Review

Review: Hands-on With the EVO 3D

One of the most anticipated phones of the summer was released today at Sprint, and we’re here to tell you if the HTC EVO 3D is everything it was hoped to be.  I took a trip over to the Sprint Store at 6905 S. Emerson Ave here in Indianapolis, IN, where I was met by some very friendly and helpful people.  I got a first-hand look at the EVO 3D and put it through some tests.

The Package:

The EVO 3D is a pretty standard HTC design, black plastic, lightweight, but sturdy.

On the front you have the standard Android buttons for home, settings, back and search.  You can see the front-facing camera in the upper right hand corner.

On the top is a headphone jack and power button.

On one side you have volume control, and a 2D/3D toggle along with the camera button.

The other side has the mini-USB jack.

On the back is the stylish camera design.

The phone feels great to hold, it’s light, and looks amazing.

The Software:

The software is Android 2.3.3 with HTC Sense 3.0.  The phone does come loaded with tons of bloatware.  True to their word, HTC has made pretty much all of this software removable, which should free up a heck of a lot of space for you.

The interface is very smooth though, with no lag that I could detect and the display looks fantastic.  It’s very colorful, very vibrant, and comes with a number of customization options.  The inclusions of HTC’s Skins, Scenes and multiple lockscreens is a really nice feature that allows you to add a personal touch to your experience and tailor things to fit you a little better.

HTC Scenes:

Scenes basically sets different themes for your phone.  It changes colors, backgrounds, and in some cases even icons.  6 different scenes come loaded on the 3D.

Skins:

Skins, like scenes, change the look of your screens.  3 skins come loaded on the 3D.

Lockscreens:

The lockscreens, obviously, change the look of your lockscreen, but also add some apps related to the themes on your lockscreen for quick access.  For example you choose the “stocks” lockscreen and some business related apps are added to the lockscreen.  You can drag one of those apps to the Sense circle and quick launch it without unlocking the device.  The 3D comes with 6 lockscreen themes preloaded.

The Browser:

I found browsing to be very quick, even though the phone was on a 3G connection, rather than 4G.  The browser is your standard Android browser, but works well for all intents and purposes.

The Camera:

Ok, ok.  All this stuff is well and good, but what about the 3D part?  Is it worth it?  Is it cool?  The answer is mixed in my opinion.  The camera quality is really good.  In both 2D and 3D modes the pictures were excellent, better than the camera on my G2X, even though they’re the same resolution.  The 3D mode looks pretty awesome when held at the right angle.  And therein lies the problem.  When you look at it straight-on the 3D effect is very obvious.  You definitely get a depth-of-field effect that you won’t find on any other phone camera out there.  But if you tilt the device you lose that effect somewhat, and you see an odd kind of sparkle over your whole image.  The same applies to videos.  I’ve included a couple shots from the camera, but you’re really not going to get the true look of the thing on a 2D screen.  It has to be experienced first-hand.

The Verdict?

So is the phone all it’s cracked up to be?  In my opinion, yes.  The software is great.  It’s fast, it can be cleaned of bloatware, and it offers a lot of customization right out of the box.  The device itself feels good in the hands and it’s certainly a light one.  The design looks really cool, and the stylish camera on the back is certainly a wow factor when you look at the phone.  The 3D is also really nice, and as the software updates roll in I think it will only improve.  If you have a 3D TV or monitor that you can use along with those 3D images and videos you’ll be taking, then the EVO 3D is absolutely the phone for you.

People who own a 3D TV will be the best served with a device like this.  The price is right, too, and you won’t pay anything extra for the 3D capabilities.  Whether or not you decide to spring the extra $10 for premium data, the phone itself is really fast and I found the 3G connection to work fine for browsing and downloading apps.  If you plan to make use of streaming video a lot or online gaming, though, you’ll want to pick up the premium data from Sprint.

Again I want to say Thanks to the people at the Emerson Avenue Sprint store for letting me manhandle this thing for a while.  They were very helpful!

Related Stories