Mobility Today Podcast #132

I really enjoyed the podcast. I am probably a minority, but I really enjoy the form factor of my Tilt. The Touch Pro with a cooked ROM sounds sweet, but I think I would miss the ability to tilt the screen too much. Also, for the money what am I really getting my Tilt doesn't already have with it's cooked ROM? I have TF2D which has breathed new life into the device. The only real upgrades I see is an accelerometer and increased resolution. Maybe I'll get the Xperia X1 once my Tilt dies for good if it ever gets subsidized by someone. My dream would be a Touch HD with slide out Qwerty and a tilting screen, but figure the odds of that. Again, enjoyed the podcast, it's one of the highlights of my week.

There does seem to be a lot going on with Windows Mobile right now. But as per usual Microsoft's promoting of Windows Mobile seems to target developers instead of consumers.

In the past two months they have announced three Windows CE/Mobile related competitions and they also started the "24 hours of Windows Mobile" webcast series (basically 24 webcast of no less than an hour where they discuss some development topic on Windows Mobile followed by Q&A).

Thanks for clarifying Chris. I'm still drooling over the Touch HD and would likely get one to replace the iPhone even if it had some UI/media player shortcomings.

Physboy - I've been an Egress user since version 2, and I own 2 licenses for it. I really like what he's done with that app, and the integration with Newsgator is great!

Sooby we definitely have show topics prior to us starting. I am glad it comes across as if we dont (not easy to do!)... Either way maybe I can twitter what we will be talking about prior.

I have always enjoyed the mobilitytoday podcasts, especially now with video streaming (that might be going away since Yahoo Live is shutting down). It's like a couple of geek hours where I can hang with my buddies from afar. A quick suggestion: perhaps some kind of main talking points can be posted or determined before the podcast? I think the free format is good, but some kind of direction is always an improvement. Even just a few of bullet points is a good start. Then, let it just free flow.

I happen to agree with Bonnie Cha, for $800.00 asking price they should have made the thing usable on both GSM based 3G networks. Not just AT&Ts. Give me a break, do they really think they are going to go head to head against iPhone? No stylus, recessed screen. C'mon dude, big miss.

I would love to get my hands on the HD. I use TouchPal for my soft keyboard and find it superior to my experience with the iPhone keyboard. There is no covering of the letters as you type since they come up above the finger when you press down. You can slide around to choose another letter if the wrong one shows up since the input of the characters does not happen until your finger lifts off of the screen. In addition, the customizability of the keyboard is where it really accels and blows away the iPhone keyboard. You have numerous layouts to access for different needs, all by simply sliding your keyboard to the right or left as desired. There are emoticons for messaging, pre-fab internet prefixes and suffixes. It is just amazing, and the predictive text is excellent as well.

As far as applications go, I love using the new touch oriented Egress 4.1.1 software for my RSS reader, which handles enclosures like a dream, allows me to email article links or open the full article to a browser of my choosing in a jiff.

I do concede that a Zune oriented syncing scenario would blow the multi-media out of the water for MS. However, I am good with the file sync process to sync my mp3s currently and the music player from HTC is quite nice as well.

The only thing that I see lacking in the MS platform at this point is the gamming software capacity for use with the accelerometers that are comming in the newer devices. That development almost appears stunted. I am not a big portable gamer though, so to that end I am not concerned with that issue.

GPS in HD also blows away GPS in iPhone.

I would see no reason to switch to the iPhone at this point or any other IMHO.

The Storm does have my attention for now though, and I am curious to find out more about it.

Really enjoyed this weeks podcast, a couple of points, I had zero problems with the sensitivity of the Touch HD screen, it is the most sensitive of any Winmo phone I have used, my problem was with the stock HTC keyboard. Using a full QWERTY when you select a key it highlights the key but you cannot see it as your finger covers the highlighted area so you don't get any visual confirmation that you have selected the correct key. If you look at the iPhone keyboard when you press a character it jumps above your finger tip and you immediately see you have the right one.

To compound the problem the auto correct feature is poor again compared with the iPhone's. Some people hate that but for me it is amazing how well that works. To get around the problem I used the latest SPB Keyboard 4.0 which works exactly how the iPhone keyboard does visually.

As a phone the Touch HD is excellent but as a phone and integrated media player it just does not compare to the iPhone for me, also applications, I dont use many but the iPhone is so easy to use in comaprison and visually superior I cannot justify making the switch and paying Ł500.00 for this device.

Until the next software update (6.5 or 7)at least I am sticking to the iPhone as it's limitations do not bother me anywhere near as much as the UI of Windows Mobile 6.1