{"id":137,"date":"2007-03-22T17:26:56","date_gmt":"2007-03-22T17:26:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/?p=137"},"modified":"2009-05-17T16:19:03","modified_gmt":"2009-05-17T16:19:03","slug":"t-mobile-ameo-first-impressions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/?p=137","title":{"rendered":"T-Mobile Ameo… first impressions"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve been the proud owner of a shiny new T-Mobile Ameo (a phone\/PDA based on the HTC Advantage<\/a> design) for a day now, so thought I’d post my first thoughts on it. <\/p>\n

Before I start, it’s worth pointing out a couple of things. Firstly, I’m on holiday this week so I’ve not used it in earnest yet. These are my first impressions from playing with it at home and setting it up. Secondly, this is mainly going to be in terms of a comparison with my last PDA (the O2 XDA Exec – based on the HTC Universal<\/a>), which I had for about a year and a half, and loved. So this may not be very objective!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The good<\/h3>\n

Everything the Universal can do…<\/strong><\/p>\n

It has Pocket Office for working on documents and spreadsheets, my wiki lets me organise my notes, it syncs with Outlook to manage my calendar and task lists, my bluetooth keyboard (that I mentioned recently<\/a>) works well with it, and the integrated QWERTY keyboard is good for quick data entry. <\/p>\n

Usability enhancements to Windows Mobile 5<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not sure where all of these have come from (Microsoft update to WM? HTC? T-Mobile?), but I’ve noticed a bunch of little improvements to the interface. <\/p>\n

For example, in Outlook, you couldn’t get to your folders list without clicking on the current folder name. This meant you couldn’t do it if you were using your phone with one hand, or didn’t want to have to get your stylus out. On the Ameo, there is a new menu option from the soft-key menu that opens the folder list. I’ve already spotted about a dozen little improvements like this.<\/p>\n

There are also a few preinstalled HTC utilities, like one to get the close button to actually close instead of minimize apps (you can see here<\/a> if you’re not familiar with Windows Mobile and aren’t aware of this issue) if you press-and-hold close. <\/p>\n

I’m sure I could’ve found some freeware to do this on the Exec if I’d bothered to look, but having some well-designed, tested, carefully selected apps preinstalled is nice – and much better than the “Active” interface junk that O2 preinstall on their devices. <\/p>\n

Big screen<\/strong><\/p>\n

With the keyboard detached, running the Ameo in tablet mode makes for a fantastic ebook reader. The size, weight, shape and very high-quality screen (with software on ereader.com including good support for VGA screens) makes reading a book on it a pleasure. I was already a big fan of reading on my old HTC Universal, but this is even better. I’ve put the font size down, and this gives me a page that feels a lot like a small paperback book. <\/p>\n

It’s also made reading through my RSS feeds better – egress<\/a> scales nicely to the bigger screen, and it’s quite cool to be able to see more of my stories on screen at once.<\/p>\n

I’ve not had the chance to write a document on it yet, but I’m thinking that the big screen will make writing a document even easier than on the Universal. With writing on a small screen, it can sometimes feel like your peering through a keyhole at your document – making it difficult to get the feel of the bigger picture. This screen should be really good to write with – I’m looking forward to my first chance to do some serious work with it.<\/p>\n

VGA support in some apps<\/strong><\/p>\n

Like the Universal, the Ameo has a VGA compatible screen. But (without the OzVGA hack) it doesn’t really look like it. The pixels are all doubled, so instead of getting more on screen, you just get the same stuff on screen but it just looks better. You could always just zoom out and set font sizes smaller, so you got high quality small text. But with images, you were kind of stuck with big images. This made web browsing a little strange looking. <\/p>\n

On the Ameo, the Opera and Internet Explorer web browsers render in true VGA. So webpages look much closer to how they look on a desktop browser. It’s really well done, and makes for a more comfortable web browsing experience – a bit like I imagine using the Nokia Internet tablets<\/a> is.<\/p>\n

Opera included<\/strong><\/p>\n

Speaking of web browsing, I’m liking Opera – preinstalled on the Ameo. It’s fast, renders nicely, and has tabs! Yay. <\/p>\n

More memory<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Universal would run out of memory when you opened too many apps, and grind to a halt until you killed some. I’ve not noticed this be a problem on the Ameo, and it’s 111mb of program memory (over double what I am used to with the Universal) seems to cope with having lots of apps open at once really well. Need to see what it’d be like with having lots open over a normal working day to really know what it’s like, though.<\/p>\n

Integrated GPS<\/strong><\/p>\n

I’ve been using TomTom Navigator with my HTC Universal for over a year now, and it has helped me out lots of times. But it was always a little annoying to have to use the separate bluetooth GPS receiver. It wasn’t that bad – it lived in the bottom of my bag, and I just had to dig it out and switch it on when I needed directions. Even so, I quite like having the GPS unit included in the Ameo – it’s just a tiny bit simpler. <\/p>\n

Connect to printer or monitor<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Ameo can connect to a monitor using the VGA cable included in the kit that came with it – without needing a computer. Presumably this means that you could also connect it to a digital projector. So you could run a Powerpoint presentation from it. That’s quite cool.<\/p>\n

It also comes with the software needed to print directly to a network-shared printer – again without needing a computer. Not sure when I’ll need either of these features, but they’re still pretty impressive.<\/p>\n

8GB harddrive<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is a nice addition over the Universal – it’s nice to have a large amount of space to dump files on. With a 1gb Mini-SD card, and a 8gb hard-drive, I’ve got plenty of space! I’m not going to install programs to it, as I’m guessing it’s not gonna be that fast. But as a dumping ground for files, it’s ideal.<\/p>\n

Data plan<\/strong><\/p>\n

Even after 18 months, I never really worked out O2’s approach to charging for data. It was always a bit of a dark art, and I never knew how much my next bill would be. And they didn’t have any dedicated data plans.<\/p>\n

So I’m loving the web’n’walk plan – ‘unlimited’ Internet access. This might not be a direct comparison between the Universal and the Ameo, but it does change how I feel about using it. For over a year now, I’ve got used to connecting, do what I needed, then quickly click on ‘Disconnect’ on the Universal. It’s very cool to just leave my phone connected, ready to be used whenever I want something, without worrying. I’ve even set Pocket Outlook to check for new emails every half-hour, which I never used on the Universal. <\/p>\n

Quick delivery!<\/strong><\/p>\n

I ordered it at about 4pm Tuesday afternoon, and it arrived a bit after 7am on Wednesday morning. That was cool – can’t remember how long I had to wait for the XDA Exec, but I’m sure it wasn’t that quick.<\/p>\n

Other bits and pieces<\/strong><\/p>\n

The kit that comes with the Ameo is very nice – you get a nice looking dual-function pen (pen or stylus), a nice leather case, spare stylus, and a little bag to keep your bits and cables in. And the stylus stays in! (Sounds unimpressive perhaps, but the stylus never stayed in – would fall out if you held the PDA upside down, which made me lose several of them!)<\/p>\n

The bad<\/h3>\n

It’s big<\/strong><\/p>\n

Really big. Seriously big. In it’s leather case, it looks a lot like a small filofax. That’s fine in meetings, or at work – or when I am going anywhere with my bag. But I used to use Windows Media Player to use my old phone as an mp3 player, and the Ameo doesn’t really fit in my pocket. So it’s really a rubbish portable music player. I might need to buy a separate mp3 walkman at some point. \ud83d\ude41<\/p>\n

The quiet keyboard<\/strong><\/p>\n

The keyboard on the Ameo doesn’t give any tactile feedback when you type. Presumably that was intentional, so you can tap away silently in meetings without driving everyone mad. If it wasn’t for seeing letters appear on the screen, you can’t tell when you’ve pressed the button. But I’d got used to the click feedback on the Universal, and I’m finding the Ameo keyboard quite strange so far. <\/p>\n

The small keyboard<\/strong><\/p>\n

There’s no dedicated number keys, like there is on the Universal. You have to press a modifier key, and then one of the letter keys in the middle. It’s another thing that I’m finding a little hard to get used to when trying to type quickly.<\/p>\n

No Pocket MSN<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Universal came with Pocket MSN Messenger preinstalled. I assumed that this was free, and came with Windows Mobile. Apparently, it’s neither. O2 install it on their devices, and I guess T-Mobile don’t as I don’t have it on the Ameo. And after a quick check on msn.com<\/a>, it seems that they charge \u00c2\u00a310.99 for it. That wasn’t a nice surprise!<\/p>\n

ActiveSync<\/strong><\/p>\n

Connecting it to my computer is getting really annoying. ActiveSync was never an example of reliability with the Universal – it’s temperamental, and every now and then will refuse to connect without restarting both the PDA and computer. But it’s noticeably worse on the Advantage. Even restarting doesn’t resolve the problem sometimes – needing multiple reboots of both PDA and computer to connect successfully. <\/p>\n

I don’t know why… I’m using ActiveSync 4.5 (which I was using before with the Exec) instead of the ActiveSync 4.2 that was supplied with the Ameo. But I wouldn’t have expected that to cause problems. <\/p>\n

It seems to be limited to USB connections – Bluetooth connections seem to work better, but I don’t want to rely on Bluetooth syncing as I use USB connections to keep the PDA charged through the day. I’ve tried different USB cables, including the really short one I got with my external USB harddrive, but no joy. <\/p>\n

As a stand-alone device, it’s great. But as something that connects to a computer, it’s very flaky.<\/p>\n

Different size SD card<\/strong><\/p>\n

My SD cards that I used with the Universal wont work with my new PDA – which only takes Mini-SD cards. That’s a little annoying.<\/p>\n

The colour<\/strong><\/p>\n

I don’t get the grey-and-pink colour scheme that T-Mobile have. I miss the black and silver look of O2’s XDAs that I had on my XDA Exec. <\/p>\n

Screen protector<\/strong><\/p>\n

Screen protectors are vital as otherwise I’d scratch the screen to bits. So it was a nice surprise to find an unexpected free screen protector included with the T-Mobile Ameo (especially as noone seems to be selling them for this model yet). <\/p>\n

It was a shame that it’s such a cheap nasty screen protector! I’m not the best at fitting these things at the best of times, but I’ve tried a few over the years (on an old iPaq, on Palm Pilots, on my old Clie UX50, and I tried a couple on my current Universal) and this one was by far the worst – it’s rubbish. It looks cheap and nasty, and even after being really careful was impossible to get all the bubbles out. <\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/h3>\n

Is the HTC Advantage better than the HTC Universal?<\/p>\n

In theory, yes. But I’m not sure yet – it depends on whether I can get used to the bigger size. Need to see what it’s like to use for a day away from home (and more importantly, my laptop!) to know if it was really a good purchase though. I’ve got a couple of days working in London next week, so that should be a good test for it! <\/p>\n

.<\/p>\n

Update<\/em><\/strong> – See comments to this post for more thoughts as I use the Ameo more…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve been the proud owner of a shiny new T-Mobile Ameo (a phone\/PDA based on the HTC Advantage design) for a day now, so thought I’d post my first thoughts on it. Before I start, it’s worth pointing out a couple of things. Firstly, I’m on holiday this week so I’ve not used it in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dalelane.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}