Windows Phone Thoughts: All Tapped Out? DinarSoft's HandyMenu v2.5 Reviewed

Configuring HandyMenu


Figure 3: Hopefully you don’t need quick and frequent access to Hard Reset…

If you refer back to Figure 2, you’ll see a little blue button at the top of the menu. This takes you to the HandyMenu Settings. To add a menu item to HandyMenu, simply put a checkmark next to it. Clear the checkmark to remove the item. It’s as simple as that. Use the arrow buttons to the right of the menu items to change the order of the items on your menu.

You designate your quick action with the dropdown below the Menu Items. As stated earlier, it includes all of the menu items offered by HandyMenu, including Hard Reset. A bit of advice… don’t make Hard Reset your quick action.

You can also select the actions that will activate HandyMenu and the quick action. The default upon installation is tap for the menu and tap-and-hold for the quick action. You can elect to reverse those actions as well.


Figure 4: More menu items…


Figure 5: … and even more!

Figures 4 and 5 show more of the menu items supported by HandyMenu. It seems that they’ve covered most of the bases for frequently used functions.


Figure 6: Display Settings.

HandyMenu includes both English and German language displays. You also have options to display icons with the menu items, to hide the tray icon (if you prefer to use hardware buttons, for example), and assign a custom tray icon.


Figure 7: Color Settings.

You can set up custom colors on the screen shown in Figure 7. You can only have one set of custom colors, but you can switch between the standard colors and the custom colors by using the “Use Custom Colors” checkbox.

The only thing that I’d like to see is an option to use the colors from your Today theme automatically. I always like to have at least 1 "con" so that the review is balanced, so this is it. It was a stretch to come up with it.

Conclusion
HandyMenu packs a boatload of features and convenience into an easy-to-use and very affordable utility. It’s such a bargain at $5.99 that I recommend it to anyone and everyone who owns a Pocket PC.