HTC makes mobile work a Snap
HTC’s latest offering to the world of mobile productivity is the Snap, a compact, attractive all-in-one package that does it all. From email to web browsing to music playing to shooting a couple of home videos, the Snap is a very capable mobile Internet tool.
The HTC Snap is about the same size as Nokia’s superb E71 smartphone but, thanks to a little less metal and a bit more plastic, weighs in at a little less than E71. Not by much but enough to be noticeable. The casing itself is sleek matt-black and although mostly plastic is by no means cheap looking. It’s only when you remove the back cover to insert the sim card and battery that you notice the much flimsier feel of the HTC Snap.
Features
As far as features go, however, the Snap is up with the best of the smartphones. Built-in Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.0, GPS, a microSD/SDHC expansion slot, and 2-megapixel camera/camcorder make the Snap a very versatile tool. The phone runs Microsoft’s Windows Mobile 6.1 which means it also has Internet Explorer Mobile, Office Mobile and a degree of complexity that only Microsoft could engineer. Which is not to say that the Snap is hard to use but there are, in most case, multiple ways of achieving the same end result which can lead to confusion at times. Most of the most important features can, thankfully, be accessed through the initial “home screen” which takes just a little getting used to. Other key settings can be accessed through the “start” menu and the settings options which can lead to a bewildering array of choices.
Input on the Snap is through the raised-key keyboard which is surprisingly usable for its size. The four-row keyboard houses a full QWERTY keyboard and a bottom row with quick access buttons and a spacebar. For some reason the developers chose to position the number keys one row in from the left. Which means that numbers are neither on the far left nor in the middle of the keypad. Some users may like this approach but I found it to be offputting and it took a little time to get used to their positioning.
One of the best features on the Snap is the very responsive trackball in the top-centre of the keypad. The ball is easy to use and gives just enough feedback to help find your way around.
Inner Circle
The Snap places heavy emphasis on messaging as its core feature, so much so that one of its marketing strategies is the obvious green circle button on the bottom-right hand side of the keypad. The “Inner Circle” button is designed to be a quick and easy way to access messages from a defined group of friends instead of having to wade through a full mailbox of incoming email. Essentially, the Inner Circle is simply a filter on incoming messages that can be defined by the user, with a nice green button to make it easy to access those users. It’s a simple enough feature but with a little time invested in setting up an Inner Circle list, it could be among the Snap’s best features.
Multimedia also has its place in the Snap with a 2-megapixel camera and camcorder and an audio player. The quality of the pictures from the camera is average and the video good enough. The audio player is basic but works well enough when you’ve worked out how to fast-forward and rewind through media using the keypad and the 2.4-inch screen is just big enough to make video usable on the Snap.
With a range of connections available including HSDPA, GPRS, EDGE as well as Wi-Fi the Snap is great for keeping in constant contact and the communications manager makes it easy enough to switch connections on and off.
Default storage is 256MB on the Snap but this can be supplemented with the MicroSD card slot hidden below the back cover. The phone also includes built-in GPS and ships with Google Maps by default and has Assisted GPS as an option to speed up satellite functions.
It’s not very often that phone reviews discuss the charging mechanism of the phone in question but the HTC Snap’s does warrant a mention. The Snap has just one external connector: a mini-USB connector. This single point is used to both charge the phone, through an electrical socket or PC USB port, as well as being the connector for external earphones shipped with the phone. It’s a design many other makers could take a lead from as it keeps the connection options as simple as possible.
There is a lot to like about the Snap, and very little to fault it on. Most users will find it easy enough to use straight out of the box and power users will appreciate its features that make it so powerful.
HTC Snap discussion
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