HTC One Review
HTC One is HTC's premium flagship for 2013. From the time the phone was launched internationally, we've been enamoured by its design. It is a make or break device for HTC, which has not been doing well financially, as the Android smartphone world is dominated by Samsung. On paper, the HTC One seems to be the best in terms of hardware specifications and materials used in its construction. Do these translate in to making the phone the best performer in practical use? We try to find out.Design/ Build
The most distinguishing feature of the HTC One is the phone's design and physical construction. Saying that the phone is a beautiful piece of hardware would be an understatement. You'd be able to appreciate its finer design nuances when you experience the phone in person. As far the design and attention to detail is concerned, we see the HTC One in the top league along with the iPhone 5.
The first thing that one notices after picking up the phone is its premium fit and finish. It has a thin profile and doesn't feel awkward to hold.
The phone does look a bit similar to the BlackBerry Z10 as both phones have a thin bezel, and the major portion of the front is occupied by the display, with the body elements (made of aluminium in the HTC One) at their narrow best above and below it. It also looks like the iPhone 5 because of its chamfered edges and fine lines between the frame.
The HTC One sports an aluminium unibody casing with a polycarbonate frame at the sides and accents at the back. The colour of our review unit was silver, with the sides and lines that run across the back done in white.
The phone has rounded corners and chamfered edges, and feels very thin.
The 4.7-inch display forms the largest part of the front, with the glass curving around the chamfered edges. HTC has used Corning Gorilla Glass 2, making the screen durable, and comparatively more resistant to scratches. There are two capacitive touch buttons, instead of the usual three, below the display panel, with the HTC branding in the middle.
Two aluminium strips surround the panel on the top and bottom. The strips feature speaker grills, which are part of HTC's Boom Sound set-up to offer enhanced stereo sound with Beats audio and a dedicated sound amplifier.
The 2.1-megapixel wide-angle front camera sits on the right, above the display, while the light and proximity sensors are located on the left.
The back of the phone is curved which, in our view, aids ergonomics, and gives a good grip. The brushed aluminium runs all over with two white polycarbonate bands at the top and bottom in line with the aluminium strips in the front.
The 4-megapixel rear camera lens is located towards the top. Unlike the One X and One X+, the lens unit doesn't protrude out and is flush with the body of the phone, which makes it look more elegant. A single LED flash is located just next to the lens. Like the One X and the Butterfly, the phone doesn't have a removable back cover. There's HTC branding engraved in the middle, and the Beats audio branding, towards the bottom of the phone. The top plastic band also features a noise-cancellation microphone.
The bottom panel features a microphone and a Micro-USB port. The right side features the volume rocker, which is a single piece of aluminium. It's flush with the side but the tactile feedback is still good. There's a SIM card tray for the micro-SIM and a pinhole for ejecting it on the left side.
Display
The 1080p display of the HTC One is among the best displays we've seen so far. The phone sports a 4.7-inch Super LCD 3 display with Corning Gorilla Glass 2 and has a resolution of 1080x1920 pixels, packing-in 468 pixels per inch. The screen's pixel density is the highest among all flagship phones, and text and images appear extremely sharp. Reading text and browsing the web is extremely pleasant.The display was not very reflective and under sun visibility was great. The viewing angles on the phone are excellent.
Camera
With the HTC One, the Taiwanese smartphone giant deflects from the usual megapixel count race and introduces the concept of the Ultrapixels. Instead of going for a camera that boasts of more megapixels, the One features a 4-megapixel resolution rear shooter with pixels that are of bigger size. While usual smartphone camera offer pixels of size 1.1 microns on an average, the HTC One's camera offers a pixel size of 2 microns(µm).Software/ User InterfaceThe HTC One runs Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean and Sense 5, HTC's own UI that includes some custom apps in addition to a skinned interface. While some people prefer stock Android over any kind of skinning, we feel that the Sense is one of the better skinning solutions, and looks great on the full-HD screen. That being said, skinning in Sense 5 is minimal compared to previous versions, and icons have been toned down, and appear flat.Performance/ Battery Life
The HTC One is powered by a 1.7GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 quad-core processor with 2GB RAM onboard, and an Adreno 320 chip for processing graphics. Our review unit had 32GB of non-expandable internal storage.
With Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, the overall experience of navigation through the interface was extremely impressive, thanks to Project Butter and all the power under the hood. We did not experience any lag at all while launching apps, playing games, scrolling web pages or switching between apps. Performance wise the HTC One is the hands-down winner, compared to other Android flagships in the market at this point in time.
The HTC One offers Chrome in addition to the default browser. The default browser also allows users to turn on Adobe flash for viewing Flash content. It also offers a reader mode for reading text heavy web pages.
We were able to play full-HD clips, though some formats including .mov, were not supported natively (this was easily fixed by the use of third party apps). The front speakers on the phone deliver excellent quality sound at high volume levels. The phone also supports Beats audio not just with headphones but also with the use of the front speakers. The quality of sound output is unmatched and even ringtones sound melodious and rich. Watching a video clip or listening to a song is a joyful experience.
