Hello: First time poster.

[Boilerbuzz]

I decided to join the forum since most of my google searches about my new EVO leads me here. I have a couple of questions. Go easy on me if it's all been cover ad-nauseam on the forum as I'm still getting a feel.

1. Is there an "out of the box" unified inbox for the HTC EVO or Hero? I've seen couple of threads hijacked by people that don't understand what that is or don't feel the need to have it. But regardless, I want it. I think it's a great feature added to the iPhone and I'd love to have it on my EVO. Is K9 the way to go?

2. I would like to backup my apps to my PC or Mac. What's the best solution for that? Since I'm coming from the iPhone, I have all of my music in iTunes. I found doubleTwist does a good job of syncing my music from the Mac. If anyone knows of a better alternative that also does video (better), that would be great. But my biggest worry is having to reset my phones and having to get ALL of my apps again. Is there a consensus on the best app backup? This can be Windows.

3. I've heard that Froyo will work for the EVO. Will it work for the Hero as well? I know - this is the EVO board, but someone may have some insight to this.

4. Does anyone have any tips to get the most out of the camera? It's "8 MPixels", but that doesn't mean much of the image capture quality is junk. You're just left with 8 MP of... Well... Junk.

Thanks for the time guys. I'm looking forward to learning more about my new phone and the platform. I'll admit that I would still be on the iPhone if AT&T didn't continue to remind me that they suck and I think the Android platform may have some catching up to do in terms of polish. But as I learn more about the Android, I'm starting to not miss the iPhone at all.

 

[horadin]

I decided to join the forum since most of my google searches about my new EVO leads me here. I have a couple of questions. Go easy on me if it's all been cover ad-nauseam on the forum as I'm still getting a feel.

1. Is there an "out of the box" unified inbox for the HTC EVO or Hero? I've seen couple of threads hijacked by people that don't understand what that is or don't feel the need to have it. But regardless, I want it. I think it's a great feature added to the iPhone and I'd love to have it on my EVO. Is K9 the way to go?

2. I would like to backup my apps to my PC or Mac. What's the best solution for that? Since I'm coming from the iPhone, I have all of my music in iTunes. I found doubleTwist does a good job of syncing my music from the Mac. If anyone knows of a better alternative that also does video (better), that would be great. But my biggest worry is having to reset my phones and having to get ALL of my apps again. Is there a consensus on the best app backup? This can be Windows.

3. I've heard that Froyo will work for the EVO. Will it work for the Hero as well? I know - this is the EVO board, but someone may have some insight to this.

4. Does anyone have any tips to get the most out of the camera? It's "8 MPixels", but that doesn't mean much of the image capture quality is junk. You're just left with 8 MP of... Well... Junk.

Thanks for the time guys. I'm looking forward to learning more about my new phone and the platform. I'll admit that I would still be on the iPhone if AT&T didn't continue to remind me that they suck and I think the Android platform may have some catching up to do in terms of polish. But as I learn more about the Android, I'm starting to not miss the iPhone at all.

Welcome to the forum! First thing, use paragraphs, they were invented for a reason

1. I am not sure, but I don't think so. I have not used K9 because I am happy how the Evo handles my multiple accounts as it is.

2. Double twist will sync nicely with your videos and music I believe. As far as apps and backing them up I think appbrain (AppBrain - the best Android apps and games on the Android market) might help you out. Not sure though.

3. Don't know. I just hope Froyo comes out for the Evo soon!!!

4. It seems that most people are setting the ISO to 200 or 400 manually and getting some decent results. Mine have been mixed but it really depends on the lighting. The best thing here is to play with it some and find what works best for you. Every condition is going to require something different and user results will vary. I have had some decent results with the camera thus far though.

You won't regret switching to Android and Sprint has been a great network for me for the 3 years I have been with them.

 

[cabbie]

easy answer to the app question is to download Astro File Manager

open it, hit menu->tools->app manager

Then select your apps and hit the 'backup' button which will save them to your sd card, safely away from the phone. Then you can mount the phone as a disk drive and simply copy the .apk (the install files for apps) to your hard drive.

welcome to your new obsession

 

[Boilerbuzz]

Welcome to the forum! First thing, use paragraphs, they were invented for a reason

I swear. I did use them. I don't know why my formatting got hosed. And thanks for the quick replies. It's a start.

EDIT: No script on Firefox got me. It's all good now.

 

[colburnr]

BoilerBuzz...are you a Boilermaker????

 

[EarlyMon]

1. Is there an "out of the box" unified inbox for the HTC EVO or Hero? I've seen couple of threads hijacked by people that don't understand what that is or don't feel the need to have it. But regardless, I want it. I think it's a great feature added to the iPhone and I'd love to have it on my EVO. Is K9 the way to go?

The built-in mail client handles Exchange, POP and IMAP protocols. If your email comes from a known domain, such as GMail or MobileMe (or even a grandfathered .mac account), it just knows and sets up with only your email address and password - nothing complicated.

Secure POP is fully supported.

You can set individual sigs for each account and set whether you want incoming notifications for each one.

Account switching is very easy, just tap the account name at the top of whatever folder you're in and you get a selection dialog.

Push is not supported beyond Exchange, you have to set a polling frequency - and that has settings for what you consider prime time and off hours.

It doesn't present as HTML mail, but it doesn't tend to screw up flows either. When receiving HTML email with images, there's a separate option at the top of the message to download HTML images (shades of early ThunderBird).

If you're going Android, you're going to want a GMail account, it's certainly seems required to access the Android Market. The minute you go there, a separate GMail-only client will automagically set itself up. It's the Google way. You can go there and tell it to sit down and shut up and integrate your GMail with your Mail, or you can leave that as an Android cul-de-sac.

Feature for feature the built-in mail aligns quite closely with K-9.

The entire Android system is modular, so the beauty of it is you can try either and settle on the one for you. The built-in shouldn't be in any way more tightly coupled than K-9. (I can't guarantee that 100%, I'm not big on using every feature for social networking that HTC thought up. I'll just guarantee it a whole lot, how's that?)

2. I would like to backup my apps to my PC or Mac. What's the best solution for that? Since I'm coming from the iPhone, I have all of my music in iTunes. I found doubleTwist does a good job of syncing my music from the Mac. If anyone knows of a better alternative that also does video (better), that would be great. But my biggest worry is having to reset my phones and having to get ALL of my apps again. Is there a consensus on the best app backup? This can be Windows.

Welcome to the Android Forums. When you find consensus on anything, alert the media.

I haven't used doubletwist, I have nothing against it, but you do have an option:

How to sync the HTC EVO 4G with iTunes - Know Your Cell

You can download the software they talk about from that page, and they take you to the right places for either Win or Mac computers.

Free. And pretty simple.

I'm not 100% clear on the whole app backup question. If you decide to root your Android, then you'll want to use Titanium Backup - it copies everything imaginable to your SD card in gzipped tar format, one per app. I'm pretty, pretty sure that there's also an app that inventories your apps and will go and restore them from the market automagically. So long as the app isn't withdrawn, that's a pretty good backup. (probably by the time I post this, somebuddy's already called it out)

With 2.1, apps are stored inside, user data (well, most all of it) is stored on SD card.

Backing up the SD card is a piece of cake.

The phone charger is a little dongle that plugs into 120 and has a USB port on it. Comes with a USB to micro-USB cable. You can plug that into your Win or Mac and just drag and drop the whole thing over.

There are hidden folders there, so you'll want to be mindful of that if you want a complete backup. (forget the LOST+FOUND folder, yes, ok?)

With a Mac, Bluetooth File Exchange seems to work like a champ for the SD card, too.

As you may have read, with 2.2, apps can be stored to the SD card.

3. I've heard that Froyo will work for the EVO. Will it work for the Hero as well? I know - this is the EVO board, but someone may have some insight to this.

Works or ready for prime time?

HTC has announced that they'll be supporting both the Evo and the Hero with a 2.2 release.

Get it sooner by rooting if you prefer.

Google for Flash CPU requirements where the Hero's concerned, if you're serious about that and rooting for Froyo.

4. Does anyone have any tips to get the most out of the camera? It's "8 MPixels", but that doesn't mean much of the image capture quality is junk. You're just left with 8 MP of... Well... Junk.

Start here and go through a few of my posts on that:

http://androidforums.com/htc-evo-4g/105894-evo-camera-blind-test-2.html#post995185

There are a few threads floating around Evo camera wonderfulness, but few with settings and advice, mostly fanning and flaming, oh well. That's one of the video threads, I think it's pretty good, and we have some still photo info talks in there.

PS - Get the Evo.

 

[Boilerbuzz]

BoilerBuzz...are you a Boilermaker????

Yes sir. And a Yellow Jacket. Purdue undergrad, Tech grad.

 

[IPvFletch]

Yes sir. And a Yellow Jacket. Purdue undergrad, Tech grad.

Purdue - CPT (Knoy hall) - TNT major - class of 2000 here!

 

[Boilerbuzz]

Just to follow up on the greatly appreciated replies, I like the built in mail client enough. It's just missing a couple of key features that are useful for me and how I use my device:

1. Unified Inbox. Some people take this to assume that all of your mail is dumped in one Inbox. This is not the case. It just removes the need to switch between accounts. It's basically just a 'search all mail in all inboxes for each account and put the result here'. It's not a true Inbox. Therefore, when you interact with each message, the client behaves as if you are currently in the appropriate account. It's great way to get a quick glance of all of your new emails from every account. The built in client doesn't have that as far as I know.

2. The handling of HTML is huge honestly. Most of my email involves links and media. Also, in the reading pain, IIRC, I couldn't even copy a sent link from the HTC client.

3. Threaded view. So far, the threading logic has been mostly miss. Trying to sort my mail by conversation/subject has yielded unreliable results from both the HTC client and the Gmail client.

So, maybe I'm missing something. I've only had the phone for a few days. Feel more than willing to correct me.

 

[Boilerbuzz]

Purdue - CPT (Knoy hall) - TNT major - class of 2000 here!

Awesome! Class of '92 Aeronautical Eng ( Grissom aka Gruesome Hall - haven't seen the Neil Armstrong Center yet. ) I took only a couple of classes in Knoy and at the time, it was one of the newer buildings. It was awesome. Then the MSEE building during my JR year... Ah, the good 'ole days. REALLY glad to know there's a fellow Boilermaker on the board. Boiler Up!

 

[EarlyMon]

Just to follow up on the greatly appreciated replies, I like the built in mail client enough. It's just missing a couple of key features that are useful for me and how I use my device:

1. Unified Inbox. Some people take this to assume that all of your mail is dumped in one Inbox. This is not the case. It just removes the need to switch between accounts. It's basically just a 'search all mail in all inboxes for each account and put the result here'. It's not a true Inbox. Therefore, when you interact with each message, the client behaves as if you are currently in the appropriate account. It's great way to get a quick glance of all of your new emails from every account. The built in client doesn't have that as far as I know.

Ah. Gotcha. Yeah, I have that on my desktop - use it exclusively. Never wanted it on my phone (still don't) so I didn't snap to the question.

Yeah. No. Not there.

2. The handling of HTML is huge honestly. Most of my email involves links and media. Also, in the reading pain, IIRC, I couldn't even copy a sent link from the HTC client.

Still to make a forward, then copy - I believe that's the same limitation as in K-9. (?)

Lack of HTML is not fun.

3. Threaded view. So far, the threading logic has been mostly miss. Trying to sort my mail by conversation/subject has yielded unreliable results from both the HTC client and the Gmail client.

Yep.

So, maybe I'm missing something. I've only had the phone for a few days. Feel more than willing to correct me.

Ain't gonna happen.

 

[colburnr]

Awesome! Class of '92 Aeronautical Eng ( Grissom aka Gruesome Hall - haven't seen the Neil Armstrong Center yet. ) I took only a couple of classes in Knoy and at the time, it was one of the newer buildings. It was awesome. Then the MSEE building during my JR year... Ah, the good 'ole days. REALLY glad to know there's a fellow Boilermaker on the board. Boiler Up!

Class of '01, Forestry and Natural Resources here. Boilerbuzz, your a "knucklehead" as well aren't you????

Boiler Up!!!!!!!

 

[Boilerbuzz]

Class of '01, Forestry and Natural Resources here. Boilerbuzz, your a "knucklehead" as well aren't you????

Boiler Up!!!!!!!

Knucklehead Central in the house!!

 

[pipli]

Thanks for info.
__________________

 

[EarlyMon]

Welcome to the forums!

 

[Flash77]

Welcome to the Fourms!!!!! Congrats on your new Evo!

 

[Flash77]

I meant Forums.........LOL!!!