HTC MAX 4G review: From Russia with love

Organizer is traditionally strong

Windows Mobile offers several time-management features and all of them are easily syncable with MS Outlook. The calendar offers daily, weekly and monthly view and you can have the week start on either Monday or Sunday. You can also hide weekends from the Calendar if you use it strictly for business.

The Windows Mobile Calendar

The To-Do list allows you to add tasks and assign them priority. The Notes also come in handy, as you can either type or directly write the text down on the screen. The Voice recorder and Calculator go without saying.

The Alarm clock has three alarm slots. Each Alarm can have its own repeat pattern. Unfortunately, due to the limited customization options in the default Alarms application, we suggest you check out some free third-party alternatives.

Pocket-sized office

Among the other WM core applications is the Office Mobile package featuring support for viewing and editing Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files. With the latest version of Office Mobile, you also have the OneNote application. Word and Excel Mobile could have greatly benefited from landscape modes, but sadly it's not available on either.

Mobile versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Adobe Reader LE

Once again, the WVGA display of the 4G proves superior in fitting much more of the documents than other handsets.

Thanks to Adobe Reader LE, there is also support for viewing PDF documents. We are pleased with the performance of the MAX 4G in this area, as opening and handling PDF documents is usually rather slow on handhelds.

And a pinch of third-party applications

The HTC MAX 4G comes bundled with plenty of software. The major omissions are a dedicated GPS navigation application and a video player with wider codec support. For almost all other general tasks, the 4G is fully ready straight out of the box.

The Teeter game is becoming a trademark of HTC phones and it's an amusing demonstration of the abilities of the accelerometer.

The Teeter game is highly amusing and life-like

And finally, there's the YouTube player. Our experience with it wasn't very satisfactory - choosing the high quality option leads to choppiness in some videos and you have no way of playing videos in HD; shame, as the picture on such a large screen would have been great.

The MAX 4G YouTube client • video quality settings

GPS navigation

The HTC MAX 4G features a built-in GPS receiver - it's the Qualcomm gpsOne chipset, which comes along with the underlying 7201A platform. It's the same chipset used in earlier HTC models such as the Touch HD. The MAX 4G also supports the Assisted-GPS technology, commonly known as A-GPS. It means you can download current satellite data over Wi-Fi or over the air for a much faster satellite lock.

The A-GPS data download manager

The HTC MAX 4G doesn't have a GPS navigation application pre-installed (it came with just Google Maps), so you have to purchase one separately. With a dedicated GPS app installed, the handset can easily replace your dedicated GPS navigation unit thanks to the large screen real estate.

Chipset sensitivity of the 4G seems to be on the faster side when it comes to getting an initial satellite lock.