Usability, Calling / Data

Usability

With Windows Telephone 7.5 (Mango) on-board, the Titan is packing the most upward-to-date version of WP7 currently bachelor. However, information technology's all the same a new platform and is quite unlike from rival platforms in both advent and in use.

The main dwelling screen works on a system of tiles, which can be completely customized past the user to incorporate shortcuts to the virtually commonly used applications and contact entries. The neat thing is, these tiles tin as well show live information such every bit new message counts, status updates, and photos. Many of them are also animated, which adds a richer feel to the otherwise spartan UI.

Whatever options or apps non found on the tiled home screen can be found in the main menu, which can be accessed by swiping left on the brandish, or tapping the pointer on the top correct of the screen. The main menu consists of a single list of icons arranged in alphabetical order, which can exist swiped through quite quickly, but not re-arranged or sorted into folders.

In keeping with the uncluttered look of WP7, in that location is a digital clock in the top right corner of the display, simply no other status information. To show the battery and network/WiFi point condition icons the user just needs to tap at the summit of the display to cause them to drop into view. I'thou not certain if I like this or not, simply it's pretty necessary due to the style that the tiles scroll all the fashion from the top to the bottom of the screen.

1 of the updates found in WP7 Mango is the task switcher, which is accessed with a long press on the back button below the brandish. This puts y'all into a zoomed-out view of the screen you were just looking at and allows y'all to swipe back and forth between screenshots of the other apps that are all the same running in the background and switch to them. Unfortunately, there is no quick way to shut an app or menu from the chore switcher, but it's a footstep in the correct direction.

Every bit you lot navigate the Titan's WP7 UI, various soft keys will appear at the bottom of the display, offering common functions. Any additional options or settings tin exist accessed via the "..." button in the bottom right corner, and throughout the UI users can long printing on certain items to bring up context sensitive options, such as long pressing on an electronic mail to delete it, mark it as read, or motility it.

Equally y'all'd await, the Titan has Windows Live and Facebook integration, and with the Mango update Twitter and LinkedIn are as well present out of the box. Impressively, the Titan can pull your contacts direct from any of these services, as well every bit Gmail and Microsoft Exchange accounts. Users tin hide Gmail, Facebook, and Twitter contacts, and thankfully now even hide Windows Live contacts, which wasn't possible before and keeps your contacts list much less cluttered.

The WP7 People app is as slick equally the rest of the UI and shows contacts, social network updates, and recent contacts in 3 separate sections. It can besides display contact images and has space for as much contact information as y'all can throw at it. Users can search their contacts, or tap a button at the top of the list to show an alphabetical grid, which allows users to leap to a specific letter of the alphabet.

The HTC Titan doesn't feature ring profiles, simply instead uses the book rocker to adjust the ringer volume, or switch the phone to vibrate. Unfortunately, the Titan's ringer and media playback volumes are linked, so yous tin't have your ringer turned up loud and your media volume downward quiet, for example.

The Titan also features a couple of neat HTC-specific functions to help it conform to its surroundings. HTC calls it "attentive telephone" and it allows users to silence their ringing phone by flipping it over, or switch to speakerphone by flipping it over during a call. It can as well turn the ringer volume upwardly automatically when the phone senses that it'south in a pocket or handbag, and lower the volume when it senses that information technology's being picked upward. Quite neat.

As with all WP7 handsets, the Titan offers very fiddling visual customization. You have a option of two background colors: black or white, and can pick from xi accent colors, which by and large just affect the color of the home screen tiles and icons. Otherwise, all y'all can change is the lock screen prototype, and that'south about it.

Overall, I was happy with the user experience of the HTC Titan. It'south pretty standard fare for a WP7.5 handset, with a few tweaks from HTC where possible. While the UI is quite basic compared to rivals, this allows it to be super-snappy and yet remains fully functional besides.

Calling / Data

The HTC Titan was a mixed purse when it came to test call quality. People on the other stop of the call reported very clear sound, with speakerphone gear up both on and off. They also reported no echo or fuzz. On my end, the speakerphone was pretty decent with good volume, just the regular earpiece was very fuzzy in my experience.

The Titan is a quad-ring ~GSM device that too works on the 850/900/2100MHz 3G bands for ~HSPA data connections. Information technology held a respectable betoken during our testing and didn't drop any calls. I averaged download speeds of around four.1Mbps and upload speeds of around 0.89Mbps on Vodafone'due south HSPA network in the Bristol surface area of the UK.

Bluetooth two.ane with ~A2DP is built into the Titan for use with stereo Bluetooth headphones, but unfortunately in that location didn't appear to be an selection to send files via Bluetooth. Also missing is USB mass storage support, and then you lot're left with using Microsoft's Zune software for PC, or WP7 Connector for Mac instead. I used WP7 Connector for Mac and at start had problem with it recognizing that the Titan was fastened. However, after a reboot it found the phone and worked without a hitch.