Using the Settings menu on the HTC HD7

As with all smartphones, there are a certain aspects to the HTC HD7 that you can customize. Go to Settings to get started. You'll be taken to a menu that has two pages, one for system settings and one for application settings. The system settings affect the phone and the WP7 OS, while the application settings only affect individual applications.

From the system menu, you'll first see ringtones & sounds and then theme. Ringtones & sounds naturally lets you change the ringtone as well as the sounds for various alerts, and even lets you preview those sounds. The theme menu lets you change accent colors and background colors so that you can personalize your phone. Next, in the system menu are airplane mode as well as

Wi-Fi and Bluetooth

, which control the settings for those connections. Wi-Fi allows you to turn Wi-Fi mode on and connect to a network while Bluetooth lets you turn on Bluetooth connectivity and connect to devices.

Airplane mode

will turn these off as well as any other sort of wireless connection so that your phone is safe for air travel.

Next is email & accounts which allows you to

configure email addresses

and sync your Facebook account. Below is lock & wallpaper where you can change your wallpaper and password protect your phone. Next down the list are location and cellular. Location allows you to turn off your GPS unit, which will prevent you from using location-based services. Cellular allows you to configure your cellular connection. Date & time lets you toggle between 24-hour mode or manually set the time and date.

Below that is brightness, which allows you to change whether the brightness is set automatically. Keyboard gives you the option of changing your keyboard language and changing some keyboard settings. Region & language allows you to change your region as well as some related options. Ease of access allows you to turn TTY/TTD mode on or off. The next menu, speech, allows you to change when the phone uses speech recognition. Below that, find my phone gives you an option you can turn on to help find your phone easier. This feature may eat up more battery power however, so be warned.

Next in the system settings, phone update is where you'll find some options for when your phone looks for updates. The about menu is where you can get more information on the phone or reset it to factory settings if you wish. The last menu, feedback, lets you choose whether you want to automatically send certain data to Microsoft to help future developments.

In the applications settings, you will find options to configure your individual WP7 applications. This is also where you'll configure the settings of your default applications like Internet Explorer and Maps. Most notably, this is where you would go to change your browser settings, alter your Office settings, or change how your contacts are organized under the people application.