Call quality: We found call quality on the HTC EVO 4G relatively clear: we could hear callers loud and without distortion, while callers said they had no problem hearing us clearly. We rarely needed to adjust the volume using the corresponding buttons on the side of the cell phone. Another plus is that regardless of how close you hold the smartphone to your face, the “End Call” button never seems to get “accidentally” hit. Additionally, there was no degradation in call quality when we used the speakerphone or when we used a Bluetooth headset, and we could still hear callers in a noisy environment, such as a crowded store.

Audio quality: The playback of music through the EVO 4G’s speaker is solid; songs sounded loud, but not distorted or tinny. The HTC EVO 4G sports a 3.5mm headset jack so you can use your own high-end headphones to listen to music stored on the Android phone, however, unless they are also cell phone compatible you won’t be able to take calls. Additionally, the smartphone supports stereo Bluetooth so if you prefer to go wireless, you can always listen to tunes via an optional Bluetooth-enabled stereo headset.

Menu/phone book: The HTC EVO 4G runs Google Android Operating System (OS) 2.1, the same as the OS currently found on the DROID Incredible by HTC. Like the DROID Incredible, the HTC EVO 4G has a 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor so it’s one fast smartphone: load web pages quickly (it also has pinch and zoom for web pages), play streaming videos without any lag time, and switch between apps on the cell phone with ease. It also has HTC Sense, an overlay that sits on top of the OS that adds more functionality and features to the cell phone.

For starters, HTC Sense offers seven screens (instead of the 5 screens native to the Google Android OS) to customize, and a slue of widgets to help customize the cell phone. It also has Footprints, an application that allows you to take a picture of a place, get all the information available about it from the web including a map, and even add a note. The idea is that whenever you go back to that place you can revisit or just share it with friends. Additionally, the EVO 4G also has the new Friend Stream feature that lets you view all the updates (including pictures, Facebook updates, and more) for your contacts in one place. That means you don’t need to go to the Facebook app to look for just a few updates from a list of people who might not all be in your contacts. Once you add a contact to People, you can opt to link the contact card to their Facebook information. (Tip: To link other accounts to a contact, select the contact and touch the broken link in the top right-hand corner of the screen. You can choose to link the person to another contact in the phonebook – in case you have duplicates – or to a Facebook contact. Select Facebook and all your Facebook contacts will appear scroll to the contact and choose it. The Facebook information and updates will appear in the contact’s listing.) More importantly all the latest interaction with people listed in contacts will appear underneath the name. For example, that person’s latest Facebook status update will appear, or a number signaling new messages from the person whether its e-mail, text message, or voicemail.

Overall, the user interface is fairly straightforward and icon friendly. To access the cell phone’s applications simply select the up arrow key and they’ll appear. There are a few things to note about navigation. If you’re in a screen and want to go back to the previous screen simply press the back arrow. If you want to exit a program simply press the button with a picture of a house. Whenever you’re in an application and want to do more, press the Menu key and a set of options will appear.

The Google Android OS is really all about having all your contact information in one spot and constantly synched. When we say all your contact information we mean all – including social networking sites, multiple e-mail accounts, messaging (messaging is threaded – so you can see a complete text message conversation in one view), and even photo services where you may have accounts created. You can add all pertinent account information easily when you set up the device. If you want to sync with your computer simply connect it via the included microUSB-to-USB synching cable and it will appear as an additional drive on your desktop, making it easy to drag and drop files from a computer to the cell phone’s MicroSD card.

Messaging: The HTC EVO 4G can handle multiple e-mail accounts, either corporate e-mail or web-based e-mail. Setting up an e-mail account couldn’t be easier and one of the screens has an HTC prompt that walks your through the set-up steps. It’s just a matter of knowing user name and password. The smartphone does the rest. The e-mail feature also supports folders already created in an e-mail account so you can save e-mails to particular folders. We should note that if you delete an mail on the cell phone it also deletes it in the account that appears on the computer. (Tip: To delete multiple e-mails from one account, while in the screen that displays a list of messages, choose Menu and then select Delete. You’ll be able to delete multiple emails quickly.)

Camera/video: This is one area where the HTC EVO 4G stands apart from other Android phones available to date. The cell phone doesn’t have just one camera, it has two cameras: an 8-megapixel camera on the back and a 1.3-megapixel camera on the front of the cell phone. The 8-megapixel camera is what you’ll be using to take most of your pictures, while the 1.3-megapixel is better suited for snapping self portraits or participating in a video call using the QIK app. Overall, picture quality is acceptable and we’re happy to report it has a fairly fast shutter. Colors are true and details are sharp, unless you’re trying to capture something in motion – those shots could be a bit sharper. Once you snap a picture, you can save it, trash it, or share it to a multitude of options including Flickr, Facebook, Twitter (the app is called Peep), Bluetooth, and various messaging options. There are quite a few camera settings: you can adjust White Balance, ISO Settings, Metering, Set a self timer, Exposure, Contrast Saturation, Picture Quality, GeoTagging, Face Detection, Grid, and Color Effects (Normal, Grayscale, Negative, Sepia, Solarize, Posterize, and Aqua).

Additionally, you can view and shoot videos on the cell phone. Shooting videos is pretty easy and the quality is quite good. Well, it should be, it shoots video in 720p HD. Like a video you captured on your cell phone? Why not watch it on a HDTV? It’s pretty easy to do since there’s a micro HDMI port at the base of the cell phone. You can watch movies in HD on the HTC EVO 4G as well. It’s also worthwhile to mention that Sprint has a ton of TV options built-in including Sprint TV, Nascar Sprint Cup, and Sprint Football. All are quite enjoyable to watch on the spacious, bright 4.3-inch EVO 4G display.

Music: As noted, the HTC Android smartphone has a music player. You can listen to songs stored in MP3, AAC (Apple’s audio format), and WMA (Microsoft’s audio format) formats. There aren’t many music-centric features included in the player, but it has the ones we’ve come to expect: Repeat, Shuffle, and Playlists (you can even create them on the fly – nice!). Plus, you can save tunes stored in your cell phone as a ringtone (Tip: To save as song as a ringtone, choose Menu when a song is playing and select Save As Ringtone. From there you can set it as either the phone’s ringtone or for a specific contact.) Another plus is that you can share songs via Bluetooth.

The HTC EVO 4G comes with an 8GB microSD card pre-installed and can accept up to a 32GB microSD card. Out-of-the box you will have plenty of room to store music on this cell phone. Besides adding your own music to the cell phone, there are quite a few free music applications that you can download from the Marketplace such as Pandora and Shazam. Plus, the HTC EVO 4G has a FM radio, though you’ll need to plug-in headphones with a 3.5mm headset jack in order to use it.

Connectivity/Bluetooth/WiFi/4G/Mobile HotSpot:The HTC EVO 4G is a connectivity dream and the cell phone was designed to share its connection. Of course, it has Bluetooth and it can be used to connect to a Bluetooth headset (we found call quality was decent when we used the Motorola T505), and even transfer contacts, pictures, and music to other Bluetooth-enabled devices. It also sports built-in WiFi, so you can use this smartphone to log onto available WiFi networks to surf the Web or send/receive e-mail. It’s a nice feature and it just takes moments to set up. The only thing you need to know is the WiFi network you want to use and password if needed. (Tip: To connect to a WiFi network, choose Settings by pressing Menu from the home screen from the main menu, turn on WiFi. Once activated, select WiFi Settings, choose Add WiFi Network. When the WiFi network you want appears, select it and follow the remaining directions to connect to that particular network.)

We should note that surfing the Web on the HTC EVO was fast using 3G connectivity, but was even faster when tested using the 4G connection (Think: Loading videos on the Internet quickly with no lag or pauses to buffer during playback of the video). That’s right, the HTC EVO 4G also sports 4G connectivity where available. One of the more exciting features is the Mobile HotSpot, which shares the EVO 4G data connection with up to 8 other devices via WiFi. In our tests, where we had 4G connectivity we were impressed with the speed that the other WiFi-enabled devices were able to garner via the EVO’s Mobile HotSpot connection.

Look and feel: The HTC EVO 4G is one good looking smartphone and that has a lot to do with it’s gorgeous 4.3-inch touchscreen display. It’s bright and viewable in direct sunlight. The entire front of the cell phone is essentially a large screen. In case you’re wondering, the screen is slightly larger than the iPhone. Of course, the cell phone attracts its fair share of fingerprints, but that’s the case with most touchscreen cell phones currently available. The back of the Android phone is as interesting as the front: there’s a built-in kickstand for watching movies.

Beyond the large screen there isn’t a lot more to describe. It has the Android standard 4 dedicated keys across the bottom of the display for Home, Menu, Go Back, and Search. On the side, you’ll find volume keys and on the bottom of the cell phone is the microUSB port and HDMI out port. On the top of the EVO 4G is the power button and the 3.5mm headset jack. Turn the cell phone around and you’ll see the camera lens and flash. However, you’ll need to remove the black rubberized casing from the back of the EVO 4G to access the MicroSD card slot and that’s just fine since it’s all bright red. Overall, the cell phone feels good in the hand. It has a bit of weight to it, but that only makes it feel more solid. If you have smaller hands you won’t be able to wrap your fingers around the smartphone, but you’ll probably still enjoy using it.

Keypad:The HTC EVO 4G is a touchscreen cell phone and as such it only has a touchscreen QWERTY keyboard, which is actually HTC’s own touch keyboard, not the one found within the Google Android operating system. We were quite impressed with the amount of times we tapped the correct letter on the first try and how well it learned the words we used on a regular basis. However, the HTC EVO 4G lacks a trackpad, so if you use apps that require a trackpad you might have some issues using those apps. That said, we rarely missed the feature.

We were a little disappointed in the HTC EVO 4G’s battery life. We definitely wish the battery lasted longer; when WiFi was turned on we were able to go a complete workday before needing to recharge the cell phone. So you’ll likely want to get an extra battery or a car charger for the commute home. That said, when WiFi wasn’t activated the cell phone did have better battery life. If you plan on using the EVO 4G as a Mobile HotSpot, you’ll definitely want to have the cell phone charging simultaneously. It’s not imperative to do that, we just found the experience lasted longer when we did this. The good news is that the cell phone will charge when attached to a computer via the included USB-to-microUSB cable. We should note that depending on what applications you download to the smartphone, battery life can drain faster.