HTC Vivid...now with ICS!

Thanks for the review. :thumb:

What are the odd angles that make a shape a 'con'?

 

Ha! Ha! very funny.

Ok, here goes:

I got the Vivid to replace my Atrix 4G. I really liked my Atrix but it was time to move on to something better.

I got the black one, it came GB version 2.3.4 but ICS 4.03 upgrade was rolled out shortly afterwards, a very pleasant surprise indeed.

The Pros and Cons mentioned by Mr. Big Meanie are pretty much on the dot for me as well with just a few variants as follows:

Pros:

• There is no LTE in our area but I easily get d/l speeds of 10-13Mbps, with the Atrix it was around 6, the u/l is quite a bit higher as well.
• This phone is fast and very smooth
• The call quality has been great for me.
• I like the angular shape, it sets it apart from all the other black slabs out there.
• The built quality is excellent and superior to the Atrix.

Cons:

• Size - I am having a hard time getting used to it, I wish it was around a 4-4.3" screen insread of 4.5"
• The battery life is dismal compared to the Atrix, granted I am probably playing with it more but I have to make extra effort to make it last a full work day, if I am not on WiFi.

I am sure I have left something out as well, so feel free to add or ask questions.

 

Here is a frontal from AT&T for reference.

 

Nice reviews, maybe its an HTC thing with the battery life. My Terrific Trophy's battery life is nothing to get excited about. Good luck to you both with your Victorious Vivid's.:-D

Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE 9.0; Windows Phone OS 7.5; Trident/5.0; IEMobile/9.0; HTC; mwp6985)

 

I got the Vivid (White) to replace my 3 month old HTC Inspire. Nothing was wrong with the Inspire, but my dad was having problems with his HTC Status, and we decided to take it back within the 30 days, I gave him my like new Inspire, and I upgraded to LTE Mine has Gingerbread, I wasn't aware that you can upgrade it to Ice Cream Sandwich. Any more info on the differences between GB and ICS on the Vivid? Is it worth upgrading to ICS?

 

I tried several times, I got "ERROR: Server Unavailable" Data was on, and I even tried connecting to WiFi, and it still didn't work...

 

Try *#*#682#*#* from your dialer.

You aren't rooted are you? You will need to be on WiFi for the OTA to download.

Good luck.



Sent from my Rum Float Vivid using Tapatalk.

 

LOL, I just googled the problem, and someone on the AT&T forums said *#*#682#*#*. I tried it and my download is running.

 

Well, the update finished, and I've been playing with it for a few minutes. Looks good so far...

 

For those of you now running ICS, how well does it work with the Vivid? I've read both good and bad things about ICS, and it seems that one either likes it or hates it...

 

A 4" screen is the sweet spot for me. I'm still dreaming of the day when Apple adds one to the iPhone. :O

 

you know, ironically, today I receive a text message from AT&T saying I have an important update available for my HTC Vivid available via WiFi only...

So far I like ICS. Its more refined and polished than GB, and text to speech works much better. I have no complaints so far.

 

Sounds the same as doing an iOS update. IDevices can only do OTA updates via WiFi as well. Considering LTE is a much faster network, you would think that OTA updates would be allowed over LTE as well.

 

I'm sure the reason is that if/when a huge update is released, AT&T doesn't want their data network to crash with everyone wanting to update the same time.

 

I agree, a flip-out 4" screen would be a good addition

 

Coming from two consecutive androids with 4" screens each, makes it harder yet to deal with 4.5". Fortunately it is tall and not as wide as the Skyrocket, infact it is the same width as my Atrix but 0.5" taller so atleast it's not difficult to hold in my hand.

About ICS, the Vivid was fast and smooth on GB to begin with and ICS has made it faster and smoother yet, also there are additional system apps in there that enabled me to get rid of some third party ones. All in all a very good experience as others have said.

I have a custom ROM that is built on the current att OS version but is rooted, bloatware removed, and a couple of goodies like flash light and battery percentage meter built in it.

I am really enjoying ICS on my Vivid.

The size of the OTA is quite large, 400+ mb, this would almost 25% of a person's quota of 2gb, yet another reason for WiFi only OTA updates, I believe.

 

Wait, what? I haver said anything about a "flip-out" screen. I would not want that at all.

 

I am glad to hear that you guys are enjoying ICS. I looked at it on the GN and it looked pretty cool.

I thought the 4" screen on the Atrix was just the right size and it didn't overtake the phone to the point where it was uncomfortable to hold for long periods of time. I really don't know why it's necessary to have such large screens on some of the phones these days. After all, isn't that what a tablet is for? Speaking of big screens and tablets, have you seen the Galaxy Note in person yet? Now that is a big tablet, I mean phone, lol.

 

As someone who has participated in the Smartphone world for many years, I'd say the most unwieldy beast I've ever owned was my HP iPAQ. That phone was so uncomfortable to hold, and did not perform as a phone all that well either. I had problems with my HTC Pure as I felt the phone was too small, and it was difficult for me to hold as well. The Vivid feels "just right" in my hands, and I love it. The large screen is also nice, as I don't have the best eyesight either. When someone tries to show me something on an iPhone screen, I feel like I need to view it with a magnifying glass since I am used to a larger screen.

I would have to say the Vivid is quickly becoming my favorite Smartphone I've ever owned, unseating the HTC Tilt.

 

I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that the Vivid battery drains quicker with low signal than the Atrix's did.

Yesterday I moved my phone from the right side of my laptop to the left in the afternoon, which is closer to the window and better signal. I managed to go 11 hours with 17% left with basically the same usage and few more short duration phone calls.

I made it point to put it there right away today, from the morning and will see if it makes any difference.

 

I feel so deprived I didn't get any notification. :crying:

 

:



Sent from my Rum Float Vivid using Tapatalk.

 

Have you tried the Juice Defender app yet Charlyee? It helps me go a lot farther on a charge. The free version works so well I haven't even thought about buying the paid version with more capabilities.

 

There has been lots of discussion and speculation about why Apple doesn't bring out a 4" screen. I don't think that I would want anything taller or wider either.

It reminds me of the first HP-35 calculator (c. 1972), where Bill Hewlett's criteria was that his engineers make a calculator that fit into his shirt pocket. I guess he rejected each one until it did. And since 12 year old Jobs called up Bill Hewlett asking for a job and parts for a project, I think they think the same way.

Personally I like the iPhone size since it fits into my shirt pocket without sticking out the top. Same with my pants pocket, in that it fits well.

4" may be the sweet spot indeed Irish Rose. The iPhone 3.5 inch 24 bit (16.7M color) Retina display has 640x960 pixels that are 78 microns square. Anything less than about 100 is considered invisible to the naked eye at 10 inches or so, hence the name 'Retina'. That gives an aspect ratio something between the 4:3 TV (1.33) and 16:9 (1.77)HD TV dimensions. The iPhone display is 1.5. There are some reasons why that is a good compromise, but I don't remember why.

The HTC Vivid 18bit (262K color) display is 540 x 960 pixels on 4.5 inch diagonal, with larger pixels sizes. That gives it the Hd 16:9 display, but a slightly less sharp display, but being around 103 microns, it is really unnoticable, and nearly as sharp as the iPhone.

If Apple went toward HD format, meaning a 1132 x 960 pixel display, with the same Retina pixel size, it would only make the iPhone 0.5" taller, but no wider. That would be a 4" diagonal screen. It would stick up a bit from my shirt pocket. But I think it would have to wait for other reasons, since moving from an aspect ratio of 1.33 to 1.77, means the iPad would have to change too, to keep things compatible. And Apple like compatibility.

So I think we will wait until both products move to HD but maybe overcoming the peeking shirt pocket phenomena can be done. Just making the 'home' button rectangular so as to gain 1/4inch top and bottom, would keep the physical phone dimensions the same. There have been some artist drawings of that around. Any talk of an iPad mini would follow the same way.