[Q] Evo Shift Pros and Cons

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bigmoneygrip23

Senior Member
May 10, 2011
136
11
St. Louis
New to this forum (i'm a cdma hero guy)...but, my wife is considering an EVO Shift 4G and theyre selling them for a penny on Amazon (sprint is still asking 99.99...yeah right). Anyway, i've read some things about a lot of people complaining about the performance after the sprint gingerbread update and the physical keyboard having a lot of problems after a while. Are these widespread concerns with this phone? Or, isolated incidents?

Our contract is up and i'm trying to get my wife to switch from blackberry to android and she insists on a physical keyboard....

Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks!
 

THEsunnypiglets

Senior Member
Nov 17, 2011
77
14
33
Any software problems I had with it were resolved when I rooted and flashed any of the amazingly stable ROMS on this site like MikShifted, Supreme Sense or newSENSE (my personal favorite Atm). As far as the keyboard, I DID have one hardware problem with screen going out after six months... idk. But Sprint was really good about replacing it for free. I most definitely recommend it. I love mine!:D

If my phone had a leg, I'd totally be humping it right now lol...
 
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prboy1969

Senior Member
May 7, 2009
10,518
7,378
Michigan
New to this forum (i'm a cdma hero guy)...but, my wife is considering an EVO Shift 4G and theyre selling them for a penny on Amazon (sprint is still asking 99.99...yeah right). Anyway, i've read some things about a lot of people complaining about the performance after the sprint gingerbread update and the physical keyboard having a lot of problems after a while. Are these widespread concerns with this phone? Or, isolated incidents?

Our contract is up and i'm trying to get my wife to switch from blackberry to android and she insists on a physical keyboard....

Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks!

My Shift is hands down one of the best devices I've ever owned. Highly underrated, once rooted the Shift is a BEAST. Easily able to match, and sometimes beat the performance of a lot of the devices out there. There are plenty of Great Roms to choose from, once Rooted. Enough to suit anyone's preferences. I've had mine since a day before official release, and absolutely recommend it to anyone :) .
 
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turkbot

Senior Member
Sep 4, 2011
791
198
owosso
Yes deffinitly agree with prboy on this phone unless HTC comes out with a new slider me and my shift are in it for the long run. Had mine a few days after release never had any hardware issues with it and would recamend it to anyone
 

davilleirt

New member
Apr 6, 2012
4
0
after owning a Shift and a regular 4g, would definitely go for a 4g instead. As with all slider phones, the keyboard springs will become loose. Mine did. Qwerty keyboards aren't as reliable as a virtual keyboards basically, and with the insane screen real-estate of the 4g, the keyboard is easily comparible to the ease of the Shift.
 

drob311

Senior Member
after owning a Shift and a regular 4g, would definitely go for a 4g instead. As with all slider phones, the keyboard springs will become loose. Mine did. Qwerty keyboards aren't as reliable as a virtual keyboards basically, and with the insane screen real-estate of the 4g, the keyboard is easily comparible to the ease of the Shift.

There are no, none, zip, zilch, zero springs in the shifts keyboard... Evo's suck... My wife has one, nothing you can say will change my mind. If a big screen and crappy outdated hardware is what you're looking for, get an evo... If you want a beast that even after 1 year on the market it is still a relevant device get the shift. And the absolute nonsense about a virtual keyboard trumping a hardware keyboard isn't even worth responding too. Show me an evo that can linpack like this and than we can start talking... And no, I didn't cheat on the score.
42575eb7-9780-36af.jpg


Sent from my PG06100
 
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bigmoneygrip23

Senior Member
May 10, 2011
136
11
St. Louis
Wow. I was under the impression that the 4G would perform a little better....good to hear. Going to the sprint store today, so we'll see what happens (Amazons sale ended, doh!)

I'm sure I'll be back to get some rooting tips. Thanks to all.

Sent from my HERO200 using XDA App
 

prboy1969

Senior Member
May 7, 2009
10,518
7,378
Michigan
I own both an OG EVO, and the EVO Shift. Hands down I'll take the Shift. I can OC higher, it equals or beats my OG EVO on everything. Only give is the screen size. But it's not enough to make me choose it over the Shift ever.

TEAM MiK
MikROMs Since 3/13/11
 

Dogahn

Member
Mar 5, 2012
26
6
I got mine with that .01 sale through Amazon... I kind of wish I did a little more research and gotten a Photon for $50. Mainly for the dual core processor and longer (larger) battery life. I was sold on the shift for 3 things, QWERTY keyboard, FM Radio & HTC's experience with Android (GF had a G1 when they first came out). The biggest reason for me was the physical keyboard, I had developed a very negative opinion about on screen keyboards from my iPhone, iPad, Kindle Fire friends frustrations with predictive text and fat finger phenomenon.

There are other more human elements I have come to enjoy about my Shift. Such as the size, I happened into a radio shack that had a Photon on the display rack and +0.4"w x +0.5h" x -0.13" is a bigger difference than the numbers let on. The screen looked huge and quite lovely, but holding the Motorola in my hand with its relatively thin frame and side button locations made finding ways to hold and use it awkward. With the depth of the Shift it sits well in your hand and the volume control buttons being the only side button lets you find a comfortable way to hold it. I also like the weight of the Shift, it doesn't disappear in my pockets and that helps me keep it safe from harm. At first I was a little put off by the lack of a spring assisted slide, but then agreed with nearly everyone else here that simpler was indeed better in this regard. Best part about a slider phone... I can put a property tag on the backside of the display allowing me to take it into my workplace without some garish chrome sticker glaring at me whenever I'm away from work. :D

Now some things I do notice that make me regret it. Power, I get maybe 4 - 8hrs out of my battery. I take it off the charger, use it to listen to FM (8hrs) or Streaming Radio(4hrs) for about 4 hours and get it home where it needs to charge. Processing, 800mhz single threaded... now the guys here have done wonderful things with their roms to allow the cpu to hit 1,200mhz but that gets the phone cooking hot as well. It also doesn't get around the fact that it is just a single core when most Android devices now are sporting two, you feel it going between applications. Bouncing between things on a Kindle Fire feels much more responsive with less load times than the Shift. 4G, maybe its my area (PDX) but this phone does not hold onto 4G at all. I've tried it downtown I've tried in the west hills, works great if I don't move but its not something I can leave on (and really you don't want to as battery consumption increases) and expect to still be connected when I pull the phone back out to check on what I told it to do with the 4G. These are not deal breaking issues, for me they really reinforce the devices role as a phone and portable information device; It won't be replacing my desktop, maybe a laptop if I got a bluetooth full size keyboard.

Dogan
It does a little bit of everything, kinda like me.
 

prboy1969

Senior Member
May 7, 2009
10,518
7,378
Michigan
What Rom are you running? What kernel? What recovery? These are all things that are going to effect the performance of your Shift ;) .
 

Dogahn

Member
Mar 5, 2012
26
6
Indeed!

For S&G's, Mikshifted-G 2.1 about to put the landscape rosie and inverted clock mods on it. Not as pretty as supremesense or cyanogenmod but I got a good flash going this time apparently and everything seems to be working smoothly.

Dogan
It lasted 14days before I rooted it.
 

bilgerryan

Inactive Recognized Developer
If you're not already convinced go with the Shift, especially if you don't like virtual keyboards... It's not that I can't use them (I swype when its short or I'm feeling lazy or only wanna use one hand) but they cause too many autocorrect errors and I would rather type out what I wanna have it say than have my phone guess.. They're not that smart yet. The Shift has a second generation Qualcomm processor opposed to the Evo's first, if I remember right the Shift performs the same at 800 Mhz as the Evo at 1 Ghz, this means better battery life. In the end it's about your preferences and what you want in your phone, compare the possibilities and find the best choice for you. That's what I did and I got the Shift. And cuz I hate Samsung
 

Dread 7us

Inactive Recognized Developer
Jul 25, 2010
1,315
1,095
If you're not already convinced go with the Shift, especially if you don't like virtual keyboards... It's not that I can't use them (I swype when its short or I'm feeling lazy or only wanna use one hand) but they cause too many autocorrect errors and I would rather type out what I wanna have it say than have my phone guess.. They're not that smart yet. The Shift has a second generation Qualcomm processor opposed to the Evo's first, if I remember right the Shift performs the same at 800 Mhz as the Evo at 1 Ghz, this means better battery life. In the end it's about your preferences and what you want in your phone, compare the possibilities and find the best choice for you. That's what I did and I got the Shift. And cuz I hate Samsung

Actually the Shift at even 800mhz out performs the Evo at 1ghz.

Sent from my PG06100 using xda premium
 

prboy1969

Senior Member
May 7, 2009
10,518
7,378
Michigan
My OG EVO4G will not go any higher than about 1.1gHz no matter what kernel I tried. As for my Shift with almost every Kernel it will easily hit 1.8gHz . All day with no issues :)

TEAM MiK
MikROMs Since 3/13/11
 

bigmoneygrip23

Senior Member
May 10, 2011
136
11
St. Louis
Sweet. We actually bought it last weekend, so I did end up going with the Shift ($49.99 at Best Buy...not bad).

But, now i'm jealous. I think i want to keep it for myself and not let my wife use it. :) . Just need to figure out which ROM to go with. Stability is probably the biggest thing with her. She doesn't care about OC'ing. But, it'd be nice to get some Sense 3.0+ features like the lockscreen and the ability to swipe notifications out of the way (like i can with aosp 2.3.7 roms on my hero). This stock ROM has launcher redraws and "Loading..." every time you go back to it, it seems.

Haven't rooted yet, but i just need to make sure she doesn't accept any OTA updates before i get a chance. Its not at 2.3.4 and from what I gather, that makes it a bigger pain in the arse.
 

Aaargh!

Senior Member
Jan 19, 2011
258
21
California
I enjoy the physical keyboard, so obviously I am biased. But this phone is great. I got mine about two weeks after release and just today, once again, I am amazed at what it can do. The devs working with this phone are still churning out new roms and kernels. It will take a lot to get me to trade this phone in. Thanks again to all the devs that help with the shifty

Sent from my PG06100 using XDA
 

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    New to this forum (i'm a cdma hero guy)...but, my wife is considering an EVO Shift 4G and theyre selling them for a penny on Amazon (sprint is still asking 99.99...yeah right). Anyway, i've read some things about a lot of people complaining about the performance after the sprint gingerbread update and the physical keyboard having a lot of problems after a while. Are these widespread concerns with this phone? Or, isolated incidents?

    Our contract is up and i'm trying to get my wife to switch from blackberry to android and she insists on a physical keyboard....

    Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks!

    My Shift is hands down one of the best devices I've ever owned. Highly underrated, once rooted the Shift is a BEAST. Easily able to match, and sometimes beat the performance of a lot of the devices out there. There are plenty of Great Roms to choose from, once Rooted. Enough to suit anyone's preferences. I've had mine since a day before official release, and absolutely recommend it to anyone :) .
    1
    after owning a Shift and a regular 4g, would definitely go for a 4g instead. As with all slider phones, the keyboard springs will become loose. Mine did. Qwerty keyboards aren't as reliable as a virtual keyboards basically, and with the insane screen real-estate of the 4g, the keyboard is easily comparible to the ease of the Shift.

    There are no, none, zip, zilch, zero springs in the shifts keyboard... Evo's suck... My wife has one, nothing you can say will change my mind. If a big screen and crappy outdated hardware is what you're looking for, get an evo... If you want a beast that even after 1 year on the market it is still a relevant device get the shift. And the absolute nonsense about a virtual keyboard trumping a hardware keyboard isn't even worth responding too. Show me an evo that can linpack like this and than we can start talking... And no, I didn't cheat on the score.
    42575eb7-9780-36af.jpg


    Sent from my PG06100