Lightning-fast…while it lasts

Take a second to think about pure, unadulterated speed. Go ahead -- close your eyes if you need to. What did you think of? The smell of burning rubber on hot race-track asphalt? A fighter jet flashing overhead at breakneck speeds? The face-crushing pull of G-forces on a roller coaster? Now add 4G LTE internet speeds to the list. Damn right, it’s that fast.

Gone are the days of hobbled map searches and apps that take more time to download than play. When we got our hands on the HTC Thunderbolt, we were internet dragsters. We consistently saw download speeds higher than 15Mbps (our Verizon iPhone 4, on the other hand, chugs along at about 1Mbps). At those speeds, we started using mobile internet more than we ever have. We pulled our phones out to identify actors in movies, to check the scores of hockey games, and to punch countless holes in our friends’ half-baked dinner arguments.

But all that speed comes at a price, and we’re not talking about the friends who won’t take us out in public anymore. Thunderbolt’s battery races to red faster than a stock car to a checkered flag. Granted, you don’t have to use LTE at all -- you can turn it off with a few taps -- but that’s like going the speed limit in a space shuttle. So, if you’re like us, you’ll spend a lot of time charging the thing.

And that’s when you’ll notice a strange design choice: the kickstand folds out in such a way that charging while watching movies in landscape orientation is impossible. That’s a shame because the gigantic 4.3-inch display will milk the battery completely dry in the time it takes to watch The Fast and the Furious, especially if you crank the volume and forget to turn off all the background tasks. (Hey, you wanted multitasking? You got it.) And that battery isn’t the only issue that made us miss our iPhones, either.

The display is clearly not as crisp as the iPhone 4’s Retina display, though it’s far from fuzzy. The OS has a confusing assortment of needlessly complex settings to sort through (How many Mac|Life editors does it take to turn on push notifications? Answer: three -- plus an email to HTC.) The 8-megapixel camera takes grainy, high-noise photos rarely worth keeping. And then there’s the blunt fact that the Thunderbolt just doesn’t feel that great in your hands.
 
That’s because at 6.23 ounces, the thing weighs a ton, and the soft-touch plastic back feels toy-like when compared to the glass back on the iPhone 4. But like any good toy, the Thunderbolt comes with myriad bells and whistles, some of which had us longing for its features on our iPhones long after we’d sent this phone back to HTC. An LED indicator in the earpiece alerts you to messages, the keyboard offers vibrating feedback when you type, and as is the case with Android devices, nearly everything’s customizable. Even the kickstand was beneficial in several instances, and the four capacitive buttons were a welcome tactile alternative to the iPhone’s solitary Home button.

The bottom line. The Thunderbolt is a great option for people who want an Android device. At times it feels shamefully like the first-generation device it is, but it’s only a matter of time until lightning strikes again. Hopefully next time, it’ll be a smaller ‘bolt.