January 24, 2010 6:49 AM
I heard that the HTC Droid Eris
was available for $9.99 on Amazon.com, so I figured that it would be a cheap way to try out the device and see if I liked both Verizon’s service as well as the Android operating system. I’ve been using my Palm Pre
on the Sprint network for over 6 months, but some of my frustrations with the device really peaked my interest in all the new Android based phones. The HTC Droid Eris was my phone of choice over the Motorola Droid due to HTC’s Sense User Interface, so for the purpose of this review, I’ll be referencing that interface in my comparisons.
Physical look and feel:
My first impression of the HTC Eris is that it is a sexy phone. It is sleek looking and easy to hold. It has a nice sturdy feel due to its solid build and descent weight. The back is coated with a hard, yet soft feeling teflon and it has a glass screen. The glass screen isn’t as smooth as the new screens on the iPhone 3GS, but it finishes the device beautifully. There is no physical QWERTY keyboard, but the phone does have 4 touchscreen buttons (haptic feedback – the phone vibrates to acknowledge the touch), 2 physical buttons (one for answering calls/quick phone button, the other for power/hang-up), and a roller-ball/button (for navigation and selection).
The Palm Pre molds nicely into the hand, but it is made of plastic, lighter weight, and feels cheap compared to the Eris. There is a slide out QWERTY keyboard. After 6 months of use, my Pre has developed a slight gap and has loosened along the seam between the top and bottom pieces of the phone (forums call this the Oreo effect). This adds to the cheap feel of the phone. Besides the QWERTY, the Pre has only one other button, which is used for minimizing apps. The Pre has the gesture area that is used for many functions depending on the application.
Both phones have a 3.5mm headphone jack on the top of the phone. The Pre has a Micro-USB port on the right side of the phone, with cover. The Eris has a Mini-USB port on the bottom of the phone. Both phones have a volume rocker on the left side of the phone.
For this category, the Eris fully wins. It just looks and feels better. I personally like the physical QWERTY on the Pre, but I’m preparing myself for the inevitable end to physical QWERTYs on mobile devices (which I predict will happen by 2020).
Applications:
This is a brief section because Android clearly wins in this space. The Android Market has more selections with better applications than what is available on the Pre. As of this writing, the Pre has around 1,000 applications, while Android has over 16,000 applications. Application count isn’t everything though, but it shows which platform developers are more focused. Also, the quality of the applications on Android are better than on the Pre. The Facebook, Twitter, augmented reality, and other applications have more features/functions on the Android OS than on Palm’s WebOS.
As far as built-in applications, I do want to point out differences between the email, calendar, and contact applications.
Email:
The HTC Eris only allows for a single Gmail account to associated with the device. The Palm Pre allows multiple Gmail accounts. Also, the Palm Pre has the unified mailbox capability. This allows you to see all your emails in a single pane instead of having to switch from one account to another. This by itself isn’t very useful as a lot of people, including myself like to look at work separate from personal; however, this functionality allows for other features such as a unified view of Flagged emails. I use this function a lot as I use flags as my todo list. I can look at all my flagged emails, from all my email accounts in a single view, which is very useful. One thing I think is a bug with Android is that calendar invitations in Exchange sync don’t show the date/time in the email! The Pre does show the date/time. Both allow you to accept or deny the invitation from the email.
Calendar:
This comes down to personal preference, but I like the look and feel of the Palm Pre’s calendar application better than the Eris’s. Free time between appointments are collapsed on the Pre using an accordion like compression view. Also, because the Eris only allows one Gmail account, you can only see one Google calendar. The Palm Pre allows you to have more than one Gmail account so you can see more than one Google calendar.
Contacts:
The Palm Pre’s Synergy feature edges HTC out in this area. Synergy displays contact info from your phone, Facebook, Yahoo!, and LInkedIn into your contacts. If people have entered phone numbers into their Facebook or LInkedIn profiles, they will display on the Pre. This is very useful to me as it simplifies contact management. Let your contact manage their own data, and you receive the updates from them directly to your phone, without you needing to do any updates. I feel that this type of functionality will be a key default in the future, especially since I hate updating contact information, when you can update your info and I benefit from it.
HTCs contact application is a traditional application, but does have some bells and whistles. There is integration with Flickr and Facebook where you can see status and photo updates within your contact list. Also, you can sort through emails, phone call history, and SMS history for that contact within the application. If Android can add the ability to get the phone numbers from Facebook, Android would be a clear winner in this space.
User Interface:
This is an area where Palm clearly has put a lot of thought and edges a win over Android/HTC Eris. The Palm Pre has simplified usage to the least amount of movements to launch application, make phone calls, and switch applications. This is an important category to me because I believe that innovations in human/interface engineering are critical for consumer electronics moving forward. Every 1/10 of a second of time savings is a key differentiator in this space.
The HTC Eris requires a lot of touches to call someone. There are many ways to do this so in order to give the Eris a fair shot, I’ll highlight the fastest way I found this to work. I’ll discuss 2 methods, speed dial and phone book dialing.
HTC Eris – Speed Dial:
This assumes that on your main home screen, you’ve setup a shortcut to the number you’re dialing and that the Eris is in locked mode. First, hit the power button to bring the phone out of sleep, swipe down to unlock the phone, click the number to dial. If you happen to not be in an application, you’ll need to click the home button before clicking the number to dial.
Palm Pre – Speed Dial:
This assumes that you have programmed one of the QWERTY keys as a speed dial button. Slide the phone open, this both brings power and unlocks the phone, hold down the QWERTY key for the speed dial.
For speed dial, the Pre wins by a large margin. It takes almost a full second to speed dial on the Eris and 1/4 second on the Pre.
HTC Eris – Phone Book Dial:
Click power button to wake phone. Swipe down to unlock phone. Click the phone hard button to bring up the phone application. Enter the first initial, last initial using the number pad. Click Call.
Palm Pre – Phone Book Dial:
Slide open phone, which wakes and unlocks the phone. On QWERTY click first initial last initial. Tap result to call.
Again, the Pre wins by a large margin. On the Eris, you need to look at what letter corresponds to what number on the number pad, unless you want to use the QWERTY which adds another click to go from number pad to QWERTY. The Palm Pre is just faster and easier.
General Usage:
The rest of the UI comes down to preference. HTC’s Sense UI is very nice and has 5 screens to stick Android Widgets. The Palm Pre does not have widgets. Switching between live applications is a lot faster with the Palm Pre’s cards. You just swipe between open cards. The Eris keeps track of the 6 most recent applications. Hold down the home button to get this list, and then click on the application you want to go to.
Search:
The Palm Pre’s Universal Search is easier to use as it searches almost all of the phones searchable items. In Universal Search, you get results for contacts, applications, and the ability to search Twitter, Google Search, and Google Maps. The Android OS requires that you go into the application such as contacts or menu for applications, then click the search icon to search that specific category.
UI is very subjective, so it comes down to personal preference, but I found the quickness of Palm’s shortcuts to be significantly faster than what Android provides.
Accessories:
The HTC Eris didn’t have any accessories unique to it. Palm’s magnetic induction charging is unique to the Pre and is highly useful. The Pre’s application behavior changes with usage of this accessory. Answering phone calls when the Pre is on the charger automatically puts the call in speaker phone. Lifting the phone from the charger during a live call or when the phone is ringing transfers the audio from speaker to the handset. I have one on my office desk, and the phone’s calendar is always up for me to look at.
Networks:
I’ll keep this short since my results will vary from user to user, but for me, Sprint wins over Verizon. Sprint has more bars in the places I go, and lower dropped calls. Also, Sprint’s data network seems faster than Verizon. Again, your results will vary over mine, but the key issue for me is that Verizon has dropped calls in my house where I only get 1 to 2 bars with Verizon, while I get 5 bars with Sprint and have not had any dropped calls in the last 6 months.
Conclusion:
I’ll keep this short since this was a long one, but in the end, I’m returning my HTC Droid Eris and keeping my Palm Pre. I do anticipate that I will change to Android one day. There are rumors that Sprint will be releasing a HTC Android phone using 4G (WiMax) sometime this calendar year, so I think I will wait for that.
~rb
, along with the lenses I’ve purchased for it.
. The other lens I use is the 
. Compared to my camera, I got the cheaper lenses. The recommendation is to buy a cheaper camera and better lenses, but I’ve done the opposite, hoping to grow into my 40D. 
so that I can get the maximum value from the camera. Some examples of the customization available on the 40D are the 3 custom settings. You can custom configure 3 different settings and save them. Recalling them is as easy as twisting the selection dial to C1, C2, and C3. I currently use all 3 settings. C1 is set for portraits, mostly for my 50mm lens. I have C1 set mostly stock, except that I also capture the full 10.1 megapixel RAW format. C2 is set for constant auto-focus (servo) as well as a faster frame speed, mostly for taking moving pictures of the kids. C3 is set for exposure bracketing. This is where I take 3 pictures, the first is at the normal exposure, the second is under-exposed, and the third is over-exposed. I use C3 for the times I’m not sure about the right exposure.
. This flash allows me to point the light at a wall or ceiling. This bounces the light off the surface and provides a balanced flash that does not bleach out color.
.
