HTC Desire 500 Tips and Tricks

Go to your browser bookmarks. Long press on a site and select Add shortcut to Home

If you have Android 4.0, then one neat feature is the ability to clear single notifications.

Simply pull down your notifications bar by swiping your finger from the top of your phone downwards. Then when you see each individual notification, swipe your finger left or right to clear each one.

If you are not happy with your notification light, then you can change and tweak it. Go to the Android Market and download an App called Lightflow.

You might need to enable the notification light before the App works. Go to Settings – Display. Then check Pulse notification.

To bookmark a contact on your homescreen, long press on the home screen background and select Shortcuts. Then select Direct dial.

If you call someone regularly this can be useful as you will have a shortcut to them handily placed on your homescreen.

When taking photos or videos, tap the screen where you want to focus on. The phone will automatically adjust the settings to improve the image or video

You can speed up the page load speed on your browser by disabling JavaScript.

To do this, open your Browser, then Menu – More – Settings. Scroll down and untick JavaScript

Please note that this may affect the functionality of some sites.

Unlike older versions of Android, Ice Cream Sandwich does not go into USB mode automatically when you connect your phone to your computer with a USB cable.

To enable USB / Mass Storage mode, first go to Settings. Then under Wireless and network, press the More… button.

Then connect your phone to your PC using a USB cable and press USB utilities.

Then click the button that says Turn on USB Storage.

Your phone will now appear as another drive letter on your PC.

If you want to remove an entire text message thread, go into Messages and look for the thread. Then long press on it and select Delete thread

If you find the vibration of your phone a little too much, this can easily be reduced.

From the homescreen press Menu – Settings – Sounds. Then under Feedback, press Vibration intensity. Then slide the bar left or right to change the intensity.

You can also turn off Haptic feedback if you really don’t want any feedback.

To soft reset your phone press and hold the Power/Lock button for a 2-3 seconds and the phone will restart. Wait about 10 seconds and then press and hold the Power/Lock button again to restart.

If that doesn’t work, then remove the battery (if it has one). Wait 30 seconds and put the battery back in. Then press the Power/Lock button to turn the phone on.