HTC Touch Pro Release Date!

[AClotfelter]

Originally Posted by saumaun

The tone of AClotfelter's message was a little sarcastic and rude, to be honest.

It was. I admit that. And I apologize to you, because I wasn't angry at you when I wrote it.

Originally Posted by saumaun

Well, it really isn't a dealbreaker for me, but it is very important that these devices look stylish. Many times I get envious of the looks of other phones [dare I say Iphone, Instinct, Voyager, etc] Then I look at my Mogul and frown. But then I realize, I can do 20354353 time more things than they can! But I really REALLY would like it to have the same appearance as the original HTC renderings and the GSM edition. It bothers me that everything we get in the US has to be late and reduced in quality or appearance.

There are a couple of themes here that I take issue with, and I was more responding to those than to you personally.

Issue 1: Phone companies often strip features out of phones. I believe that a lot of this has to do with the fact that they believe they can remove features and dumb down a device, and they will be ok as long as a phone looks 'hip'. As long as a phone looks cool, they can sell it to the masses without having to invest as much in the technology. I look at a phone like the iPhone, and I see the triumph of style over substance. Here you have a nice hardware platform (especially the large screen and slim form) but it is very limited, because apple is not interested in allowing you to openly hack the device, or easily load custom software. It is the ultimate in generic slick coolness, but you are limited in a lot of ways by what Apple wants you to be able to do.

The Instinct is a prime example of this as well. My wife has one, and I have played around with it. It's a nice, simple, cool little handset. But after I had played around with it for a short while, I was already thinking how much better it could be if you could change this or that, generally make the device work for you. But there is none of that. With a phone like that, you get what you get, and that is it. I look at phones, the good ones anyway, as mobile computing platforms. General-purpose communications tools that you should be able to modify, enhance, and make your own. it is probably the one electronic item you will interact with more than anything else, and you shouldn't have to bend over to conform to the way that it wants to work.

A good phone is like one of those large flat lego pieces. One of the large green ones that you use as the foundation for the house you want to build. On top of that, you have a large number of pieces, blocks, to build your own creation. When a phone provider takes a perfectly good phone, and does something like reduce the RAM, or removes some of the features like the motion sensor or second camera, I feel like we are getting one of those nice large foundation lego pieces... only to discover that someone has melted holes in it.

My point is this: instead of using a lot of time and energy trying to petition or appeal to the phone companies to make the phones look cooler, we should first and foremost make sure that the platform is solid. That means making the hardware as capable as can reasonably be expected. That means not trying to lock us out of customizing and rebuilding the software as we see fit. That means making a device that, while not perfect, at least has the potential to be better than just 'good enough'.

We need to let them know that we will not accept whatever they have lying around to throw at us like some half-chewed bone. Having a cool-looking device is fine, but we need to let them know we have our priorities. When we place such a high value on a phone's looks, I fear that we are signaling the wrong priorities.

Issue 2: A lot of people on this site try to speak with authority in areas where they in fact have no genuine knowledge on the subject.

And to be clear here, I'm not talking about you, Saumaun.

Nor am I talking about the many clearly knowledgeable people who frequent this board. There are also of course people here who work for the phone providers, or have some sort of legitimate inside info.... those people are few and far between.

What I'm talking about is all of the posts where someone is looking for information, and someone else pops up as if they are the authority on the matter and state "This is the way it is" without any experience or proof. This MO is rampant in forums like this one for pre-release hardware. Look all through the Raphael forum and you will see countless posts claiming in no uncertain terms that this phone will work one way or another, or have this feature or that... these people have never touched this hardware, but neither have we, and they are counting on our inability to prove them wrong.

A lot of times, it seems like these people are just trying to state their hope for a product or its features as pure fact. A lot of these posts look like this: "No, you can not do it that way, only this way. At least I hope to god, or else such and such company is stupid". In this example, the person talking hopes that product XYZ has feature ABC, and so they seem to go around the boards stating that 'XYC' definitely supports 'ABC'... maybe in the hope that the company will read their post and make it true... I don't know.

Whatever their motives, I think behavior like that is deplorable. All those people do is obscure the real debate, and confuse people who are looking for the real information.

I say all of this because I looked at your question asking if the CDMA "guts" of a Touch Pro could be moved to a GSM body as the type of tender juicy query that those trolls live for. I'm not saying it's a stupid question, but at this point, nobody knows... and the only answers you get are going to be totally off the top of someone's head. I can understand that this is an important issue for you, but at this point, we don't even know what the CDMA Touch Pro looks like on the outside, let alone the dimensions and screw locations on the inside of the case.

Originally Posted by land2634

I would think that a guy with a post count astronomically bigger than yours should have the right to ask that type of question. Sauman is a big contributor to this site and if the form factor is important to him, I'm sure he isn't the only one. If it isn't a big factor for you, then just sit back, relax, and enjoy talk of the specs.

I wasn't saying that he didn't have the right to post a question, only stating my opinion on the matters he raised. I didn't state my opinion in a very good way, and I'm sorry he was insulted. However, him being a big contributor does not mean I can't disagree with what he says.

Originally Posted by land2634

...weren't really answering or asking a question. Your words were "take a pill"

Those weren't his words, they were mine.

[[sammich]]

AClotfelter, all is forgiven. I wasn't even mad in the first place!

I see with where you're coming from, and agree with your post

[land2634]

Originally Posted by AClotfelter

I wasn't saying that he didn't have the right to post a question, only stating my opinion on the matters he raised. I didn't state my opinion in a very good way, and I'm sorry he was insulted. However, him being a big contributor does not mean I can't disagree with what he says.

Gotcha, just wanted to make sure you didn't feel like Sauman wasn't a pretty big contributor to the forum. No biggie.

Originally Posted by AClotfelter

Those weren't his words, they were mine.

Yeah, misread the name...

[Yibrushn]

And once again peace reigns at ppcgeeks

[drexappeal]

I don't know how solid this website is, but for Upcoming Sprint Cell Phones, it has the HTC Herman Expected on October 2, 2008.

http://www.phonearena.com/htmls/Spri...ier-c_2_3.html

[[sammich]]

Originally Posted by drexappeal

I don't know how solid this website is, but for Upcoming Sprint Cell Phones, it has the HTC Herman Expected on October 2, 2008.

http://www.phonearena.com/htmls/Spri...ier-c_2_3.html

So far, I like the picture of the Herman. If it stays the same between GSM and CDMA, that'd be great!

[dabackwoodboy]

yea i jus hope the date is right

[drexappeal]

Originally Posted by dabackwoodboy

yea i jus hope the date is right

Me too! If it is, I should be hearing from my rep a couple weeks before or possibly even when the Touch Victor is released in the stores!

[EtherealRemnant]

Originally Posted by drexappeal

I don't know how solid this website is, but for Upcoming Sprint Cell Phones, it has the HTC Herman Expected on October 2, 2008.

http://www.phonearena.com/htmls/Spri...ier-c_2_3.html

That would make me *INSANELY* happy - my birthday!!!

[meanbastard]

My friends think I'm crazy cause I plan on picking it up when it comes out no matter what the price. Looking forward to that Oct. release date if that link is correct.