Every once in a while, a device will come along that people can’t help but continue to develop for, even after some owners have moved on to other hardware. Come see for yourself why the HD2 continues to be one of these “renaissance devices” after the break.

A couple weeks ago, I did a “throwback” episode of our “5 Minute Posts About Something Cool” section where I covered some recent development on the aging (but still full of life) HTC Blue Angel. In a recent episode of XDA TV, the host covered a similar piece of news that I found very interesting in this department on the timeless HTC HD2, which has practically been the “unofficial phone of the year” since its release and received a lot of support in the way of custom ROMs and ports of Android (and even WM7). This time, they’ve done it again with a port of Android “Jellybean”. “Smokin901” has a thread over on the XDA DEVELOPERS forums with more information, but from the XDA DEVELOPERS blogpost, it looks pretty complete with many features already working correctly:

Mobile Data 3G/2G
Voice Calls
WiFi
Bluetooth
SMS
Sound check download page for fix
Video Playback
USB Mass Storage

This is more then can be said for some early attempts at Jellybean on even some newer devices, and one of the only things still broken on it is the camera feature. It’s great to see development on older devices like this and even though I don’t own an HD2, I continue to look forward to progress made on this as this will extend the useful life of the device for people looking to move on and upgrade from Windows Mobile.

.:Albert Bunn

ya doin good maan aye?? This is how a local Bahamian asks you if you are doing well. Well, long story short I am currently in the Bahamas and my beloved HD2 decided to give me some problems. The problem started out of no where, I came home took my phone out of my pocket to check some email while I sitting on the can to save some time. So I sat down woke my phone up from sleep mode and tried to unlock my phone and I could not do it. My phone would not recognize my touch on the screen. I did not panic since this happens once in a while and I just pull the battery and put it back in and then it works fine once it reboots. I did this again this time and still same problem the phone would not recognize me touching the screen (indicating a problem with the digitizer). I do the battery pull and reinsert a few times getting more and more worried each and every time it started up. Soon I gave up and finished my business on the can and googled my issue, lots of people had the issue and only option was to send the phone to HTC or to fix the screen myself.

I quickly fire off an email to HTC to ask them to check my warranty status and I get back good news, I have warranty until September 16th, 2011. That is GOOD NEWS!!! but also bad news because my phone stopped working on September 14th, 2011 which was yesterday evening. I quickly called HTC and went through the RMA process  and I tell them that I am in the Bahamas and they tell me the closest repair center is in Texas and I have to mail my phone to them before the end of warranty expiration which is in two days. This is a problem, there is no way my phone will get to Texas from the Bahamas in one day without me paying an arm and a leg and even that is no guarantee since people here work on an island time and lifestyle. So the next best thing to do was to send my phone with a friend to Miami tomorrow and have him ship it from Maimi and it will get to HTC by Monday which is two days after my warranty expires.

Now do you think HTC will consider my device to be out of warranty since I sent it in two days late when I am out of the country? I still reported my problem within my warranty period and logged the case with them but shipping my device to them took me a little longer and due to circumstances out of my control. So do you think will HTC try to screw me over? Have any of you had this problem before?

For all our HD2 owners surfing the blog here, popular ROM author Sternas has released yet another update to his ever popular Artemis HD2 Custom ROM for HTC’s revolutionary HD2. Version 64.0 was more of a simpler performance upgrade with just a few modifications made “under the hood” for memory and performance, but still a good looking ROM packed full of useful goodies and preinstalled software, while not overdoing it. Sternas has a vast number of screenshots of the ROM that can only be described as a multitude so that you can get a pretty good idea of what Artemis HD2 looks like before you even put it on your device (I know I am personally a little “leary” sometims myself of ROM threads without screenshots). For those of you fortunate enough to still own what is arguably still the best mobile phone ever built, head on down to Sternas’s thread at XDA DEVELOPERS to learn more abut the Artemis HD2 ROM.

::AB

Many of you might not know this but I really love working out. I love running, cycling and lifting weights but lately I have been focusing on my run because I feel like that is where I am the weakest. I wanted a way to keep track of my runs and listen to music at the same time but I did not want to hold my phone in my hand while I ran. So, I thought an arm band would be my best option.

So, I went to the mall to look for an arm band and never really saw anything that really worked for my phone or that I liked because they did not fit my phone properly or they just seemed really cheap quality. I did some google searching and came across iarmbands.com and they had arm bands specifically for my phone (and every other smart-phone out there), I went ahead and order one and it was the same price as what they had at the mall kiosks $15.

I have really put this armband through several workouts(20miles of running and 3 hours of weight workouts) and It has worked really great I have no major complaints about it and would recommend it to anyone that works out a lot and is looking for a good arm band. However, let me break down the pros and cons of the arm band.

Pros:

The phone is really secure in the arm band there is no way for the phone to fall out even if you do summersaults or gymnastics. Some armbands that I have seen usually have an open top or then just have like one small strap to secure the phone. This armband is different as you can see in the photos. Also the openings on the arm band are pretty well placed I can connect my charger and my  headphones at the same time if I want to and this helps when I am going to a workout and I am charging my phone in the car as I drive to the workout.

The phone can be used while it is in the arm band. Yes, there are some issues with the screen responsiveness because of the plastic but this does not mean the phone can not be used if the need arises. I have sent several text messages and used several apps while the phone was in the armband and did not notice any major issues other then when I was pattern unlocking my HD2 which needs a constant contact with the phone screen. However, one or two tries and it works so it is not a big issue.

Also this case has a small flap for extra headphone wire or to keep the headphone wire out of the way. I usually wear the armband on my right hand and I noticed that if I don’t route the headphone wire through the flap then it keeps coming in the way and keeps coming under my arm.

The arm band is really comfortable yet it has snug fit and there are no worries about it falling off of my arm. The first time I put the arm band on I had to slip it on instead of tieing it around my arm but this is a good thing because I have the entire band for tightening should the strap start to stretch a little. Also when I first put the arm band on I thought it would slip off but when I tested it on a run it worked
perfectly and did not slip I even flayed my arms to try and make it fall of but it did not. I even tried the arm band while doing bicep curls and tricep dips and it worked perfectly trough those.

Cons:

There not really and major issues with the case and some of the issues that I did see with the case I already kind of talked about in the pros section but I will highlight them again here.

First issue I noticed when I put the arm band on was that the rough part of the velcro strap might rub against the arm if it is not placed exactly on the soft part. However, when I was running I did not notice the rough part scratching my arm even when it was not placed correctly. I would have liked for the soft portion of the Velcro to be slightly larger than the rough part this would have helped eliminate the issue if someone has sensitive skin.

If you want to order an arm band then head over to iarmbands. com and check out all the different kinds of arm bands. They have an arm band for every phone that is out there for just $15.

Here is a detailed guide on how to install Windows Phone 7 on your HD2.

Disclaimer: Please try this guide on your own risk. Mobility Digest or I are not responsible for any damage caused your device from using this guide.

Steps before you begin:

1. Make sure you have HARDSPL 2.08 installed on your phone. If you do not then you can get that here.
2. Make sure you have at least 50% battery.
3. Make sure you have a radio version that is something like this 2.xx.50.x. If you dont then you can get that here.
4. Once these steps are done we can begin.
5. Make sure you have a backup SD card and not the one you normally use. You could lose all your data on the card.

Flashing Windows 7 on HD2:

1. Download the Windows Phone files from here. Extract the files on to your computer somewhere and this is what you should see after you extract the files.
   
2. Next connect your phone to your computer and your phone screen should look something like this. you can just leave it on the home page and dont need to be in bootloader mode or anything.
3. Once that is done open the MAGLDR12 folder from the extracted files and then double click on ROMUpdateUtility.exe
4. Read the ROM update instructions and click through them.
   
5. Once you click through it the phone should enter bootloader mode automatically and you should see a progress bar on your phone and on the computer.
6. Once the ROM update is done your phone will automatically boot and you will go into this screen.
7. Scroll down to USB Flasher by using the volume up and down keys on the left side of the phone and then hit the green answer call button.
8. Once you do that you will see this screen next:
9. Once you see this screen. Go back to your extracted files on your computer and open the folder LEO70_ROM and there you will see an application called DWI run that application as an administrator if you are on windows 7.
10. Once you do that you will see a batch of these screens. Read the information and click through them.
11. After that screen shows up for a while here is what you will see on your phone:
12. Once this is done the phone will reboot and you will see this screen.
13. Which will be followed by this screen.
14. After that screen you will have entered windows phone initial setup process and from there everything is self explanatory.
15. In order for the phone to recognize your memroy card if it has not already done so go to:  Settings>about>reset.  AGAIN MAKE SURE YOU HAVE A BACKUP MEMORY CARD IN THERE.

THANKS TO XDA AND DFT TEAM. I will be updating this post soon with instructions on how to get back to WM 6.5 if you choose too but for right now I wanted to get these instructions out.

The swish army knife of the smartphone world has gained itself another blade. The HD2 now has an operationally port of the Microsoft’s latest Windows Phone 7 OS, thanks to the devoted DFT team.

Adictivetips.com has posted a very well constructed guide to getting the goodness up and running on your HD2. Almost everything seems to be running except the live services, but we’ve seen reports on Xda-developers.com of a fix for that.

Needless to say, this is huge news for HD2 owners. The device has long surpassed its product cycle and is proving to be a gem of a device all over again! Enjoy your WP7 HD2!

via Engadget and Addictivetips

For those of you who have been dual booting your HD2 between Windows Mobile and Android finally have a solution if you only want to use Android! DFT, a team of developers and coders, over at XDA-Developers which allows users to skip booting into Windows Mobile and directly boot into Android. The hack is called MAGLDR and it is only available in very limited ROMs right now but will hopefully be available in more ROMs soon. This flashses to NAND so it would be as fast as a native Android device. For more information check out the hack thread or you can try out a ROM that has it.

Image taken from XDA. Not my actual phone.

I have a Tmobile HD2 and I hate some aspects of the phone. I love the processing power of the phone and I love the size of the screen but here are the things I hate relating to the screen.

I really hate the fact that it does not have a physical keyboard and I hate the capacitive screen. I really miss not having a stylus and I miss having the fine control and precision pressing that I had with the stylus. One place where I really miss this precision and accuracy of the stylus is when I am watching youtube videos and I want to go to a certain time in the video. It is almost impossible to get to that certain time on the capacitive screen with my fingers.

I also miss being able to write down notes on my phone. I miss being in a class or a meeting or just writing a grocery list and quickly pulling out my stylus and jotting things down. Also having a stylus was cool, people were always “Wowed” when I pulled it out and started to write or draw on the screen. I can live with this problem but typing on the screen has me really pissed.

Another thing I hate about the capacitive screen is the fact that if there is even a small drop of water on the screen it starts freaking out and going spastic and I can not use the keyboard till I wipe down the screen. This just gets annoying because even if my fingers are slightly wet it is almost impossible to use my screen. I send about 3000 texts a month and use Palringo on my phone almost 24/7 so I use the keyboard on the screen a lot. I thought I would get used to keyboard when I bought the phone but NOPE!!. I miss the physical keyboard and every phone I buy from here on out will have a physical keyboard.

On a side note, someone want to explain the benefits of resistive vs. capacitive screens? I know I can look it up but I would much rather have the readers educate me and tell me I am a moron for hating capacitive screens. :)

I know you all must be wondering how many more OtterBox Cases I have left to review and I can tell you that this is the last one I have to review for a while. I had to take a little bit of time off from reviewing products so I am trying to get back into the swing of things and caught up. Good news is I have 4 more reviews scheduled so stay tuned!  Today, however, I have the OtterBox Defender Series Case for the HTC HD2 International Device. The International version of the HTC HD2 is different than the T-mobile release of the HD2 so you need to make sure that you are ordering the right one. We started off the OtterBox Case Reviews with the Commuter Series for the HTC HD2 that you can read here: CLICK HERE. There is a pretty significant difference in the two cases. The Commuter Series is a less bulky case that has a polycarbonate back cover and silicone insert that slips over the device. OtterBox also supplies a Heavy Duty Screen Protector. The Defender Series Case by OtterBox is simply the Ultimate in device protection. Hence the name coined by OtterBox, The Defender Series. One look and I am confident you will agree, this is simply the toughest case money can buy for the HTC HD2.

So let’s just jump right into the video review:

The OtterBox Defender Series for HTC® HD2™ (International Version ONLY) is part of our toughest line of cases. A screen protector covers your 4.3″ display to keep it shiny and new, while a tailor-fit polycarbonate shell snaps directly over your device. Wrap this all in some mighty silicone (for shock absorption), and you truly have a top-quality case. Never worry about dropping your phone again! About our Defender Series: An innovative three layer design protects your HD2 from bumps, drops, scratches and dust while keeping it fresh as new.

Compatibility:

• HTC HD2 T9193
• HTC HD2 T8585
• International ONLY, does not fit US version

Features:

• Three layers of protection
• Complete interaction of the device’s functions
• Ratcheting belt clip holster included

Material:

• Clear protective membrane on touch screen
• High-quality polycarbonate shell
• Durable silicone skin

PROS:

• Offers superior protection for your device
• Comes with built in screen protection.
• Excellent build quality
• Perfect fit and ease of installation

CONS:

• Adds a lot of bulk to your device
• Pricey at $54.95

GRADES:

• Overall: 9.5/10
• Design: 10/10
• Performance: 10/10
• Value: 9/10

To purchase the OtterBox Defender Series Case for the HTC HD2, head on over to OtterBox or CLICK HERE