The HTC Droid Incredible Review, Clearly Better than the Nexus One
by Anand Lal Shimpi on May 10, 2010 1:27 PM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Snapdragon
- Droid Incredible
- HTC
- Android
- Mobile
The Camera
HTC outfitted the Incredible with an 8 megapixel camera with a default resolution of 3264 x 1952. Like the Nexus One, the Incredible’s Camera is very fast. You get a smooth frame rate from the live viewfinder, and there’s minimal shutter lag. It makes the iPhone 3GS' camera feel archaic by comparison, like I've just dusted off my first point and shoot from 13 years ago.
Unlike the Nexus One, HTC’s camera app gives you a lot of control over the post processing of your photos. You can adjust brightness, contrast, saturation and sharpness. There are even white balance and ISO settings. While I found these items more of a pain to use (who wants to mess with sharpness settings on a smartphone camera?), I do appreciate the option.
The Incredible comes with a blindingly bright LED flash that actually makes low light photography possible. We are talking about a very tiny lens so low light performance, even with the flash, is grainy:
But in a pinch it works just fine, which is more than I can say for the iPhone’s camera in low light conditions.
The flash can be forced on/off or left on auto mode. This is important because the flash has the tendency to blow out photos when used indoors.
Outdoor performance is great but be warned that the photos look better on the ultra high density screen than they do blown up at full resolution.
Browsing through photos in the camera app is very fast and uses the swipe gesture, again an improvement over the Nexus One. And just like the rest of the phone, you have tight integration with online services within the camera app itself. You’re two taps away from sharing any photo you take via Facebook, Twitter, Flickr or the usual suspects (MMS, Email). I’ll say that the HTC Incredible was the first smartphone I really found myself using as a camera on a regular basis simply because of its speed, quality and ease of use.
Smartphone cameras are quickly making headway in becoming the point and shoot camera of choice. I’ve seen demos of smartphones that have two lenses (one wide angle and one telephoto) and use a fast SoC to combine the output of both to produce photos where everything is sharp and in focus.
In the case of the HTC Incredible however, there’s a very practical use of its high quality camera today...
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rcc - Monday, May 10, 2010 - link
As I read the review, the commercial that came to mind was "it's just like a xerox" from back in the 80s.and then, but not quite as good........
Anyway, I'm looking for a smartphone update, but a clean sync with Outlook is still a requirement. Who does it other than WinMo so far??
xenon2009 - Monday, May 10, 2010 - link
I believe HTC does have an app called HTC Sync which does do Outlook syncing. I am not sure if it is available for the Droid Incredible but it is worth a shot. You should be able to get from HTC's website.cfaalm - Tuesday, May 11, 2010 - link
That works. I was able to sync my Legend with Outlook. You can download the app or even pull it from the SD-card that came with the phone (it should be on there). See website for instructions. It's really easy.gregounech - Monday, May 10, 2010 - link
Hey anand guys!I'm front France and typing this message from.my HTC desire.
I saw It's going to be out this summer only in usa, however it is already out in Europe. It adds HTC sense to the same hardware base of the nexus one and addingvsome other things.
Some websites loved it and I'd love to see you guys review it comparing to those two Android based smartphones.
Please.review it...
Regards, Gregounech a French addict to anandtech!
cgalyon - Monday, May 10, 2010 - link
Not sure if this is what you meant, but you can copy/paste in e-mails using the default mail client. I didn't try from the widget (removed that widget in fact), but if you enter an e-mail, just press and hold and it will highlight. You can move around to extend the highlight and when you release you'll have three context buttons. The first of these allows you to "copy" (later to paste). Also you enter the "expose" view by pressing the home button when on the home screen: at least my optical button doesn't pull it up...GlobleWarmingisbunk - Monday, May 10, 2010 - link
Anand,How Does the HTC Incredible compare to the Eris as far as performance.
I noticed that you did not review Eris, like you did with the Nexus One.
Thanks.
GregANDTCH - Tuesday, May 11, 2010 - link
How well does this one do on App space? Friend of mine had (I believe) the Nexus One and they reached a point where they couldn't put any more Apps on it. They were told you couldn't run them from the msdcard. It was only for Music & Pictures.safcman84 - Tuesday, May 11, 2010 - link
or can we expect a a new HTC phone in Europe as well?Cheers
IKeelU - Tuesday, May 11, 2010 - link
Is there anything stopping the N1 from eventually including the improvements made by HTC? As an N1 owner, I'm a little disapppointed that my device is "almost there" in several key areas, notably the touch screen, keyboard input and overall smoothness. Enough to make me consider hoccing it on ebay and picking up the incredible once it supports GSM in Canada.It seems a lot of what differentiates the inredible from the N1 could technically run on the N1 (besides the improved touchscreen, if there is indeed a hardware difference there).
Impulses - Wednesday, May 12, 2010 - link
If you don't mind rooting it and voiding the warranty, you can flash a Sense ROM unto it (visit MoDaCo) which basically gives you all of HTC's software improvements... The touch sensor on the Incredible and Droid are still better than the N1's tho (when it comes to multi-touch anyway, which I don't think has much to do w/any of Anand's issues which he usually described a issues of responsiveness or accuracy).I doubt there's gonna be a GSM Incredible, the Desire would be it's GSM equivalent, basically a Nexus One with Sense, an extra hole for the speakerphone, and a touchpad instead of a trackball.