Welcome to a new style of review, where the device will be reviewed by myself, and Heather, so we get a joint perspective of the device.
The HTC P3300 was launched in September 2006, and in the UK is also available as the T-Mobile MDA Compact III and O2 XDA Orbit. We've had this device for around two months now, and have been holding off the review hoping that the Windows Mobile 6 upgrade was released, however it's not yet out, so here's the review as is. When the upgrade is released, I'll update the review.
Despite owning a large number of PDA devices that accept SIM cards over the years including the Sony Ericsson p800, p910i and the iPAQ 514 voice messenger,6915 and 6815 this is my first HTC device. In some of the pictures below you can click the image for a higher resolution picture.
Heather switched from a Nokia 6233 Phone and Tom Tom One to the HTC – she was pleasantly surprised by the ease of use, clarity of both screen and sound together with it small size and weight.
HTC appear to have added a number of useful extras to the standard OS, including the ClearVue PDF reader, a ZIP utility and the ability for the device to run in both portrait and landscape modes with a single click from the homescreen.
I firmly believe that GPS will be in all our devices in the not too distant future, and hence my interest in this device as it combines an integral GPS device with the excellent TomTom 6 software, along with the standard PocketPC Phone features found in similair devices like WiFi, Bluetooth, GSM, GPRS, Edge and an inbuilt FM radio (that only works with the headphones attached as they provide the aerial).
Included in my box was the unit, an AC adapter, a functional pouch, the headset, two printed manuals (one quick start guide, and a very detailed product manual), a spare stylus, as well as the TomTom activation codes.
The size of the unit is good, it bulks up with the included jacket, but without is a reasonable size to slip into a trouser pocket. The picture below shows the unit lined up as follows, reading from left to right, the htc p3300, an iPAQ 514 and the Nokia 6233.
The next picture shows the thickness of the unit, reading from top to bottom Nokia 6233, iPAQ 514, htc p3300.
htc bundles a number of screen applications with the device, which can be accessed from the today screen.
From left to right these are a quick access click to the battery settings, a one click screen rotation, access to the phone, wifi and bluetooth settings (see screenshot under phone), the backlight settings option, the Quick GPS software and the soft mouse on/off toggle.
The one click screen rotation is especially useful when browsing webpages as the two screen shots below show.
The htc is light and slimline and although slightly larger than the Nokia 6233, the combined Satellite Navigation of the htc far outstrips its slight size disadvantage.
The touch screen operation and keyboard is accurate and this coupled with the Word Completion function enabled both email and text messages to be created relatively quickly. There is a transcriber option available but I never really mastered this with enough accuracy and seemed to spend most of the time correcting misinterpreted words. The individual letter recognizer was a more accurate option if you really want to use hand writing but I decided to stick with the keyboard/pen function and instead found that I was easily writing messages too long for one message and then having to shorten my rambling!!
The wheel and soft mouse allowed an alternative way of navigating menus without pen operation. Although very easy to use I did find myself slipping back to the pen touch screen usage and really only used the wheel to scroll down my email lists etc. I found no advantage in taking up operation using the soft mouse function.
One feature I found very useful compared to my iPAQs is that you can completely power off the device by pressing and holding the power button, compared to only puttting it into standby with a short press. The downside, of course, is a longer start time the next time you turn your device on.
Use of the phone functionality was straight forward with a number call options to ensure that phone use was comparable to a traditional ‘dumb phone'. The large dial buttons enable me to dial using my finger rather than the pen with an added bonus of Smart dialing which allows me to short cut selection from my contacts list. Better still is the voice speed dial although a bind to set up is accurate and the faster call option.
The htc comm manager is a screen where you can toggle the phone, bluetooth and WiFi on/off, and also edit WLan and Bluetooth settings.
The Camera was relatively slow to load compared to the Nokia phone camera and I found the use of the touch screen for zoom slightly fiddly – would certainly be a hindrance for an action shot. The pictures produced were adequate 2 Mega pixel quality and there was a standard range of features such as zoom and self timer.
The radio only works with the included headphone, which acts as the FM aerial. In our tests it worked fine, and quickly tuned into a variety of stations. Sound quality was good, with no hiss or interference.
Sat Nat loaded and established satellite connectivity quickly. The large clear screen and clarity of speech made it an easy contender for the TOM TOM One. Not having a cradle for the htc, my cup holder in the car proved most useful although slightly rocky. The option to change the orientation of the screen would enable you to find the most suitable viewing angle for your car. Overall a most useful application without the extra bulk of a separate sat nav system!
In day to day use it appeared that the htc was very quick at locking onto the GPS signal, so it we decided to compare the startup times to the iPAQ 6915.
In the first 3 tests, both devices were soft reset, and then TomTom was loaded. The time from clicking on the TomTom icon to it getting a fix was measured. The 2nd and 3rd tests were done without a soft reset. Test 4 was done when both devices had downloaded their respective GPS connection acceleration and had then been soft reset. Tests 5 and 6 were done after exiting TomTom but no soft reset
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| htc p3300 | 3m 6sec | 19sec | 20sec | 1m 19sec | 21sec | 1m 14sec |
| ipaq 6915 | 3m 32sec | 1m 45sec | 1m51sec | 58sec | 51sec | 40sec |
So as we thought, the htc certainly is quick to lock onto the satellite, once the initial cold start has been done. The QuickGPS software certainly helps the initial lock, but doesn't seem to improve subsequent warm GPS locks.
The device bears comparision the ipaq 6815 which also runs Mobile 5, but does not have integrated GPS. In a side by side comparision it outstrips the 6815 in weight, features (included GPS, 802.11G) but will have a lesser battery life compared to the excellent battery life found in the 6815.
| htc p3300 | iPAQ 6815 | |
|---|---|---|
| Size | 108 mm (L) X 58 mm (W) X 16.8 mm (T) | 5.8 x 1.9 x 10.2 cm |
| Weight | 130g with battery | 140g |
| OS | Microsoft® Windows Mobile® 5.0 | Microsoft Windows Mobile 5.0 for Pocket PC, Phone Edition |
| Camera | 2 Megapixels | Integrated HP Photosmart Camera 2 Megapixel with LED light, 1600 x 1200 resolution, JPEG and 3 GP formats |
| Battery Life | Rechargeable Lithium-ion polymer battery Capacity: 1,250 mAh Talk time: Up to 3.5 - 5 hrs Standby time: Up to 150 - 200 hrs |
removable/rechargeable 1530 mAh Lithium-Ion (user changeable) |
| Screen | 2.8'' TFT-LCD 240 X 320 with 65,536 colours |
2.7” transmissive TFT, 65K colours, LED backlight with power save mode |
| Phone | GSM/GPRS/EDGE: 850, 900, 1800, 1900 | Integrated tri band GSM/GPRS/EDGE phone |
| Wireless | Bluetooth® 2.0 Wi-Fi®: IEEE 802.11 b/g |
Integrated WLAN 802.11b, Bluetooth® 1.2, IrDA |
| Expansion | microSD™ memory card | Mini-SD slot supports 4-bit mini-SD memory standards |
| CPU | TI’s OMAP™ 850, 201 MHz | Intel® PXA272 Processor 416 MHz |
| Memory | ROM: 128MB RAM: 64MB SDRAM |
192 MB total ROM memory (128 MB ROM available for persistent storage, 64 MB SDRAM), certified up to 1 GB |
Overall I loved the htc and would readily swap it for my Tom Tom One and Smartphone. Its simplicity in use together with the overall look& feel of quality greatly out strips a couple of small niggles in its functionality.
However, the use of a standard phone keypad together with predictive text provides a faster option than the pen/touch screen on the htc. The touch screen really only comes into its own if you are truly wishing to use the full functionality of Outlook email etc. If you text usage greatly outways email then a smart phone could be a better route – that is of course if you don't require Sat Nav (a large bonus in my life).
I believe that this is a serious contender for an all in one device with the added bonus of Sat Nav and is a must to look at before making a PDA purchase. If the free Windows Mobile 6 upgrade is released then it really will be a killer device.
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