I bought the HTC Trophy a few weeks after release and I have been pretty happy so far despite some strange quirks here and there.

First off I would just like to say that the Windows Phone 7 UI has been incredibly easy to use, the animations fluid, and apps are all designed with a level of consistency; everything just feels together on the software side. Setting up multiple e-mail accounts as well as social networks took five minutes without any trouble. The core UX was great from the get go but when it updated to Mango the phone became even more powerful with the added features such as Bing Music search, scan, local scout, multitasking, etc.

The software feels incredibly polished however the hardware isn't the most striking. It won't win any design contests but it is a tried and true design. I don't think anybody will complain about the Trophy's design but then I don't believe anyone will boast about it either. I'm a big camera person and the camera on the back of this device is sub par at best. The photos come out pretty grainy in low light conditions and a little washed out in normal lighting. But perhaps the one area where the camera does excel is when taking close-up shots. Another complaint is that the battery life is about two or three hours shorter than I would have liked. I consistently set the brightness to low unless I really need it brighter, I don't even have automatic push email and still the battery drains at around 8pm after unplugging it around 9 or 10am.

The biggest complaint is not specific to the Trophy but more specific to the Windows Phone platform itself as the app selection is much smaller than its competitors. There are big name apps, yes, but it took almost two years before a Pandora app was made available and then there's also the Xbox Live integration that's a bit disappointing. Xbox Live on Windows Phones should be, by right, above and beyond what any other platform has to offer in terms of mobile gaming. But this is not the case. Yes, we have Angry Birds and Doodle Jump, but I would like to see a mobile Halo game or a mobile variant of Gears of War or something that really uses the Xbox integration to its full extent. One last little qualm about the Xbox Live is the fact that Xbox Live games like Angry Birds costs more on Windows Phone than on Android. Now I believe the reasoning behind this is because Angry Birds on Windows Phone offers achievement points where as playing the game on an iPhone doesn't but still it feels a little off to me. The HTC Trophy may not be the flagship Windows Phone people may have wanted it to be on Verizon but in the end it is a very capable smartphone.