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Review: UltimateLaunch

Posted by Cris on Sunday 10th August 2008 at 16:34The Windows Mobile interface has never been anything spectacular. Right out of the box the interface is usually boring, with a heavy reliance on the less than finger friendly start menu. Well, since this IS a site meant for finger friendly apps, we want something that doesn't have a large amount of overhead, we want it customizable, and we want to keep the stylus out of it!

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Here is UL doing its best to impersonate an iPhone interface

Ultimate Launch fits this discription perfectly, although not without some work. After installing UL and activating the plugin, the first thing that pops up on the today screen are a few tabs, each with a few standard icons in them. In just this standard form, the plugin is not worth it's $15 price tag. Spend some time with it though, and it can be one of the best $15 you have spent on your mobile. My impressions of this plugin are viewed through a Verizon branded XV6700, overclocked to 624mhz.

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User Synned's UL setup. You can see this tab has both the HTC-home plugin as well as icons.

UL at its simplest is just a set of tabs with content in each tab. The icons that represent each tab can be changed with any .ico file, and text labels can be added as well as the number of tabs. The content of each tab boils down to either shortcuts, or today plugins. It's also possible to have a combination of the two. Explained this way, UL doesn't sound like anything special, but the number of options and settings in this plugin is incredible. Any icon you see can be changed with a .ico file, options like the number of tabs, size of icons, margins, transitions between tabs, and even gestures can be used. The gestures was the thing that got me hooked. A swipe left or right transitions to the left or right tab, but can be changed to launch applications. A swipe down or up can be programmed to launch programs as well. The transitions between tabs use animations which can be selected from a menu of 6 options like slide, turn, cube and blend. For anyone familiar with Linux, the cube is strangely similar to a compiz cube. Also from the Authors site, programs can be downloaded that turn on and off various functions on the phone, as well as make a call. So an icon can be linked to make a call like to 'makecall.exe -phonenumber'. These can be downloaded from UL's site, which is http://www.ultimatelaunch.de/ Just look for SmartUtilities, which is a free download and a quick .Cab install.

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A screenshop of the configuration screen of UL. There are a total of 8 tabs just to configure the basic of UL, plus separate screens for each tab you create.

So grab a cup of coffee and get to customizing, because that's really what Ultimate Launch is made for. Do you want an information crammed tab? Then take your favorite Battery Status plugin and HTC-Home and stick it in a tab, right next to your tab used for contacts, which is right next to all your system shortcuts. Move all the icons down to 24X24 to fit more in per tab, and you have yourself a jam packed setup. You can take as long as you want with the shareware version as well. The only downside to the shareware version is that every now and then 'NOT REGISTERED' will appear in the corners, but will not affect the functionality of the plugin.

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Gestures launching programs? Eh, sure why not.

I did find some downsides to the plugin since I have had it. If you install the plugin into the storage card, when you reboot your device UL won't show up except for an odd icon. You need to either switch the plugin on and off from the settings menu, or long click on one of the visible tabs and select 'reload .ini'. Also, if you have a page full of icons, the transition animation from tab to tab can slow down. This is more your device though, and on my XV6700 I just had to change it from cube to something like slide even when I was overclocked to 624mhz. It also takes a second to load today plugins if they are in a tab and more complex than the messages or wireless plugins. Something like the HTC home plugin can sometimes slow down UL when switching to that tab. Having more plugins as tab content also increased the memory footprint. The configuration menus are also less than thumb friendly, but can be navigated without a stylus depending on how accurate you are. I personally broke out the stylus when I needed to configure the plugin.

There aren't many apps that I would recommend someone go and pay for, especially when there are so many apps on XDA that prove similar functionality. But the customization and the fact this plugin feels polished and does exactly when it needs to makes it a winner for me. If you are willing to spend some time before you plunk down $15 for it you might find you like it as well.

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