Having recently migrated (or in the process of evaluating whether to keep it or not) from a WindowsMobile phone to an Android phone, I see some limitations in the Android 2.1 interface of my Verizon Incredible:

1) I cannot choose to SORT the People entries by FIRSTNAME, LASTNAME or BUSINESS, as is common in the WindowsMobile (and other) interfaces.  This is not a trivial issue.

2) Why does the Android Calendar not provide a Category option for those of us familiar with the WindowsMobile (and Outlook) environment?

3) This phone is not for those who are used to a Point-An-Shoot cellphone (ie. open it up, hit a speed-dial button and you're off to the races).  I'm not even going to could the "clicks" required to perform that simple task, given that the phone can "wake up" on whatever screen it was last displaying.

4) As so many others have stated, the battery life of this device is severely limited.  Don't even consider going away for the day without taking along either a spare, fully charged battery, an AC to USB power supply, a cigeratte to USB adapter with USB 2.0 to USB Micro cable (luckily my work Blackberry has the same cable), a USB-connected emergency battery source or a laptop with the USB 2.0 to USB Micro cable .

5) The documentation provided with this phone was minimal (granted everything these days is online) but for a phone that can be configured nine ways to Sunday, there isn't even a base configuration description for those of us willing to pare down the running apps with third party software in order to save some battery usage.  To date, the only thing I've found to do is to RESET THE PHONE.

6) Did I miss a section on this website that discusses migration from WindowsMobile to Android?  I know that there is a Google interface, provided I can import (ActiveSync 4.5) my old phone to MSOutlook on my laptop.  Again, not much in the way of documentation.

My son (owner of a Moto Droid) tells me that the HTC Incredible is worth keeping but the jury is still out on this.  My 30 day window from Verizon is closing so if I don't hear something positive soon, it might be curtains for Android 2.1 for me.

David

To change or not to change... that is the question! I am a convert from WinMo and have not looked back.

1. Android takes a little different approach then WM... basically, it is expecting you to just "search" for the contact you are looking for instead of scrolling down a list. If you give a try, it really does work better and is more natural... it makes sense, but it is a different philosophy.

2. Android just does not have the "deep" Exchange/Outlook integration just yet, but they are working on it it appears.

3. It really is a bridge between a dedicated camera and a cellphone camera. I love it myself... you can set a short-cut key on the home screen to make it easier to get to it.

4. Over the weekend just past, I took the Incredible off the charger @ 7:30am Saturday morning and did not put it back on until 10:00pm Sunday night! I used the device as needed, but not as much as normal during the week. The "trick" I use right now is plug it up when I go to bed. When I wake-up in the morning, turn the power off and leave it plugged up. The LED light will change back from green to amber. It charges for another 30 minutes or so will I get ready, the light is back to green by this time. I am good to go all day again. I still carry a spare USB cable and a car charger.

5. The device really takes care of itself, and if you really get a full charge on the battery, you should be OK.

6. hTC has their hTC Sync app that should do just what you are looking for here...

Hope all of this helps...

There is a 200+ page manual that covers just about everything you are having problems with. It is available in PDF on this site. I have had two Win Mobile devices and would never consider going back. I have no problem integrating with Outlook on my PC.  Grab the latest version of K-9, the Jorte calendar app and you will be much happier.

I am an attorney with over 1,000 in Outlook which I synced to my Incredible yesterday.  I was appalled that there was no option of organizing them on my phone last name then first.  First name then last isn't feasible for my business.  After a little searching on the Android Market today it appears that I found an app thats a perfect solution:   "Better Contacts by Scott Stephen"  It has the following features-

   -Sort by last, first name, company or display name

   -Group filter

   -Display or not photo and it's size

   -Alphabetical sidebar for quick browsing

   -All contact details

   -Call log

I've used it all day and it seems to work great so far.  Hallelujah to the Android Market for making life a lot easier!

Joe,

Check your contacts immediately!

When I transferred my (over 2000) contacts (so there!) from Outlook to the Incredible, via HTC's SYNC program, it truncated all my contact "memo" fields to about 256 characters.  Screwed me up in about a dozen or so places, so far.

RE: 'searching' vs. 'scrolling.'  No, it really doesn't work better if you have hundreds and hundreds of contacts.  Say I want to locate 'Joe Blow" in the list.  I scroll down and find a haystack containing a hundred or so 'Joes" somewhere among which is the right one.  Now instead of scanning the first word in each list entry, I have to read the entire line to find the correct 'Joe.'  This is bad design.

Besides, back when user interface design was young, one of the guiding principles was to allow the user to customize anything that wasn't absolutely fundamental to the central function of the application. Are there any other widely used address books for ANY platform that impose one single display format on the user?

The People app, the email, the browser — all of them seem to have been hacked together by a bunch of 20-somethings under the influence of too much Jolt cola, people whose primary use for their mobile phones is social media. Many obvious features and customizations are lacking so that these apps are only border-line usable by business people.