HTC Incredible compares well to Nexus One

Some of you might be wondering what is the difference between the HTC Incredible (Verizon) and Nexus One (T-mobile) other than the obvious difference in the mobile phone carriers network. I just bought my HTC Incredible from the Verizon store and will try to explain the differences and similarities (My friend has the Nexus One).

* Side-by-side, both color saturation, clarity and contrast are great on both HTC smartphones since they are equipped the same excellent 3.7-inch AMOLED capacitive touchscreen display with a native resolution of 480x800. If I have to pick a winner, I believe the Incredible is slightly better, probably because it is brand new and free of fingerprints and dust.

* The Incredible uses optical trackpad for navigation, whereas the Nexus One uses the trackball (like the older Blackberrys). The trackpad on the Incredible seems to be more responsive and can scroll quicker, however, I have to say the trackball on the Nexus One seems to be more precise and easier to control while not overshooting the target. But I think I can master the trackpad with a bit more practice and getting used to how much pressure to use to control it precisely.

* The Nexus One and Incredible both have 4 capacitive buttons for Home, Menu, Search and Back below the screen. Both devices' buttons are very sensitive to touch, no difference here.

* The Nexus One has 5MP cameras with a single LED flash, whereas the Incredible has a better 8MP sensor with dual-LED flash. Both cameras have auto-focus.

* In terms of raw processing speed, both smartphones run on a 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon CPU, which is the state-of-art and both phones can open/close and switch between apps quickly without any noticeable delay.

* For system memory, the Nexus One has 512MB of RAM while the Incredible has 64MB more (total of 576MB). Another hardware difference is the Nexus One has a unique dual mic system for ambient noise cancellation. This feature is unique to the Nexus one and is not available on the Incredible. I am not sure how effective it really is, but I use my Plantronics 975 Bluetooth headset with arguable the best noise cancellation system so it is not a big deal for me.

* You will notice the UI software is different when you turn the phones on,. The Nexus One uses the standard Android 2.1 OS (Eclair) home page UI, whereas the Incredible and Desire run the proprietary HTC Sense UI . I really like the Sense Inteface better than the basic Android 2.1 standard UI. It is more than skin-deep; it replaced and refined much of the standard (boring) interface for most of the Android operating system experience. There are more usable space on the home screen, better media apps and a sleeker number dialer. The visual appearance is amazing (Incredible!). It is very attractive and stunning and best of all, none of the eye-candies seemed to affect or slow down the performance of the Incredible when comparing with the Nexus One.

* Yes, the Nexus One does have an advantage due to the T-Mobile 3G network, which is you can use voice and data at the same time. Being on the Verizon network, the HTC Incredible can't. Is it a big deal? I think only you can answer that question, but for me, I can honestly say I can't remember a time why I would really need/use this `feature'. I have Pandora and it stopped streaming when I am on a call, but I don't want to listen to my music anyway when I am on a call. And if I have to look up something why I am taking to someone, I can always call them back. I guess if I am using the Android Google Maps Navigation while talking, I might have a problem, but my car has built-in navigation so it is not an issue for me.

Since I just got my Incredible today, I can't comment on battery life or reliability, but since HTC already made similar phones (Nexus One, HTC Desire, etc.) I believe battery life shouldn't be an issue. So far the call quality over my Plantronics 975 bluetooth headset is great and no drop call when I was driving to work for an hour on the phone. I will append my reviews in a few months if I discover any significant issues. For now, I am very happy with my HTC Incredible.