San Francisco Vs Hero?

[Guest Jetpac]

The question keeps getting lost in the main SF thread, but how does the SF compare to a phone like the HTC HERO?

its all well and good comparing to the desire and galaxy S, but those are flagships, and the wildfire and pulse ar both entry level.

So what about comparissons to the dated flagship models that people may still have from running contracts?

Im currently using a Hero with a custom rom, contract is up soon and was thinking about this phone + a £10 sim only contract

Is the SF a worthwhile upgrade from the HTC Hero? as they seem very similarly specced, battery comparrison etc?

[Guest clivec]

IMHO it's better than a hero in every respect, even on a modded rom, all except the camera, still photo's are ok, video is pathetic. The one good thing i've noticed is that my hero wouldn't playback a lot of previous video's i'd recorded from other phones i'd owned (nokia's and the like) if they were over a certain size/quality. Whereas the SF has played everything i've thrown at it so far. The processor might not be the zippiest in the world but the available RAM makes it seem better than it is. This thing's not even been JIT'd or overclocked yet, and i'm sure the camera video quality can be improved with a custom ROM too.

+1 to the SF from me

(hero was my first ever android phone, loved it)

[Guest Jetpac]

IMHO it's better than a hero in every respect, even on a modded rom, all except the camera, still photo's are ok, video is pathetic. The one good thing i've noticed is that my hero wouldn't playback a lot of previous video's i'd recorded from other phones i'd owned (nokia's and the like) if they were over a certain size/quality. Whereas the SF has played everything i've thrown at it so far. The processor might not be the zippiest in the world but the available RAM makes it seem better than it is. This thing's not even been JIT'd or overclocked yet, and i'm sure the camera video quality can be improved with a custom ROM too.

+1 to the SF from me

(hero was my first ever android phone, loved it)

Speedwise in comparison?

i know it wont be as zippy as the desire etc. (but i dont want to pay the extra 150 they want for the phone on upgrade +the 7.50 a month i would be paying over a sim only contract).

Would you mind testing the perfromance with the Angry birds beta? to see how well it runs?

Does the SF make use of Assisted GPS or is it only capable of standard GPS?

How is the battery in comparison? or full stop infact (as the spec sheets put the battery at about half of what the hero is capable of!?)

cheers!

[Guest daniel_owen_uk]

Coming from the Hero myself I would it's better in every way too, aside from the camera.

Screen is stupidly better.

GPS locks in my kitchen almost instantly, miles quicker than the hero.

Angry birds plays no bother :lol:

Battery life is same if not a little better.

[Guest amoebauk]

I find angry birds beta on my Hero (Froyd Villain 2.2 Rom, overclocked to 691mhz) a little jittery at times.

I am hoping hoping the little extra oomph the Blade has fixes that. If not, well at least it'll look nicer on the better screen...

[Guest Cealum]

Sorry for offtopic, but could someone compare it to a Motorola Milestone ? Could get one for 180€ (155 GBP) .. should i buy the Milestone or the Orange SF ?

[Guest David Horvath]

Sorry for offtopic, but could someone compare it to a Motorola Milestone ? Could get one for 180€ (155 GBP) .. should i buy the Milestone or the Orange SF ?

I would stick to the Milestone if you ask me..

[Guest Cealum]

I would stick to the Milestone if you ask me..

could you explain why? one good point is, i could buy it in germany, so no problems with guarantee :lol:

[Guest David Horvath]

could you explain why? one good point is, i could buy it in germany, so no problems with guarantee :lol:

Its sold in a high number worldwide and it has a decent physical keyboard. Its one of the best phones with Android from Motorola. Think about playing Quake 3 on it B) You would have a hard time with the Blade B)

[Guest Cealum]

But you can`t install costum roms and anything on the Milestone or? Im a total newbie to android and android hacking. Also the Blade is compared to the Desire.Is the Milestone as good as this ?

[Guest David Horvath]

But you can`t install costum roms and anything on the Milestone or? Im a total newbie to android and android hacking. Also the Blade is compared to the Desire.Is the Milestone as good as this ?

Not everybody wants to hack Desire or Milestone. Everybody wants to hack Pulse and G1. The reason is rom quality. If i could i would buy a desire, desire z, or milestone. Its too expensive, so i stick to Blade.

[Guest Cealum]

Not everybody wants to hack Desire or Milestone. Everybody wants to hack Pulse and G1. The reason is rom quality. If i could i would buy a desire, desire z, or milestone. Its too expensive, so i stick to Blade.

As i said, im totaly new. With your Iphone you needed to jailbreak it, to get homebrew. Is it the same with Android or is the only reason the rom quality? Otherwise i think, im going to buy a Milestone.

[Guest David Horvath]

As i said, im totaly new. With your Iphone you needed to jailbreak it, to get homebrew. Is it the same with Android or is the only reason the rom quality? Otherwise i think, im going to buy a Milestone.

You can easily install homebrew soft on Android, its open and based on Linux and open source community. If you have it "hacked" you can install custom kernels and specialized software what normal users are not using. I'm not using root rights at all, altough my pulse is rooted.

I think if you can buy a high end Android smartphone, dont really bother with hackability. I wouldnt pay that much, rather than buying a cheaper one, and hack it :lol: Thats personal opinion.

[Guest Cealum]

hmm.. still not sure what to do, other opinions ? or should i make a new topic, because its offtopic ?

[Guest Ufufu]

hmm.. still not sure what to do, other opinions ? or should i make a new topic, because its offtopic ?

Don't even think about it, just get the Milestone. The Blade seems to be awesome for a low-end device but it can't compete with the high end devices - there's a reason it's that cheap.

However the price you are quoting (180 euros) seems too low to be true - unless it's from a shop or a person you trust you should be careful.

[Guest clivec]

ang on, ang on, i've just come from a milestone straight to the blade. I sold it for more second hand than i spent buying the blade (obviously) but keyboard aside, I have to say, the blade is better. Now my milestone was overclocked to 1Ghz on a custom ROM, and don't get me wrong, it was a nice phone, but it was let down by the fact that it only had 256mb of RAM on board. Once you have a few screens worth of widgets on and email going on and so on, you quickly get short of RAM, which means that switching between apps isn't as quick as it is on the Blade. Plus, the keyboard on the milestone is really not very good, so it doesn't make up for it in that respect.

As a comparison, with much the same set up on both phones, i had about 40mb of ram on first boot on the milestone, compared to about 220mb on the blade.

Just cos its cheap, doesn't make it very second rate

Oh, sorry, the camera on the milestone was quite good, but its pretty average on the blade.

[Guest hong99]

Coming from HTC Hero myself i finally brought my SF (Blade)...I'm not sure which is better since they are both rather niffty phones. On 1 hand i really love my HTC hero. But i will keypoint some points.

Materials: Material wise the Hero feels far more robust and prestige feel. The Blade feels rubbery maybe a little cheap. But by far no where near the worst I felt.

Screen: Without a doubt SF is better by a country mile. It's sharper, better viewing angles more vibrant with true blacks. Hero is good and sufficient but Blade is just better. The SF is 3.5 inches compared to Hero's 3.2 inches. Hero is TFT LCD screen where as SF is AMOLED screen.

Lights and Notifications: Hero seems better as the buttons are lit up during the dark. A feature i think is missed and would be nice on SF. I like the hero when you have missed call, msg, etc ... the trackball will flash. On the SF the Back button is backlit (red or green) for notications.

Buttons: The hero has more buttons and they are all backlit...so access in dark is nicer. Plus hero has extra Phone, Search buttons. Hero has extra Trackball.

USB Connectivity: Suprisingly welcome that SF comes with Micro USB. Far better than HTC exclusive USB cable and port. SF is better only because it's more standard and easy to replace the cable at cheaper cost.

Performance: Hero feels a bit sluggish now. SF is smoother experience thanks to the faster processor. Hero 528 mhz (about) whereas SF is 600 mhz. Also noted that 3D gallery (android app) the 3D effects feels smoother and pinch zoom on photo's is far smoother than Hero.

Speaker (Placement): Both speakers are great. Hero is at the back of the phone whereas SF is on the bottom right hand side. When place on the table i'd say SF has better placement. So SF is better here.

Lock Screen & Power: I prefer the SF here. When both devices are in Lock mode the HTC hero can be unlocked by swiping OR pressing Menu button which is find is annoying (especially with MENU button). SF must be swipe screen which is how it supposed to be. Also many times HTC Hero is powered on via the face button on the phone accidently. Not so with SF. SF at the top and must hold for a second or so. So no accidental operation. Hero can have custom lock screen via HTC sense. SF is just standard froyo lockscreen. (not very customisation.

Size: Both are identical in size but minus the raised chin on the SF. Also SF looks slightly thinner in thickness.

Camera: Hero has far better camera 5MP (hero) vs 3.2MP (SF) but both are lacking any sort of flash so both seem poor in low light conditions. Both also have autofocus and touch focus. Regular Geotagging, time stamp, etc.

Firmware: By default (out of the box) Hero is android 1.5 and SF is 2.1 (eclair) so SF is better in that respect. But both are upgradable to froyo 2.2. But sidenote Officially Hero is 2.1 but SF (aka Blade) has 2.2. I prefer 2.2 froyo and SF is much more stable and better usability.

Interface: I prefer HTC sense interface to all so Hero has the edge. But then again there is nothing wrong with custom stock android 2.2 since sense can be emulated accross via apps from the store...ie fancy widget, visual bookmarks, peoples widget, kakimemo, etc..

Rooting, Hacking, Community: Hero seems to be all about customizations so there is far more roms and community support out there. SF is also heating up with growing community and interest thanks to cheap price. Both phones can have custom firmware, root access and A2SD.

Features: I'd say they are a draw in this aspect. GPS, Touch Capacitative Touch screen, Multitouch (pinch zoom, etc with 2 fingers), Accelerometer, Brightness sensor, Vibrate, WiFi, Bluetooth, Compass, etc.

Batterylife: HTC is probably slighly longer but barely noticeable. SF has decent life. Assuming standby time. But day to day use both i'd

say will last 4-5 hours. Using Wifi, 3G data network. Both will need to charge within a day.

Price: SF is an achievement. Hurray!! 99 pounds for a very functional phone and matches pound for pound for HTC hero (a once 400 pound phone). SF maybe missing the feel good factor of HTC hero and that's only because of the price.

Overall Winner: (Drumroll)..... ZTE Blade (Orange San Francisco) ... yes yes ...you not read wrong and i am not mad!! ZTE Blade is better. for 100 pounds your getting state of the art Android 2.2 (sony ericsson x10 is only 1.6) phone that is easy to hack and root. A gorgeous 3.5 inch touch capacitative (not resistive like other cheap Android phone) with multitouch (2 finger pinch zoom) functionality (sony ericsson x10 xperia phone does not have...lol). SF is easily unlockable to all networks (especially like me.... if you hate Orange network) via unlock code from ebay for £1.50.

Closing words.... get one now...guaranteed you won't be disappointed. :)

[Guest ddotpatel]

Coming from HTC Hero myself i finally brought my SF (Blade)...I'm not sure which is better since they are both rather niffty phones. On 1 hand i really love my HTC hero. But i will keypoint some points..........

Big props for that post mate. All the key info you could ever need on the subject. I think you have just swung it for me,.... Phone recycling bag will be ordered today.

[Guest BigOmar]

The Orange SF has the potential to become the AK-47 of Smartphones

cheap,robust and reliable.

[Guest Spaennis]

The Orange SF has the potential to become the AK-47 of Smartphones

cheap,robust and reliable.

+1!! xD Totally agree! ;D