HTC S743 with Windows Mobile 6.1 Standard

     HTC's recent devices, such as the Touch Diamond, Pro, and HD, all have the most recent version of TouchFLO 3D which brings a finger-friendly, information rich, and attractive design to the main screen of Windows Mobile touchscreen devices (seen above). But in the case of the S743, where the platform that they used - WinMo Standard - is not as capable, they made several small changes, none of which are hugely impressive.

    This is the default Home screen, called HTC Home. It's essentially the default sliding-panel WinMo Standard interface, but with a few changes. I should mention that you can dial right from the home screen by using the numeric keypad. So to bring up Bob, you'd type 2 - 6 - 2, and the device would find relevant matches. This allows for very speedy dialing. The default background is actually solid gray - this beach scene was built into the device and I think it has a better look.

HTC has added the ability to preview email messages and SMS through one of the panels. Nice.

Also new - we can cycle through our Internet Explorer favorites, and launch a page right from this screen.

HTC has added weather to the sliding panel interface (sans the animations)...

...which can be expanded to a simple five-day forecast.

    Now, if you slide open the keyboard while on the home screen, you'll get this Action Menu for about five seconds. The idea is that if you've opened the keyboard, you probably want to do something relating to messaging. If this is not the case, you can exit, or wait a few seconds, and you're back the Home screen. This can be turned off if it's annoying.

Ok, let's drill down into the Start menu. You'll find that HTC's offering of added programs isn't terribly interesting (I have added Skyfire myself, seen above).

Here is a huge annoyance, there are no scroll bars in the Start menu! You have to hit More to move on.

Here we are in the multimedia folder.

Here's something great - HTC has brought over the look of the Camera Album app found on their newer devices. It is a pleasant way to look through your photos.

And from the Camera Album, you can rotate the image, save as a contact, etc.

Then, when you open a photo, you get this menu that allows you to email the photo, add to contact, start slideshow, etc.

The S743 comes with Office Mobile 2007.

If we drill into Accessories, we can access Connection Setup which will configure your device to various GSM carriers, plus Adobe Reader LE for PDFs, Comm Manager, and the other usuals.

The skin for the Comm Manager is among the best I've ever seen on a Windows Mobile non-touchscreen devices - it's similar to that of the Touch Diamond/Pro/HD.

In the second pane of Accessories, we can access Task Manager to kill programs, Internet Sharing (always helpful for tethering to a laptop), and QuickGPS (for getting quicker GPS fixes).

Though not as good as Microsoft Voice Command, Voice Commander lets you talk to your device and issue commands without training it...

...and it's pretty easy to use.

    When someone calls, you get a larger than usual photo in the caller ID...nice! Also, like the Touch Diamond/Pro/HD, the device will vibrate when a caller picks up when you call someone. This avoids you holding the phone up to your ear until someone answers.

Here's a small HTC innovation: while on a call, you can use the D-Pad to access certain functions that would normally be buried in the right soft key: speakerphone, hold, conference call, view contact, and mute.

And as we expect, this is what the calendar app looks like.

And here is the contacts app. As mentioned earlier, you can dial right from the home screen, so you don't need to go into Contacts first.

Does this look familiar? It's the volume meter from the Touch Pro/Diamond/HD, brought over to the S743.

Let's drill into Settings to see if we have any unique entries.

From Power Management, you can switch on and off automatic lighting. This is recommended to conserve battery.

Here is the second pane of Settings.

This is where you turn on and off the Action Menu, that is, the four-choice messaging picker shown earlier.

And this is the third pane of Settings. Nothing interesting here.

In case you missed it, here is the software tour we took.

CAMERA

The camera application performs well and is similar to that of the other HTC devices.

Once you take a picture, you can use the D-Pad area to exercise certain commands like: trash, add to contact, email, etc.

You can change settings such as brightness, white balance...

...plus adjust the resolution and quality.

Here is an outdoor shot from the 3.1MP camera. If you click on the image for the original, you'll find a lot of noise, and the colors are not accurate. The snow looks more gray than it does white, etc.

And indoor shots aren't much better. The S743 doesn't have autofocus, so a macro shot like this comes out blurry and dull. Overall, the camera on the S743 is poor.

Click onto the last page where we'll wrap everything up, plus talk about battery life and performance!