Guest Paul [MVP] Posted August 10, 2004 Report Share Posted August 10, 2004 It's nearly finished, and it'll be online in the next day or so - Paul's C500 Review. Just to give everyone a little taster of what to expect, here's an excerpt! Performance The C500 features the same amount of memory as the E200, but sports a new generation OMAP 200MHz processor, as opposed to the '132'MHz processor found in the E200. The result? This phone is FAST! It is noticeably snappier in use than the E200, and there really are times when you notice the difference. The (new and redesigned) spinny-round-please-wait thing does still appear, but it's less frequent than before and doesn't display for as long! So all this is at the result of battery life right? Well, er...... NO! Battery life on the C500 is absolutely stunning! It seems that the processor is doing something clever behind the scenes when the phone is being unused... added to a whole host of other optimisations that HTC have made, my battery life on the C500 is TRIPLE that of my E200! I suspect even more impressive gains will be witnessed by users who leave their phone idle for long periods of time. So... a big thumbs up for performance! Compatability Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition is designed to be backward compatible with previous Smartphone software, and - good stuff - every Smartphone application I have tried works fine... until it comes to games. OK, this is not a gaming phone, but if you ARE a gamer, you need to think carefully about whether to buy this phone yet. When doing (very late on) testing of this phone for Orange, I came across a bug. A bug that was found too late to be fixed in time for the retail build. (Why oh why didn't you get me the phone earlier Orange?) The bug is, put simply, that a vast majority of games do not run correctly. Many experience terrible flickering, some freeze, and some, yes, do run fine. Orange are currently working on a fix that I am hoping will be available soon, but in the interim, the gaming situation on the C500 is quite desperate. :cry: Read THE most complete review yet of the Orange SPV C500 Smartphone, only on MoDaCo. P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Simon Desser Posted August 10, 2004 Report Share Posted August 10, 2004 "]The bug is, put simply, that a vast majority of games do not run correctly. Many experience terrible flickering, some freeze, and some, yes, do run fine. Orange are currently working on a fix that I am hoping will be available soon, :cry: :cry: :cry: So that probably means from day one, we'll be asking:- "When's there going to be a C500 ROM update?" :? :? :? :wink: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul [MVP] Posted August 10, 2004 Report Share Posted August 10, 2004 Maybe finally we can have something worth downloading on 'Downloads' (formerly 'Orange Update'), and make it's existence worthwhile! P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest ferret Posted August 10, 2004 Report Share Posted August 10, 2004 Coming Soon: Paul's C500 Review (The sequel) - Entitled, "Post your C500 bugs and issues here thread". (Sorry, couldn't resist). Orange are currently working on a fix that I am hoping will be available soon Oh dear, looks like the chimps at Bristol Zoo have had their leave cancelled. I'm in a foul mood tonight aren't I ? :wink: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest dearsina Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 Games? Like handango games or emu games? As long as the gnuboy emu works (and hopefully also with sound thanks to the superpowerful processor) I'm calling 150 for an upgrade. Since you say it is affecting a whole host of games, is it correct to classify it as a bug? Perhaps 'work of 10 drunken monkeys in a hurry' would be more precise? But on a more serious note, could this be a resource delegation problem rather than being a small coding flaw, thus calling for a more substantial name like 'uncompatibility' rather than the ephemeral 'bug'? Not that gaming uncompatibility was a big surprise with an internal sd card and a joystick looking like that... A few other questions come to mind, but I am sure Paul will have answered all of them in the extended (or rather complete) review. sina london /needs to go to bed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest www.msmobiles.com Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 Consider extensive testing of these: - quality of sound during phone calls - both with Bluetooth headset and without headset - network operators have special programs that measure it with special metrics, but I don't know how you could test it.... - whether Bluetooth serial ports are compatible with Bluetooth GPS receivers - only latest update in E200 fixed it but I don't know how it is in Second Edition that C500 has - which version, exactly does .NET CF in this phone has ? it is possible to find out with /Windows/cgatutil.exe or so utility - just starting one EXE program that exists there arlready - how it is with SD (or mini-SD) card? is it working and reliable now? - how it is with playback of MP3 with (quasi-standard) 128kbps encoding? are they skipping from time to time, like it is in E200? - disadvantages - consider finding out also everything that is negative about this phone, not just glorious achievements, so that people will find it easier to chose betweeen this one and MPx220 - screen sizes - the one of C500 compared to E200 and MPx220 otherwise: yes, I think that this time, they use new architecture of hardware - processor, etc that can handle all the smartphone tasks and this phone may be very good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest mcwarre Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 "]The bug is, put simply, that a vast majority of games do not run correctly. As I have maintained all along; for those of you who buy this, enjoy your Beta testing :P :D :lol: People are already asking for updates and it hasn't been released yet! When will people learn? If you don't buy it then they have to reconsider selling products that are not 'fit for purpose'. I appreciate that not everything is 100% correct first time, but I ask you; allegedly crap joystick and no gaming? Come on Midnight get onto them about it; your livelihood is disappearing down the drain...... On the bright side, it seems that Orange at least have the decency not to charge the vast majority of personnel who want this phone. Come to think of it, aren't all beta testers given 'evaluation' copies for free? Enjoy........... Roll on MPx220 (at least it will be significantly more useable) A more apt thread would be BTA...... “Beta Testers Anonymous” because you must have an uncontrollable addiction to buy that rubbish :D :D :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul [MVP] Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 FWIW, I like the joystick, and overall, it IS a stunning phone! P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest barkythedog Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 it is interesting that companies are allowed to release buggy phones etc if we gave a drug to a patient under restraint that was buggy or didnt work properly we'd all could get a serious kicking or the patient could die so obviously we only buy in licescened drugs maybe the same laws should be applicable to all technology that we have in the medical proffession then we wouldnt have this problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest mcwarre Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 "]FWIW, I like the joystick, and overall, it IS a stunning phone! P Paul, Fair enough. It is down to opinions. Opinions are like a***holes; everyone has one. You sure that you didn't mean to say it is a 'cunning phone' and that you have a 'cunning plan' to make it better? Pin a tail on it and call it a weasel? :D :D (that's Baldrick from Blackadder for you wipper-snappers out there) :wink: Not that we would ever compare the O'Brienmeister to Baldrick :P :D :lol: :D I will keep an open mind and make my decision when my contract is up in Dec. I an quite sure that it will be extremely obvious (one way or another) as to the better phone............. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest fozzie Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 Paul, In light of some of the emotive comments already made about this (as yet, unreleased) phone, could you clarify a couple of things: 1. It is just a mobile telephone; it won't significantly change my life, the world, the universe etc? It won't stop war, famine or make Badger beer taste any better? 2. Orange have no legal obligation to ensure that this phone does absolutely everything that me, the rest of its' customers and all future customers could possibly dream up? 3. It is my free choose whether to buy this phone or not? If I choose not to, Orange will not go in to liquidation, their CEO will not have to take up stress therapy and join AA and I won't have to be on a constant lookout for snipers or assassination squads? I suspect the answers are NO, NO and NO! .......... I can't wait to get one :P Posted from my SmartPhone! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest zeta101 Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 its interesting that the smartphone community would put up with "that a vast majority of games do not run correctly." I mean thats not a bug if a *vast majority* dont work...fine if one or two games have compatibility problems, thats to be expected, but this is crazy. I'm not actually much of a games person really...i was hoping to use the emulators on the c500 (cos my e100 is a it slow hehe)...so im actually not that bothered with this problem as long as emulators work (do they work paul?), its just the principle, i mean cant tey ever get it right? HTC have made this brilliant phone and now because of orange/MS its screwed up again. I can see it now...a lot of people who are new to smartphone will see the c500 and think "wow thats a pretty good looking smartphone and it isnt a brick, i think ill take the plunge and get one" and then they find out that hardly any games work. Will orange salespeople be explicitly stating that this phone has a major bug? i wonder... we can expect a lot of whining to appear on this forum when a bunch of new users buy the c500. I would expect orange to release an update to correct this quite early (and im not talking months! lol)...ah well ill probably still buy the thing when it comes out :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest zeta101 Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 fozzie, orange DO have a legal obligation to make sure the phone does what its advertised to do...im just waiting to upgrade and see what the orange trainers have to say, if they explcitly state that theres a problem at the moment then thats fine :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest fozzie Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 zeta101, you're right - Orange do have a legal obligation to ensure the phone does do what it is advertised to do. If it doesn't, then you are entitled to a refund. Simple really! Posted from my SmartPhone! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Disco Stu Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 fozzie, orange DO have a legal obligation to make sure the phone does what its advertised to do...im just waiting to upgrade and see what the orange trainers have to say, if they explcitly state that theres a problem at the moment then thats fine :P What advertising ? :? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest maxh2003 Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 now because of orange/MS its screwed up againThing is, this looks a bit like the problems the PC world had when we all had to move from Win9x to Win2K/WinXP. But there were good reasons why we all had to make that change. This time, it looks like Microsoft have broken backward compatibility not to provide more features on the phones we'll actually be getting, but to provide *the possibility* of new features - features which the C500 isn't going to offer (e.g. 240x320 displays). That doesn't seem so clever to me. Why not bring in support for 240x320 displays etc. when, and only when, such devices are available? (Possibly they'd do this so that all us developers have to get started on compatibility now, and not later, but even so...) Think I'm with mcwarre on this one - I'm going to wait til my contract's up in December. The extra processing power is nice but it's not going to revolutionise things, and it'll be a while before full compatibility is reached. Plus, I'd be worried as to whether there'll be much software that really makes use of the extra processing power. If I was selling Smartphone software I wouldn't even expect the destination device to have .NET support, let alone a 200Mhz processor - otherwise you've just slashed your market by a factor of 10 or so... More frames-per-second in PicoDrive would be nice, though... :D orange DO have a legal obligation to make sure the phone does what its advertised to do Simple get-out for Orange, then, would be to make sure there are no disprovable claims on the advertising literature. Unless they actually promise backwards compatibility I would think they'd get away with it. Orange are currently working on a fix No disrespect to anyone at all but we've all heard that one before. Have they given you (Paul) a beta to test? In fact, is there any tangible proof that Orange can do anything about this situation? I'm second-guessing what's going on, but I have my doubts as to whether it *can* be fixed via a patch. Moreover, Orange have a good reputation for, let's say, being cautious with issuing updates. If this patch turns out to be a bit of a bodge - which it does sound like - will they ever be able to bring themselves to release it? What if it breaks someone's phone? :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest mcwarre Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 1. It is just a mobile telephone; it won't significantly change my life, the world, the universe etc? It won't stop war, famine or make Badger beer taste any better?Whilst it won't significantly change your life etc. it is not *just* a mobile telephone; it surfs the web, synchs with email outlook etc so in effect it is a mini-pc (why it runs a cut down version of windows CE). Although not even the C500 could make Badger Beer taste any better (or worse) :wink: 2. Orange have no legal obligation to ensure that this phone does absolutely everything that me, the rest of its' customers and all future customers could possibly dream up? Who is on about 'dreaming up'? People (including me) want it to do what it is meant to do. Can you imagine M$ providing an upgraded OS for your PC and not ensuring at least a significant backwards compatability for games? :roll: :roll: 3. It is my free choose whether to buy this phone or not? If I choose not to, Orange will not go in to liquidation, their CEO will not have to take up stress therapy and join AA and I won't have to be on a constant lookout for snipers or assassination squads?Exactly; why people would consider this if they are use the C500 for gaming a lot is beyond me. Whilst O may not go into liquidation if I don't buy it, if enough people see the problems then they will have a failed product............. The charges for care replacements for SPV, SPV E200 (and to some extent MPx200) must be crippling O's insurers.... I suspect the answers are NO, NO and NO! .......... I can't wait to get one :P So the answers are possibly, pose an objective question and watch for those assasination squads :wink: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul [MVP] Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 This issue CAN and WILL be fixed via a patch. I am in contact with exactly the right people at Orange to ensure it happens. It IS worth noting that the problem is not with 2003 SE, but in the implementation on the C500 - hence HTC can fix it. P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul [MVP] Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 So, my (silver) Retail unit to replace my (black) pre production unit arrived this morning, picture below. OMG the C500 looks stunning in Silver! P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest mcwarre Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 P, You say "the problem is not with 2003 SE, but in the implementation on the C500 - hence HTC can fix it". So is it the software implementation, or the hardware implementation? Hopefully not the latter....... Nice piccies thanks. Are you resisting the temptation not to fully charge it before going for it??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest midnight Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 everyone please calm down (oh AND STOP BLAMING ORANGE), jeez, the issue is a HTC issue, we did find it early, just not early enough for it to be fixed in this rom. We told Orange about the bug as soon as we could (and no, they didnt know about it), as Paul said, some games work, so if they tested the device with those games and it works then thats passed the testing phase. Orange repeatedly tell us this isnt a gaming phone, hence the decision to go with this type of joystick. The joystick is far more of a worry to me as that cant be fixed, the rom can, but they have chosen this joystick for a reason and thats apparently (i dunno cos i havent got a c500 yet) due to the fact that in normal use, navigating menus is much improved with this joystick. Who knows, one day we may see a proper gamer phone, but that day isnt yet. (oh, and for all you thinking that it's only HTC with these problems, Sagem (well Mitac actually) screwed up the GAPI implementation in the Sagem My S7, its only due to the bug being found early enough they managed to fix it, if the C500 bug was found a couple of weeks earlier we may have seen it fixed in the C500 aswell. But Mitac have had the GAPI bug since the 8380 and only now have they got around to fixing it.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul [MVP] Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 The software implementation! I'm using the battery out of my pre-prod unit, and will fully charge the new one overnight :P P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul [MVP] Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 I might have to disagree with you a little on this one Midnight, altho it is a HTC issue, Orange should have found it early enough to stop it going retail, it is an issue with their testing as much as anything else. I accept there are bugs in products, but I DO NOT accept that they should make it to market with these bugs. P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest midnight Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 well that all depends, like i said, some games work, we havent tried all games either, so we may have just been unlucky in the ones we tried are the only ones that dont work and everything else does, and as we noticed, many only crash after 5 minutes of play, which Orange aint gonna look for, if it loads, it works. Lets face it, would you have noticed it if it wasnt for the fact that Eclipse doesnt even load? :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul [MVP] Posted August 11, 2004 Report Share Posted August 11, 2004 Yeah, I would say so, I spend more than 5 minutes at a time on the bog ;-) P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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