HTC S730 review

Introduction It is many peoples opinion, including my own, that the S710 from HTC is the best Smartphone ever. The form factor combined the regular telephone number pad along with a slide out keyboard in a tiny package. It was, to be blunt, almost perfect. Yet within weeks of its release we craved a new device. A rumour surfaced about an upgrade boasting 3G/HSDPA, a bigger processor and above all GPS. It seems an almost eternity since these rumours and the accompanying mock up images surfaced but finally I have the S730 in my hands. Packing extra data speed and a GPS capable Qualcomm chipset the S730 promises the world. Can it deliver as its older brother did? Read on to find out.....

For your delectation photographs are thumbnails which may be clicked on to load a larger image.
Thanks go out to the folks at Clove for providing us with a review sample.
For more information on the s730 at Clove go to the Clove website

Specification

Brand: HTC	Audio Subsystem
Project Codename: HTC Wings 100	Microphone: mono
Model ID: WING100	Speaker: 1 loudspeaker (mono)
Release Date: November, 2007	Audio Output: Proprietary jack
	Audio Chip: Qualcomm MSM7200
Physical Attributes
Dimensions (width x height x depth): 51 x 105.8 x 19.4 millimetres2 x 4.2 x 0.8 inches	Cellular Phone
Mass: 150 grams (battery included)	Cellular Networks: GSM850, GSM900, GSM1800, GSM1900, UMTS850, UMTS1900, UMTS2100
	Cellular Data Link: CSD, GPRS, EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA
	Phone Controller (DSP): Qualcomm MSM7200 (QDSP4000, QDSP5000)
Software Environment
Embedded Operating System: Microsoft Windows Mobile 6 Standard	Control Peripherals
	Primary Keyboard: Slide-out QWERTY-type keyboard, 31 keys
Microprocessor, Chipset	Primary Keyboard Backlight: Automatic keyboard backlight (upon press of any key)
CPU: Qualcomm MSM7200 (Chipset)	Secondary Keyboard: Built-in numeric phone keyboard, 22 keys
CPU Clock: 400 MHz	Secondary Keyboard Backlight: Automatic keyboard backlight (upon press of any key)
CPU Core: ARM1136EJ-S	Directional Pad: 5 -way directional block (including action button)
Instruction Set: ARMv6
	Interfaces
	Expansion Slots: microSD, microSDHC, TransFlash, SDIO
Memory, Storage capacity	Serial (UART): RS-232 , 115200bit/s
ROM type: Flash ROM
ROM capacity: 256 MB	Proprietary connector
RAM type: SDRAM	USB: USB 2.0 client, 480Mbit/s
RAM capacity: 64 MB	USB Series Mini-B (mini-USB) connector
	Infrared Gate: Not supported
Graphical subsystem	Bluetooth (802.15): Bluetooth 2.0 , Internal antenna
Display Type: color transflective TFT	Wireless LAN/Wi-Fi (802.11): 802.11b, 802.11g (54Mbit/s)
Display Color Depth: 16 bit/pixel (65536 scales)	Built-in Digital Camera
Display Resolution: 240 x 320 (76800 pixel)	Main Camera: CMOS sensor, 1600x1200 (1.92 million pixels)
Display Diagonal: 2.4 " (62 millimetres)
Graphical Controller: Qualcomm MSM7200	Power Supply
	Battery: Lithium-ion polymer , removable
	Battery Capacity: 1050 mAh

In the box Far from the boring packaging of old the S730 comes in the new style of HTC packaging. Surrounding the main box is a colour sleeve with the device and HTC logo on. Inside there's a well designed matt black box that flips open to display the device nicely. Rather than the old familiar plastic bags inside there is a really nice foamed backed card with the device itself set into it. HTC have added an image of the slide out keyboard to the inlay to give an impression that the device is open when it isn't. While a little gimmicky it does give the S730 an impressive sense of majesty. It seems with the new packaging is certainly aimed more at Joe public as opposed to the business or early adopter markets. The box contains: HTC S730 Battery Wired Headset (Sponge earpiece covers) Chunky Colour Manual Quick Start Guide Getting Started CD - MS Outlook 2007 Trial I was surprised at the absence of an extra software CD and a carry case of some description. All of the HTC devices I have owned in the past have included have contained both. The pack I received was not sealed so could be incomplete, but I don't believe this to be the case. Again I find the inclusion of an Outlook 2007 trial CD is interesting. In the old days Outlook XP (2002) was supplied, but not as a trial. I wonder if many people will upgrade to the full version? The documentation pack includes a handy quick start guide and comprehensive manual as you'd expect. The wired headphones are of a reasonably high quality, better than those supplied with previous devices. This continues the feeling that HTC are making a bit of an effort here. Not especially from a performance perspective, but definitely aesthetically.

Convergence It goes without saying that today's mobile telephones and PDA's are much more than the terms telephone and PDA infer. Today’s devices are becoming ever more complex to meet the demands of the modern lifestyle. No longer are users happy to carry around a PDA, phone, etc; more functionality is demanded from the market and in ever more pocketable and slight devices. The HTC S730 strives to meet these needs boasting a truly spectacular specification considering its tiny frame and therefore contains the following areas of functionality within the device: Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) Mobile (cell) Phone Camera Push Email Portable media player

Aesthetics I'm not going to mince my words, the HTC S730 is a truly lovely looking device. The shell is smoothly curved with a flush sitting screen. The silver outline of the screen and action button on the Dpad set off the gun metal finish beautifully. While we're on the subject, I simply adore the gun metal finish. It’s timeless finery for a gadget and really sets the S730 apart from almost any other Smartphone. In fact, I can't remember such an exceptional Windows Mobile Standard device from an aesthetic perspective. It's simply stunning. There's a strange clear jewel on the front of the device too which I think is probably used by the third party ISP's to customise the device. You'd think a blank clear jewel would look weird but it works. All the number pad buttons are shaped very nicely and reflect the light in different directions to give a nice contrast of light and shadow. On top of this the S730 also comes with the now obligatory blue backlit keyboard, just in case you're not melting already. As a side note to the aesthetics section I think one of the major improvements to the device's looks when in use is the addition of the HTC Home screen. When you flip out the keyboard and the devices unlocks your first breath is taken by the keyboard and your second as the stunning screen springs to life showing the lovely Home screen.

Size For those of you who think big is beautiful, look away now. There's nothing for you here. One of the major selling points of the Smartphone range of devices has to be the form factor. The device is small compared to most of the Pocket PC devices like the Hermes and Kaiser. The real bonus for me though is the weight. The device is sufficiently small and lightweight to make it very pocketable in most circumstances. I doubt you'd even notice it on a belt clip, but then why would you need one? It's begs to be put in a pocket. I had to keep having a feel (steady on, this is a family site!) to make sure it was still there! It's not all good news for S710 fans though as the S730 is both a little larger and a little heavier. I don't think the increase in size is enough to put you off should you fall for the lovely gun metal finish though.

Ergonomics In the hand the S730 feels a lot like the S710 (obviously) or also the candy bar phones based on the HTC Tornado reference design (O2 IQ, Imate SP5/SP5M, SPV C600 etc). It's a little heavier of course but is roughly the same height and width and has the same nice rounded edges. These rounded edges sit the device nicely into the palm of the hand an help it stay there. The matt finish means there's a little extra grip there too. I found the front controls to be very nicely laid out, and on the whole, responsive. The exception was the action button which seemed to require a little more pressure than normal on some occasions. The rest of the number pad was good for both dialling numbers and entering SMS messages. The hardware keyboard is essentially the same one as the S710. In my opinion it is about as small a thumb board as you can get while still maintaining a decent rate of typing speed. The keys are a little smaller than the Kaiser and Hermes, and although I thought it felt a little cramped, it didn't slow me down or make text entry uncomfortable. You would not think twice about writing a couple of page email with it, although for anything more than that you may wish to reconsider. If you have big hands (I take a medium/large glove) then you might struggle a little, so I advise you try before you buy.

Hardware Layout The front of the S730 is the business end of the device. Almost all of the controls are located here. From the top down is the front facing camera, the 240x320 screen, the Dpad surrounded by the soft keys, home and back buttons and the phone pad. Either side of the phone pad are the green and red call buttons. You'll also notice the clear jewel at the top that will presumably be used be third parties to add a logo.

With the slide mechanism opened, the hardware thumb board is exposed, containing a landscape version of the soft keys and the Cap and Fn indicators.

On the right hand side of the device is the camera button and the MicroSD card slot. The MicroSD card slot is protected by a rubber cover. It's good to see that HTC have retained the external SDHC slot, and not gone "semi-internal" as on the Touch.

The left hand side of the S730 houses the COM manager button and the volume up/down control. It's interesting to see the COM manager button on the left hand side of the device as many Pocket PC's have it on the right.

The USB port for charging and syncing the device is located on the bottom of the device. This port can also be used for connecting the included headset. You'll also find the lanyard connector and microphone here too.

The top of the S730 is almost bare, housing only the power button. It's interesting to note that the top of the device is still the standard position for the power button on Smartphone devices whereas HTC have moved the power button to the right hand top corner of the device on most Pocket PC's.

On the rear of the device you'll find the battery cover, camera, vanity mirror and speaker. I found the speaker was much more susceptible to obstruction and muffling than most other devices.

Screen As we've come to expect from HTC the 2.4" TFT screen on the S730 is sharp and bright. In strong daylight I found the screen could have been a little brighter, but it's certainly usable in most conditions. As with most of the recent Smartphones, including the S710, the screen sits flush to the front of the devices. One good by product of the flush screen is that it makes it so much easier to clean. Gone are the days of toiling away with a lint free cloth trying to scrape small bits of grime and dust from the edges of the screen. The Smartphone form factor benefits from having a clear cover over the TFT itself making it a much sturdier screen than on the Touch screens of PPCs so it less susceptible from pressure damage too. I'd recommend a screen protector to prevent scratching as always though.

Camera This most recent generation of HTC devices seem to be being released with a mix of 2 and 3 mega pixel cameras. The Athena and Kaiser have 3MP cameras and the S730, Touch, etc 2MP. We've already seen that good quality images coming from the 3MP on the Athena, but the question is can the new 2MP hardware compare. The short answer is yes. The S730, like the Athena uses the new version of HTC's camera application which is much better than on the older devices. Coupled with the newer hardware the results are actually quite good. Sure, it will not win any awards, but from the images below you can clearly see the images are getting better and better as the devices evolve. I think the Athena is actually reaching the quality you could print out a 8 x 5 image and frame. The s730 is close, you'd have to decide for yourself if you'd frame something of the quality the image below shows. The low light images are still a bit weak and there's no flash on the s730, not even of the standard high powered LED masquerading as a flash. Maybe for the next generation of devices HTC will give us a real flash? Perhaps. Until then progress is still progress and I do feel the still camera is a reasonable addition to the device. The order of the photos from left to right are:

HTC Magician, HTC Wizard, HTC Strtrk, HTC Hermes,Ameo (HTC Athena) and finally the HTC S730.

Telephony As I've already indicated, I feel this device is aimed far more at the public sector than any other HTC Smartphones. Historically HTC have won very few friends for the telephony implementation in its devices. Usually suffering from volume and clarity issues the handsets struggled to compete with dedicated telephones, and often as not had difficulty even maintaining marginal signals. Although the recent phone edition (now called "Professional or Standard") devices have improved over recent generations I was hoping the S730 would contain a phone strong enough to live with the Nokias and Sony Ericssons. You'll be pleased to know that I was pretty impressed with the telephony on the S730. I thought the signal, reception and volume to be better than my wife's LG Chocolate. While the Chocolate is not the greatest of devices it does at least mean that HTC can produce a device to finally live with a regular handset. Good stuff.

Hardware Interfaces

As seems to be the current trend, there is no IR port on the HTC S730.

Wireless The S730 comes equipped with both cellular data (CSD, GPRS, EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA) and Wireless LAN (Wi-Fi) supporting the 802.11b and 802.11g (54Mbit/s) protocols. If you're used to connecting a Pocket PC device to the web there's very little to differ with the way it is executed on the S730. I found the WiFi signal strong and sturdy, not having any issues connecting to the 3 WAP's I tried it on using a 54g WPA-PSK setup. The 3G/HSDPA cellular implementation is excellent on the S730. In general I found the signal strength to be above average and I barely saw anything other than "H" (for HSDPA) wherever I went. In a couple of black spots I did see "G" (for GPRS) but this was unusual. By comparison my HTC Hermes displays the "H" symbol rarely, in the same areas, more often than not only supporting the slower "3G" protocol (UMTS).

GPS There was much made of the s730 coming equipped with GPS since the rumours of its existence first surfaced. Indeed the Qualcomm MSM7200 chipset is the same one contained within the Kaiser, and we know that device has working GPS. Unfortunately the GPS functionality in the s730 is not operational. GPS software recognises that GPS hardware is indeed included, but it is not possible in its current state to get a lock. We've seen disabled GPS before in the HTC Trinity, which was later enabled with a ROM upgrade, so there could be a hope here but many have speculated that the GPS antenna hardware is missing and that software enabling is not viable. I guess only time and HTC will tell.

Bluetooth The S730 has Bluetooth version 2 as is standard with the latest HTC devices and supports many BT profiles. The regular features of Bluetooth are still up to scratch too, and even better than before. Using my Bluetooth Headphones the signal was amongst the strongest of the HTC devices I've used. As with most of the HTC devices the A2DP wireless headphones profile has by default been set to JointStereo only. Joint Stereo is a technique used that when the two stereo streams are playing the same or very similar sounds it combines them to save space. This helps to reduce the data transfer rates. If you wish to enable True Stereo you can use a registry change to "unJoin" them.

Storage The S730 comes with a nice 256MB ROM and a fairly miserly 64MB RAM. In reality this equates to Storage Memory total of 32.46MB and Program Memory total of 47.90MB. I find this 64MB/256MB combination a bit strange. I found even with bare ROM installation it was reasonably easy to exhaust the measley 64MB while paradoxically I couldn't think of enough software to install to ROM to even dent the 256MB. It seems to me that a balance of 256MB/128MB would have been a much more sensible solution. As with many of the smaller HTC devices the S730 comes with a built in MicroSD card slot. Currently, MicroSD cards come in sizes up to 2GB. Fortunately the S730 is also compatible with the latest SDHC MicroSD cards. At the present time these SDHC cards can be bought up to a capacity of 8GB.

Battery The battery life on the HTC S730 is quite poor for a Smartphone and even mediocre for a Pocket PC. An average day’s use for me consists of up to 20 minutes of calls, 30 minutes of browsing in a strong 3G/HSDPA area and about 100 push emails. I'm not much of a texter but there's usually a couple of SMS in there too. I also use my device as an MP3 player while I'm cycling to work, so there's also an extra 30 minutes of music, over a set of Bluetooth headphones. I found with the S730, like the Hermes and Trinity devices running WM6 that at the end of the day I've had about 40% charge left over. This essentially means you have to charge your device everyday. I found with the Touch I was only using approximately 40% in 24 hours, meaning I could get a good couple of days running from a single fully juiced battery. It's obvious that the common factor here is 3G. The devices capable of using the faster cellular data protocols have roughly 40-50 per cent less battery to work with from a single charge. I know the processor comes into it too. If I examine the battery usage rates against the wireless data protocols supported by the device you can see a direct correlation between 3G and low battery life. Devices like the Touch, Wizard and Vox all boast 2 day charging cycles, but only offer GPRS and EDGE. The S730, Hermes, Trinity and Ameo have the much higher speed UMTS and HSDPA functionality but will need recharging daily. With 3G signals still a little unreliable (but getting better every day) it's an interesting trade off.

Operating System The S730 comes shipped with the Standard (Smartphone) flavour of Windows Mobile 6. If you're a Professional user and you are thinking of going standard the standard strain is very close to the Pocket PC version. Under the bonnet however, there are a wealth of differences in the UI (user interface). The majority of these differences centre around the lack of a touch screen on the Smartphone devices. This means the user must be capable of using the Dpad, phone pad and soft buttons to control all aspects of the device where previously a stylus and touch screen was used. I've never had a problem using the Smartphone UI, I think it's quite good in fact, but I've often thought some of the differences need not be so different. The differences between the Today screen and its Smartphone counterpart the Homescreen for example, I can't see why the Today screen couldn't have been implemented the same way. In the same vein is the menu system. The Professional menu system is fully controllable by the d-pad and could be launched by the left soft key, so why not use the same across both platforms? In general the Standard UI is close enough to the Professional one for the average user to switch between the two, although be warned, there is a learning curve. At each generation since WM2003 we've heard that Microsoft will be combining both platforms into a single OS. Again we're hearing that WM7 (or whatever it is called) will be the one. Fingers crossed.

The list of programs on the HTC S730 by default is: ActiveSync - The WM client component of ActiveSync 4.xx Adobe Reader LE - PDF Viewer Audio Manager - Skinned front end to Windows Media Player Audio Booster - Simple graphic equaliser application Bluetooth Explorer - Bluetooth File manager Calculator - Calculator application Call History - Links to Call History applet Camera - HTC Camera control application Comm Manager - HTC client application for managing the phone / Bluetooth and WiFi (HTC application) Connection Setup - Wizard to set up your SP settings for GPRS etc Contacts - Links to Contacts applet Calendar - Links to Calendar applet Flash Lite Player - Allows you to play flash content on the device Games - Bubble Breaker & Solitaire File Explorer - WM 5.0 File Manager Interactive - Downloadable content access Internet Sharing - Allows you to use your device as a modem Internet Explorer - Web browser Java - Java Midlet Manager Messenger - Microsoft Instant Messenger application Messaging - Links to messaging applet Message Options - MMS and SMS settings Notes - Note taking application Office Mobile - Allows you to view Word, Excel and Powerpoint files Pictures & Videos - WM 5.0 Video / Picture viewing application RSS Hub - Allows you to browse RSS news feeds Quick Notes - Note creation application SAP Settings - Remote SIM Access over Bluetooth Speed Dial - Voice activated speed dialling / application launching (HTC application) Streaming Media - Streaming images etc over GPRS/3G Tasks - WM 5.0 To-Do list application Task Manager - Allows you to monitor and control your device resources Video Recorder - Links to Video recording applet Voice Notes - Links to Voice recording applet Windows Live - Windows Live Signin Windows Media - Media player.

After using a few "grey" versions of Windows Mobile 6 and the Smartphone version on the Vox I'd decided for the duration of testing the S730 I was going to "go commando" (from a software perspective obviously) and not install any third party apps on the machine at all. HTC have added several new applications to the Microsoft suite offered in the WM6 OS; HTC Home, HTC Audioplayer and Task manager are the main ones. HTC Home is a Homescreen plugin that offers a three tab display. The first tab gives you Service provider information along with the date, a large digital clock display and indicators for SMS, Email and missed calls. The second tab shows your local weather, in a daily or 5 day display. The final tab is a 10 person photo contact launcher application. In general HTC Home is a very welcome and very usable addition to WM6. It's a little limited from a configuration perspective and the list of cities available weather wise is quite short. It is however free, and very easy on the eye. HTC have also updated the COM manager aesthetically, which looks good and added Audiomanager, a skinned front end to Windows Media Player that fits visually with the HTC Home look. Task manager does what it says on the tin allowing you to monitor the current programs in use. All these applications are nothing new to Pocket PC users but have been a log time coming for the Smartphone platform. Very good news indeed.

Performance One of the major advantages the S730 has over the S710 is the newer more powerful processor. Whilst the S710 ships with the standard low power OMAP 201 Mhz chip as seen in most of the newer Smartphones the S730 has a new 400Mhz Qualcomm chip. I found the S730 to be reasonably swift in general operation, but not overly so. There is still a noticeable lag when the screen changes from portrait to landscape and vice versa. Similarly the navigation through the menus was not a rapid as I expected with device pausing for thought occasionally. I'm assuming that this is ROM based and that future updates will address this. Fingers crossed. From a memory perspective I found a couple of times I experienced the "your system is short of memory please close down some applications message". I found this a little disturbing as I only has the base software installed on the machine. I admit that I was running on a Push email system with the HTC Home plugin enabled. I also had HTC Audio manager in the background and internet explorer too. Now this is quite a lot of activity, but for me it's normal usage. These are core apps and I want to be able to have them all running concurrently. HTC should have given the device enough RAM to use its core applications in my opinion. While I did have a couple of memory issues there was no issue with stability what so ever. I did not experience any unforced soft resets, nor did I need to soft reset to clear down the memory. The S730 was rock solid.

Value Cost: £249 +vat (£292.58 inc). From a value perspective I think most people will look at the S730 from either of two angles. I'll look at the S730 as a first time buyer or as an upgrade. Firstly if this is your first WM device for a while, or ever, the S730 is exceptional value with its below £300 price tag. There's a whole load of device for your money here and you'll not be disappointed. If you're upgrading from a recent Smartphone or more specifically the S710 (I hate to keep harping back to the S710 but..... ) the jury is still out. As I've said it's undoubtedly a good device but is it £300 well spent? I just don't know.

Pro's & Con's

Fantastic looking	Poor battery life for a Smartphone
Excellent form factor (both keyboard and number pad)	No GPS
Big 400Mhz processor	Not enough RAM (64MB)
3G/HSDPA	SIM card tricky to remove
Good telephony implementation	Speaker muffles if placed on soft surface
Best 2MP camera to date	Slightly insensitive action button
Externally accessed MicroSD	Slide unlock a little too sensitive
Excellent HTC Home plugin
Very stable OS

4WM Rating 86%

Conclusion I've made no effort of hiding my opinion that the HTC Kaiser is more of a Tytn 1.5 than a Tytn 2, and I believe HTC have sold us a little short with the S730 too. I think what we have here is the Vox 1.5, and not the Vox 2 we hoped for. If you're packing an S710 already I'm just not sure whether the S730 is the best place for your hard earned cash. I don't understand the logic behind providing us a device capable of GPS but not fully enabling it. I also find it difficult to get to grips with the 1 day battery life too....shouldn't Smartphones go several days without a charge? Then there's the lack of RAM that struggles with just push email and the HTC Audio player. So the HTC S730 is a bad device then yes? Well no actually, not at all. Despite its flaws the S730 is an excellent device. The 3G/HSDPA implementation makes web browsing a pleasure and you can't argue with the superb form factor. The extra software tweaks HTC have added to WM6 really provide a slicker experience throughout and I found using it for the week I had it to be thoroughly enjoyable. HTC had the opportunity with the S730 to give us a truly legendary device and while it's not what it could have been the S730 is still arguably the best Smartphone on the market today.....with the caveat that you need to charge it every day.