to get it customized the way I want... But one I can root it, slightly overclock it, get rid of some of the stock apps and realocate the memory I'll definetly be going back to Sense I just really really like it.

ChiTownJim

Another thing is when I kill all apps with home I have anywhere between 95-105m available with sense I was only getting about 70 .

pkopalek

That's a great point, Sense is definitely a RAM hog.

But the OS will kill processes once your available memory gets too low anyway.

A Task Killer will let you see that, reasonably. I haven't thought of the RAM cost difference.

+1 for Home

smacky

It's the best thing I've ever done for my phone. Got rid of task killers, lag, and other craptastic issues. If HTC gets off their asses and fixes the keyboard lag issues and whatnot, then this phone becomes more manageable. With 2.1 and, hopefully, its optimizations, the phone will be a lot less frustrating than it was with Sense.

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jkmasi

If I disable Sense and then want to go back to it later, will all of my apps and other customizations be there? Or will I have to start over?

jreed2560

Yes. It should go right back to the way u had it.

jkmasi

It's a little scary... but I kind-of want to try it!

jreed2560

nothing to be scared about. Ur not going to brick your phone turning sense off. Your not uninstalling anything either. If you want to be completely sure, save your scene and you'll have nothing to worry about.

ps. If you have htc widgets on ur home screens they will not work with the stock home. This doesn't mean they are gone, just not available.

Frisco

I've done that several times.. back and forth with no loss of any configurations in "scenes" or other areas at all.

I still end up using Sense, even though I like the idea of having the choice just in case I begin to see a real reason. Right now Sense does not seem to slow my Eris down or drain he battery at all.

jreed2560

Not stating this as "hard evidence" but I did notice that with my Eris running stock android and my wife's IQ Eris running Sense, that opening up the same applications took longer on hers by an average of .25 to .5 seconds. (neither running a task killer btw)

NPH-

how can i make the switch to home???

also, if i switch to home and realize that i want to switch back to sense, can i do this or not???

jreed2560

menu>settings>applications>manage applications
scroll down to sense and select it then select clear defaults
hit the home key and a pop up will appear. check the box to do this action by default and then select home. Repeat this process (only swap home and sense) to go back to sense.

NPH-

thx jreed!

alright everyone... im gonna make the switch and see how I like it

if this will reduce lag on my end I am all for it

smacky

It'll speed everything but the keyboard lag up. It isn't a question of whether it speeds up the phone or not as much as it's whether you want Sense or not. It seems with Home, it is a bit faster, but not a world of a difference, but I'm sick of Sense as well. In my case, it was a double-whammy. I may long for Sense in the future, and it's only a few menus away, but right now I'm busy pretending I own a raw Android phone, not something with sugar sprinkled on it.

hallstevenson

I turned Sense off today and located a lot of replacement widgets. Looking for on/off widgets for GPS, WiFi, and so on. What are the ones shown above?

As for speed, if it's faster, it's barely faster than Sense, IMO.

bberryhill0

I like Quick Settings better than widgets. Android Agenda Widget for calendar.

* If you don't check use as default when you pick Home or Sense you get to pick which one you want to use every time you hit the home key.

Last edited by bberryhill0; 02-08-2010 at 10:55 PM.

ssick92

I seem to have alot better speeds once I switched to Home.

bberryhill0

I like the Sense People widget.

smacky

I have a sick feeling Home vs. Sense is gonna turn into the task killer debate where everyone thinks their phone has it right. Please don't.

ssick92

Just create a folder, then put shortcuts to peoples contact cards in it. It is like the same effect plus you can have more than 9 people.

bberryhill0

It's the Facebook integration part that I like. Great tip. Thanks.

Last edited by bberryhill0; 02-09-2010 at 12:45 AM.

jreed2560

I think as long as we keep newsradio outta here we'll be fine.

@hallstevenson the toggle widgets are beautiful widgets. They work great. the only thing I don't like is that there isn't one for mobile network.

jeffyo

I tried going back to orig. like I had with my G1 and I didn't think it made much difference in speed or functionality. I really like sense, so I go back to it and love it just as much as the first time I saw it. It's the best Custom android OS out there. 7 screens, nuff said.

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Last edited by jeffyo; 02-09-2010 at 03:15 AM.

Frisco

A debate on that could erupt, I agree.

I still thank you for showing that tip. I think that after toying with it in both modes for a while I've come to the conclusion that it'll be useful to me in Home mode when I'm traveling and on my phone a lot making calls, texting more and the emails flowing in at a more steady pace than on non-traveling days.

It is good to have those choices. We don't have to necessarily pick one and make a religion about how THAT mode is the best for everybody all the time.

snorge

I bought Ahome it seems to be a lot faster than Sense, about the same as the default android home gui but with a lot more options and some okay widgets.

smacky

I actually found one, although it is a different style than my wifi toggle and it looks out of place. But I found one. Just poke around androidlib, searching random phrases for mobile or data toggle and you should find some.

I'm, of course, talking about free ones. You can always buy icon sets and whatnot.

pkopalek

+2

The Sense widgets are too good and hard to replace

7 home screens is amazing for getting what you want on your phone easy access

Scenes allow it to go even further. Home is home. One home. Three screens.

Sense UI is way prettier. I just wish we had 1ghz.

mhrebin

just a quick question. I switched to home since I am a simple kinda guy and don't really bother with widgets too often but I know some people on here have tons of widgets with sense on and whatnot. Do these widgets affect your battery life? I would imagine the widgets like facebook, weather, twitter would update constantly? What about the calendar widget and bookmarks widget? Those were two I had on my screens that I liked.

hallstevenson

Please change your .sig then.

mersh21

Is it actually proven that home will give you better battery life? You are all intriging me with this home thing. The main reason i bought this phone was because of sense but i'm still not thrilled with my battery life and the occasional lag. Other than that i love this phone and i love sense.

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hallstevenson

I doubt there's any proof for any of the claims made. You can't realistically judge battery life without using the phone the exact same way and for the exact same amount of time.

Same with speed... You can't stopwatch most actions. Or someone says their browser opens instantly. Mine does with or without Sense.

DannyJd

I really think that if you want to save your battery life, don't use the phone. Then it really lasts for days!

In all seriousness, I turned off Sense, there isn't much that I miss. I have beautiful home and widgets, android agenda (to replace HTC Calendar), Toggle Switch Widget, and it works for me. I do miss the Peep widget for twitter, but other than that, I am able to fit everything on 3 screens. For me, there is no noticeable difference on battery life, I'd like to believe there is less lag (not that there was much before), but it could be my imagination.

mersh21

Well thanks for all your opinions. I think i'm gonna stick with sense just for the shear fact of that's one of the reasons i got this phone. Thanks guys.

hallstevenson

Anyone looking for a calender replacement similar to the HTC widget, try Smooth Calender.

For toggle widgets, look at OneClick Widget from "WeDroid". It includes GPS, WiFi, Brightness, Airplane mode, and more.

CycloneFever

Smooth Calendar is nice. Wish it came in 4x2 though.

pkopalek

I use CalWidget. Very simple but a LOT of information.

Very good for looking at appointments, or like me, where I can look at the schedule of my entire team (as we use Google Calendar) for the days/weeks/month ahead on one widget.

I highly recommend. Customizable transparency, any size, any color. No font/font size customization, but that might come eventually.

I like it better than the Sense calendar.

smacky

Yeah, no one's saying this does or does not increase or decrease battery life in general; it's just how it affects them. My phone lasted longer yesterday than it ever has. I like Home and I'm gonna continue to use it. But like someone else mentioned, the reason they bought this phone was for Sense, so he's gonna keep it.

CycloneFever

This is what I am using now in lieu of Smooth Calendar.