Customizing your phone
Ah, the fun part – making the phone experience yours and not what some manufacturer tells you it should be. There are four main components to customization:
Scenes, Wallpapers, Widgets and Apps (oh my!).
HTC allows you to create different visual profiles on your phones which they call “
Scenes”. By default, the phone will come with a scene that has the carbon fiber background and all of Sprint's proprietary apps and widgets on the screen. All of this can easily be changed by pressing menu and selecting “Scenes”. Within three taps you can load up a separate scene for the office, or traveling, or out with your friends. You could have a completely different phone experience every day of the week. You could let your significant other create a scene and title it “jealousy” because they don't have an Evo of their own (applies to me). It's all completely customizable and easy to configure.
Now, you may be saying that
Wallpapers are nothing new or exciting (especially if you're familiar with an iPhone – zing!) but Android has a special take on this with “live wallpapers”. In addition to your typical static images, these live wallpapers are animated, and usually have some sort of user interaction by actually touching the background. Some of them are really cool, from interactive coy ponds to games of pong to slowly shifting orbs of light.
To change your wallpaper, again click the “Menu” button and there is an option for “Wallpaper”. You will notice then you get the options for adding a static wallpaper from HTC, your Photos, or Live Wallpapers. When selecting the live wallpaper of your choice, you're generally given a ton of options to configure it how you want. Play around! Find whatever suits you.
Note 1: Live Wallpapers will eat up your battery! You need to decide if its worth it or not.
Note 2: For some examples of more Live Wallpapers from the Marketplace, watch below
Android Live Wallpapers.
(thanks to evoman2be913!)
The next component is perhaps the biggest feature of Android device, the
Widgets. For those who are unfamiliar with them, think of them as mini applications that sit on your homescreens and enable you to get data at a glance without going into a full blown app, or adjust settings on the fly. They are truly what powers Android and makes it so appealing to many.
In most cases, when you tap on a widget it will launch the corresponding full program. So for example, the big giant clock that is the default on the middle homscreen, did you know if you click on the clock it opens a full “Clock” app? If you click on the weather in that widget, it launches the weather app, too. That's what I mean by offering data at a glance...you no longer need to load up a dedicated Twitter application to see what your friends are tweeting, it can all be loaded right onto your homescreen.
Adding and removing widgets is a breeze, and there are lots the come preloaded on the device. To add a widget, simply long press on an empty place on the screen (or “tap and hold” if you prefer) and you're greeted with the following menu. Note that you also do the same thing to add a folder, application, or shortcut. When you select “Widget”, you are greeted with a menu similar to the Live Wallpapers, and also similar is that most widgets have lots of options for you to play with. To remove a widget, simply long press on it and it will turn red, then drag to the bottom of the screen.
The final thing to talk about are the Android
applications. This has been the Achilles's heel of Android, but as most things it takes time to progress, and has made big strides, boasting over 50,000 apps. To access Android's version of an “App Store”, launch the application called “Marketplace” There is nothing ground breaking here and is pretty self-explanatory. However the one thing I want to highlight is that Google let's you buy an app and within 24 hours (I think) you can return it for a full refund if you aren't happy with it. Really cool feature that let's users buy with confidence.
There are several app management tools, like Astro Manager (which I'm not familiar enoguh to comment on). One thing I'd like to highlight is the website called
AppBrain. This let's you browse the Marketplace on the internet, and you can even create “lists” of apps you want ahead of buying the phone. AppBrain has an app (that's a mouthful) that you can grab off the Marketplace that will automatically transfer the list you saved on the web onto your phone.
To see an example, here is my list I made called “Wanted”. On launch day, I can simply grab the AppBrain app and it will do the dirty work and get the applications I've saved. Pretty slick. Also, remember there is an entire forum dedicated to applications and one for games too - use them!
Finally, if you want the visual version of this guide, watch the following video. It is by far the best video I've seen that showcases the Sense UI, and is the inspiration for this guide. Yes, it's for the HTC Desire, but the Evo will have the exact same interface.
YouTube - HTC Desire Sense Interface Walkthrough