Just switched from a RIM Blackberry over to the HTC Incredible, a choice that wasn't really a choice given my preference for Verizon. I'd tried the Droid and found the keyboard so irritating that it soured me on the phone completely. Having given up on the iPhone ever being available (and being appalled by Apple's increasingly evil behavior), the arrival of the Incredible seemed to imply I could finally cease my fence sitting.
The phone itself has the rather typical form factor, with some flourishes (red highlights around the camera lens, red battery and red interior). The screen is absolutely gorgeous. The colors seem a bit eye popping and over-saturated, but it's so superior to what I was used to, I can't bring myself to complain. The OS and interface a completely intuitive, and I had no problem adjusting despite my spending the last 3 years on a BB.
Migration to the phone was effectively seamless. I just moved everything to Google (gmail, etc.), and the phone did the rest when I added the account. The experience was far less painful than even a BB to BB migration. No need to bother the Verizon folks to transfer things for you.
The browsing experience is infinitely superior to RIM's browser (not really a surprise), but there is a fairly irritating issue with managing bookmarks in that there isn't any way to manage bookmarks. The browser doesn't allow any kind of folder hierarchy for bookmarks, and users have found a couple of painful workarounds with folders containing bookmarks on the home screen (a manual process I've refused to undertake). Another solution was using Xmarks Mobile as a home page, which seemed to be the least of evils approach for now.
HTC's Sense UI is a pleasure to use, supporting all the nice multi-touch stuff that users have come to expect. The downside is that its overlayed on Android 2.1, and HTC's track record is not great in terms of providing updates as Android marches relentlessly on. So your likely to fall behind new Android releases, but multi-touch is probably worth it. Rumor is the Nexus One is no longer slated to available as a Verizon phone, so there may not be a choice anyway.
The 8 mega pixel camera is impressive (although coming from no camera on a BB, you could argue I'm easily impressed).
A not completely shocking shortcoming is battery life. My BB could last around 1.5 days on a charge, and watching the Incredible's battery run down in a matter hours has inspired a certain queasiness. The first app I downloaded was "Power Manager", in the hopes of getting a handle on this power hungry device. The only real solution that comes to mind is buying extra power cabling and leaving them at the desk, car, bedside to top off the battery whenever possible. Power Manager at least allows you to easily choose profiles that easily switch off unnecessary functionality. I suppose I'll have to pop for a bigger battery when one becomes available.
The fairly obvious conclusion is that if you want a smartphone on Verizon, the Incredible is the choice to make. This will change when the CDMA version of the iPhone becomes available, but then it will likely be a matter of personal preference of living under Apple's tyranny or choosing the more open but less polished world of Android.
