[vinnych4se]

Sense 3.6 is the best its honestly touchwiz everyone should be hating on everything is over themed and looks ugly

[dancing-bass]

OK this might come as a shock, but last year when I first started reading about Android phones and thinking they were cooler then iPhones... I got very interested in Sense as opposed to Touchwiz. Now, almost a year later and I'm getting excited for my new toy (Gnex). I should be pulling the trigger hopfully this weekend. But if I hadn't had the chance at getting it, I was leaning more toward the HTC phones with Sense over the Sammy phones with Touchwiz. I'd heard enough bad things about Blur that I didn't even want to bother....

And at this point I'm pretty happy that my first Android will be "pure" - no skins. Once I get used to the device and OS, I'll consider rooting/flashing/roms and all that good stuff

[emceephi]

I had a Mytouch 4G which had T-mobile's uglier version of Sense. The thing was bloated and laggy. It felt more sluggish than my old Nexus One. I didn't care for any of the widgets and never used them. I preferred the look of vanilla Android too. I eventually rooted it and installed CM7, which was a huge improvement.

I now have a Sensation. Sense didn't seem as bad, since the phone was fast enough to handle the bloated software. Still, I wasn't happy with it and decided to root it and install a ICS rom. Now my phone is buttery smooth, and the ICS look is so much prettier.

[MrBucket85]

The old lock screen and launcher were terrible (although both could be altered and have since been fixed) but now I just can't deal with the sense calendar and contacts apps.

[kore_sar]

"Sense sucks" battery too fast on my HTC Desire HD. No other true reasons exist for me.
That's why I switched to CM.

[experiment 626]

I have the Rezound and it runs very quickly for me. I think the 1GB of RAM is the hardware threshold which allows devices to run Sense smoothly. That said, I hate how Sense tries to sync and manage everything out of the box. If I could I'd keep Sense Weather, Clock, and Lockscreen and purge the rest of Sense off my Rezound.

[coronaboy10]

I dont hate Sense, what I hate are people that buy a phone they know has a Sense ui and then complain about it how bad it is. I never understood why people do that unless they're going to root the device.(which I do btw).I"m running an custom ROM with Sense 3.6 and as far as I'm concerned its the best version I've used so far. My first device was the OG Incredible.Well actually it was Blackberry Storm, but we all know how that turned out.

One thing I can say i hate about it, is when it crashes. Like if you're browsing a web page sometimes and then decide to go to the home screen sometimes Sense doenst like it go to the white screen to reload sense. Or just spin before loading it. Nothing major. I can live with it til an update to the ROM which comes very often.

[EggoEspada]

I love the new Sense. My only issue with it is it doesn't completely follow the design guidelines, and I wish they'd switch to using ICS blue rather than green at least. I just want them to make it a little more coherent with stock. Other than that, they did a really good job with it. Can't speak for performance yet, but it seems to be less of a resource hog.

[HAAS599]

My first taste of Sense was with a Sprint Hero.

I hated Sense initially because it bogged down whatever phone it was on. It took up too much system storage and made the phone slower with all the flashy graphics and animation it was using.

Now-a-days, phones have enough storage and power to tackle just about any "skin" you through at them. I still hate Sense though because i don't like how it looks. The stock look and theme of 2.3 and 4.0 are both much more pleasing than Sense. I admit that Sense offers some better functionality in some areas but nothing that can't be accomplished with an app.

With the HTC One X in particular, I think the lock screen is ugly and the app dock is also difficult to look at. The dock reminds me of default ADW laucher. The browser sucks compared to ICS stock or Chrome. The keyboard also sucks. Sense scenes suck and are useless.

The only thing Sense has going for it is the camera app. Give me stock ICS in all it's black and cyan glory with HTC's camera app on the One X and all of a sudden "We got a badass over here".

[VDub2174]

When I had my EVO 4G I hated Sense because the battery life was craptacular. I rooted my EVO 4G and used an AOSP ROM and couldn't have been happier. As time went on I saw how Sense was improving and started missing it more and more. Assuming Sense has better battery life, I would like to try it out again.

I'm also gonna say that I like TouchWiz and NotBlur too. I had a Moto Photon and really liked that phone! I would still be using it if it wasn't for an unfortunate rooting incident that left me with a brick. When I messed up my MoPho I upgraded to the Epic 4G Touch. Another amazing device!! Right out the box the battery life was amazing and the phone wasn't sluggish at all like Sense was with my EVO 4G. Of course I rooted to use an ICS ROM and was using Nova Launcher but recently went back to a ROM with TouchWiz and I still like it.

[bllackkman]

It would be nice if you could compare Sense to anything else but you cant!!! Sense is the best UI and a very close 2nd would be MIUI, all the other UI's out there are irrelevant

[csking1995]

Have you noticed that a large percentage of the ROMs, widgets, and customization options blogged about, discussed, or generally promoted on this site and in the forums have one thing in common? That's right, they are all attempting to make your stock Android system look like Sense.

As an average, run-of-the-mill, heavy end-user, traveling professional, my Android phone with HTC Sense has made life easier in many ways. And mind you, I am still rockin' my (original) Droid Incredible (oh yes he did!).

[krosref]

it's unnecessary. android has progressed to a point that it doesn't need "enhancing," not to mention that skins usually delay android updates. also, HTC can largely stand on their design and build quality in terms of differentiation.

[doogald]

Hate is a strong word. There were only a few things that I didn't like about Sense:

- the inability to customize the static bottom of the launcher, I guess we'll call it a dock. My Sense phone had a physical phone button, so a software button for the dialer was a waste of space, and there was no way to put anything else there. I understand that this is now fixed...

- I never particularly liked Peep at all, but that was easily ignored

- the custom Sense email app on eclair was buggy. I am guessing that was fixed long ago.

- the launcher was a little laggy on things like screen transitions, etc.

- Sense on 2.1 anyway would put up a blown up photo of the contact record of the caller that was always terribly pixelated

- I didn't like that event reminders would put a "snooze" button on the lock screen that was located just where my thumb would go when I pulled the phone from my pocket. I also didn't like the fact that the calendar event would remind me every 5 minutes if I didn't clear a notification, which became old really fast when I was driving to a meeting 45 minutes away with the notification tone going off every 5 minutes


There were a lot of things that I really, really liked about Sense, though:

- the toggle widgets, particularly one for data

- the notification badges for messages, emails, missed phone calls, etc.

- it's hard not to like the weather widget

- I always preferred the Sense dialer to stock Android's


As you may be able to tell, my experience with Sense goes back to eclair and cupcake. I decided to avoid an HTC handset when I upgraded not because of Sense, but for other reasons. If HTC made a phone that held a weak signal as well as Moto phones do, and had better battery life, I might have a Sense phone right now.

[extraclass]

How do I know when I am using Sense or not! My HTC Shift seems to work flawlessly so I really have nothing to complain about!

[P_M_G]

It's funny how so many comments are about battery sucking widgets like FriendStream...um, if you don't use it - drag it to the trash and it won't be running. Also agree with the comment above about people buying phones with Sense and then ing about it. If you hate the UI - then buy something without it - there are plenty of other options.

My only issue with sense and I'm not honestly sure it's a sense issue, is when i'm browsing web and use the back button to go back a page, only to get kicked back to my home screen.

IMO Sense crushes TW - my wife & daughter have it on their Epic4Gs and I hate using their phones.

[_X_]

I bought my wife her first Android phone (HTC Hero, to date that was her favorite phone.) because of sense. When I did the research Sense was the best alternative. Since then I've upgraded to Galaxy S.

My biggest beef with skins is they offer an inconsistent behavior and use different terminology across Android devices, that lends itsself to a REAL BAD user experience(that is the true fragmentation of Android). Going from HTC, Samsung, Moto is not easy you have to stumble through the devices to navigate around.

Yesterday I was trying to help somebody with their Razar, coming from Samsung(*) I struggled to find the equivalent email client and set her device up.



(*) I actually really dislike the Samsung Touch UI. And from day one installed ADW Launcher and prefer this launcher over stock ICS.

[dyastrab]

I actually like Sense. I've had a Dinc and now Dinc2. I've found it useful on both devices and better than what I saw Motorola was producing. (Especially the date and time picker). The additional programs like Footprints and its car panel are little bonuses that I actually use on occasion and would miss if they were removed.

It's not without its flaws - on the Dinc2, the contact widgets makes people profile pictures look a little fuzzy. I've also heard (but don't know for sure) that it slows HTC's ability to roll out updates.

But overall, it doesn't seem to slow down my Dinc2 and I find it useful. Its actually a reason to buy an HTC phone.

[sddfdds]

Principle. While there may be some things that are actually improvements, in the grand scheme of things, it's change for the sake of change. I'm so sick of people crying about differentiation. They can't differentiate on hardware? The One X is a freaking glorious piece of hardware. And while the ICS rollout hasn't been the smoothest for the nexus line, it's still valid to be concerned about future updates. Really though, all HTC needs to do is provide a stock rom. Maybe I'm oversimplifying it (I 100% don't know what I'm talking about here) but just throw the necessary hardware drivers into aosp and call it a day, so someone can go to the aosp site and build a stock rom for the one x or any other phone in the same way you can the nexus, xoom, etc. But they don't need to make this rom the default, or even do some weird voodoo to make it an option on startup. Just bury it on their website and let the 10 people who want it flash it themselves and say it's warrantyless or whatever they need to do to sleep at night.

[IceDree]

... I'd heard enough bad things about Blur that I didn't even want to bother....

Blur was bad in it earlier versions & it was the most hated UI & gained allot bad rep (some people just hate it because others does)

But that was on Android 1.6 , 2.0 & 2.1
It 2.2 it was better, but looked the same

On 2.3 Motorola redesigned it & dropped the name Motoblur™, now they call it MAP UI (Motorola Application Platform UI)
Motorola improved it ALLOT, its not the same as the old one & its getting better with every new version
Give it a shot one day in a store ... you might like it

[IceDree]

I don't hate it at all, but I think its a bit too much

For the record : I don't have an HTC Sense phone, but I play with them in the stores when I get a chance

I've played with a Sense 2.1 on a Desire HD one & It was okay , no lags or what so ever

I've played with a Sense 2.1 on an Incredible S & it was awesome

I've played with a Sense 3.0 on a Sensation & it was the buggiest laggiest phone I've ever used !!! I'd a Motorola Milestone at the time & my phone was so much faster than the Sensation (Un-scientific test off course) , but later that day I found out that the Sensation have ALLOT of problems & Sense was the least of em

I've played with a Sensation XE & it was smooth as it can get unlike the Regular one

I've played with Sense 3.5 on a Sensation XL & I was surprised on how much better it was


There's few things I love about Sense 3 & up such as the Weather Animation (nothing can come close to that) & lockscreen (I think it's better than everything out there) , if I bought an HTC Android phone* it will be because of this two things

Don't know about Sense 4 , but I don't like the new dock , looks very generic to me

In the other hand I HATE touchwiz becaue it looks like an iPhone (that home button doesn't help either)

* I said HTC Android phone because I'm leaning toward getting a Windows Phone next time ... probably HTC

[Crispy]

From what I've seen Sense 4.0 doesn't look too bad. However there are still basic issues like -

- bundled apps can't be uninstalled. e.g. the ad supported versions of TuneIn, Sondhound, the million clock widgets, Amazon mp3 etc etc. You can disable these but it will still take up space on your phone

- Contacts and Dialer look like they're from Froyo

- too many rounded corners, gradients, highlights. ICS is all about a flat monochromatic look

In the end, the real question is - are the added features worth the reduced battery life and size? For many people the answer will be yes, but there will always be those who want stock ICS.

[heathroi]

I'm not anti sense either but the stock rom on the inspire had a horrible battery life so i switched to cyanomod, which was night and day and have just not gone back. And now Ive got ics installed (xda; redemption) shrug.

[turdbogls]

i guess the main gripe i have with it is the space it takes up. with "all in one" memory becoming more and more popular, i want the most amount of space i can get. disabling apps may help the "lag" and battery drain, but the apps are still taking up space.

sense 2.1 was intrusive IMO, but Sense 4 looks like it has done a pretty good job of adding to AOSP instead of taking away from it. i still LOVE AOSP ICS, and wouldn't trade it for anything...but i find myself really wanting this ICS/Sense4.0 port for the nexus to come through just to try it out for a little bit

[MrSmith317]

Sense and most of the UI "experiences" have a fundamental flaw. In order to provide you with the best "experience" you have to allow them to manage your data...their way. If for one prefer to keep my apps separate. I don't login to youtube with my facebook account etc... So perhaps that's enough of an argument.

I will say that if Sense, Blur, Touchwiz, etc were in the market as add-on launchers a la Nova, ADW, Launcher Pro, etc. They would probably do a lot better and it would put phones on even playing fields as far as upgrades go. Then we could finally put "fragmentation" to rest. As well as get the most customizable experience any phone/MID has to offer.