Indepth HTC One review
Wed, Mar 20 2013 02:16
| Andriod, Smartphones, HTC
HTC in-depth review:
The HTC One sure is a beautiful piece of hardware and it's very clear HTC has set out to differentiation it at every point on the spec sheet with other phones, and have done a fantastic job of this. As other smartphones are increasingly faceless, monolithic black slabs, HTC sandwiches its screen between two bassy front-facing speakers. BoomSound. As competitors crank out 13-megapixel shooters, HTC bucks the trend with a much lower megapixel count, but larger pixels and improved optics. UltraPixels. Add to that a new way to shoot and share images and video. Zoe Share. Plus, a new home screen experience that brings the world to you. BlinkFeed.
And let’s not forget how rare it is to come across a decent aluminium smartphone these days.
If HTC is to recover, it’ll be through a combination of intelligent marketing and great products. We can’t review the former, but you can bet we’re going to get stuck into the latter. In fact, we’ll do it right after the break, in our definitive review of the new HTC One.
There’s a certain futility about merely describing a device like the HTC One. We could fill paragraphs talking about each little nuance of its gorgeous brushed metal chassis, but to really understand and appreciate this phone you need to hold it in your hand. Neither renders nor photographs do it justice. What we’re trying to say here is that the HTC One is a very pretty piece of technology indeed.
The basic profile of the HTC One is a lot like the Droid DNA or its international cousin, the J Butterfly, but the feel is strikingly different. HTC’s recent history of polycarbonate designs makes way for a welcome return to the aluminum unibodies of old. This curved aluminum block is HTC’s most precisely-crafted phone yet. Reflective, diamond-cut chamfers adorn the edges of the casing, and the back has a subtle, ergonomic curve to it. (On the inside, HTC sandwiches the battery between the screen and PCB to achieve this look.) In the hand, it’s light yet substantial, and the feel of the brushed aluminum leaves you in no doubt that you’re holding a premium product.
An injected matte plastic trim can be found around the edge and back of the HTC One, and this houses part of the phone’s antenna assembly (on an all-metal phone, it’s got to go somewhere). It also breaks up the exposed metal areas quite nicely -- on the silver version we’re reviewing it’s white; on the black version it’s black. It houses the microSIM tray on the left edge, and on the right side it’s punctuated by a metal volume rocker. Up top is the power button, and there’s a good reason for its being there -- it also doubles as an IR blaster for the Sense TV app.
Thankfully, there’s no protruding One X-style camera hump this time around -- in fact, the camera is slightly recessed into the chassis itself. This way it doesn’t interfere with the flow of the curved back -- however, the lens may be more vulnerable to scratches when the the device is laid flat.
On the front sits a SuperLCD 3 panel at 1920x1080 resolution, and this has to be one of the best-looking screens we’ve ever seen. It uses the same display tech as the Droid DNA, but HTC’s condensed this 1080p panel into a 4.7-inch space, making it sharper than ever, at 468 pixels per inch. Its colors are bright and vivid without being overblown, and there’s no discoloration or wash-out when viewing at oblique angles. Being a modern LCD, the HTC One’s screen is expectedly excellent in outdoor performance.
The flattened business end of the HTC One is also home to its two front-facing speakers, forming part of HTC’s “BoomSound” system. This combination of larger speakers, more advanced membranes and Beats Audio results in the loudest and bassiest sound experience we’ve heard on any smartphone, without sacrificing clarity. For music and video content, that’s great. But on anything but the lowest volume setting, it’s almost too loud for regular notifications and ringtones. Powering on the HTC One for the first time, you’re assaulted by the full force of BoomSound in HTC jingle form. And the first phone call you receive on the device will be equally terrifying if it strikes you unprepared.
On the subject of audio, we should also mention the bundled HTC earphones. They’re not Beats-branded, but they’re about as good as the urBeats in-ear cans offered with some HTC handsets last year, and a significant step up from the truly awful HTC earbuds included with earlier devices. Kudos to HTC for not skimping in this area.
Beneath the screen is the one seriously questionable design decision we almost don't have to point out -- HTC’s unique button setup. Unlike about every other Android phone on the planet, you’re limited to just a back and home key on the HTC One. No multitasking key, no menu key. To jump to the task-switcher, you have to double-tap the home button. Want Google Now? Long-press the home key. We adjusted to the new button setup pretty quickly, but it's one nasty holdover from HTC’s 2012 phones. Moreover, it takes the home button out of the easiest part of the phone to reach -- the center.
Apps that require the menu key -- including the bundled Twitter application -- reclaim a lower portion of the screen to make way for a virtual menu button. The dreaded black bar. Whether HTC or app developers are to blame is debatable, but regardless it’s an ugly way of handling legacy apps, and one that detracts from the otherwise slick software experience.
On the inside, the HTC One’s hardware credentials mirror its impressive exterior. It’s running the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 CPU -- a quad-core chip at 1.7GHz -- with 2GB of RAM and 32 or 64GB of storage. Qualcomm’s new chip is about as fast as it gets in the Android space right now, and that was reflected in our daily use of the HTC One, which has been a completely lag-free experience with no slow-down and lightning-fast app loading times.
We’re using the European model here in the UK, which packs 32GB of internal storage; other territories, including some Asian countries, will get a 64GB option. Storage is arranged in a single partition for both apps and media, and the HTC One connects to PCs and Macs via MTP connection, in line with Google’s guidelines. There’s no removable storage option -- unless you count HTC Sense’s ability to connect USB thumb drives -- but with a minimum of 32GB on-board, we’re not going to make too much fuss over this.
The version we’ve got also supports European 4G LTE frequencies -- 800MHz, 1800MHz and 2600MHz -- which are the main three in use in the UK and mainland Europe. In addition, you’ve got quad-band HSPA at speeds of up to 42Mbps. The HTC One is also one of the first phones to boast 802.11ac Wifi compatibility, so that’s an added bonus for owners of the latest super-fast Wifi routers. Both Wifi and Bluetooth capabilities work as expected.
And yes, it makes phone calls, too. HTC’s touting new software tweaks called “VoiceSense,” which automatically cranks up the call volume in loud environments. VoiceSense joins an array of other voice call features, including the ability to ring louder when the phone’s in a bag or pocket, and Sense’s automatic quieting of the ringer when the phone is picked up.
So all the requisite boxes are checked for a high-end Android smartphone in 2013. But as we’ll discover throughout this review, design is where the HTC One truly shines. As much as we’ve praised phones like the Nexus 4 in the past year -- and admired devices like the Windows Phone 8X from afar -- the HTC One is on another plane when it comes to build quality. That’s not hyperbole. With its latest handset, HTC leads everyone bar Apple in this area.
HTC One software, UI and apps
The HTC One runs the new HTC Sense 5 atop Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean. That means you’re not quite running the latest version of Android, but on a non-stock phone there’s not a whole lot of user-facing stuff to miss.
In the latest version of its user interface, HTC has completely reinvented Sense, giving it its biggest makeover ever. The iconic flip clock has gone, swapped out for a new home screen dynamic based on the “BlinkFeed” news feed. And Sense’s cartoonish icons and menus are gone, replaced by sleeker, more geometric graphics. A new, condensed Roboto-based font is used in the menus and many of HTC’s apps, and this looks great on the HTC One’s super-high resolution screen.
Sense 5 has also lost an awful lot of its visual noise, and that’s a good thing. The excessive embossing around the edge of buttons and menus is gone, replaced with clean lines and a curved gradient towards the notification shade. Further evidence can be found in the new HTC wallpaper gallery, which is stocked with classy, minimalist backgrounds now a million miles away from Android’s own “Holo” design language.
It’s also fast as all hell. Sure, that’s helped out by the speedy Snapdragon 600 CPU and Android 4.1’s “Project Butter” performance tweaks and the 2GB of RAM, but HTC also deserves credit for making Sense 5 an entirely lag-free experience. Seriously. Not once did this thing stutter or stall.
For serious news junkies (and bloggers), BlinkFeed isn’t going to replace your RSS reader, nor is it meant to. BlinkFeed is clearly designed for "normal" people -- civilian smartphone users. It’s a supposed to be a quick, easy way to “snack” on information.
How well it works for you will depend on how well its curated list of integrated services fits with your social and news habits. We suspect most smartphone users will find some use for it, even if it doesn’t become their default home screen.
This is HTC’s first iteration of BlinkFeed, and it’s very good for a first shot at this sort of thing. But its usefulness is hampered by its closed nature, and we’d like to see it opened up in the same way DashClock Widget is. That’d let the development community pick up where HTC left off and add even more capabilities into this flagship feature. With some more customizations, BlinkFeed could be a real asset for power users.
There’s also no way to turn it off entirely -- though you don't have to use BlinkFeed if you don't want to. Swipe to the right and you’ve got a standard Android home screen arrangement -- a four-by-four grid of icons and a selection of surprisingly stylish Sense widgets with which to customize it. Up to five home screens can be added, and you can set any one as the default home screen.
The app drawer has been redesigned too. It’s a lot more customizable, which is good because the default arrangement isn’t particularly easy to navigate. HTC seems to expect many users to hop between BlinkFeed and the app drawer without using much of the traditional home, and so the app drawer can be re-arranged into folders. That’s not necessarily a bad idea, but it means you’ve got more hoops to jump through if you want to create app shortcuts on a home screen page. The process of moving stuff in and out of the app dock is a more convoluted than it needs to be.
More: BlinkFeed: Inside the HTC One's home screen reader
Task Switching
As we mentioned, you can access the task switcher on the HTC One by double-tapping the home key. This brings up a grid of the nine most recently used apps. That places a hard limit on the number of apps you can switch between, but we figure nine is probably enough for most people. You can see all nine immediately without scrolling, which is good. However, the lack of app icons on this page means it can take a little longer to spot the app you’re after. A good many of them look the same -- black text on a white background.
Like the old Sense task-switcher, you flick a card up to get rid of the app. Thankfully, We didn't notice any of the multi-tasking issues that some folks reported on devices like the One X.
We’re not sure whether we prefer it to the stock Android task-switcher, but it’s an improvement on the old Sense 4 implementation to be sure.
Get Started
First introduced in Sense 4+, HTC’s “Get Started” web service lets you take the first steps towards setting up your new device on your computer, before you even purchase it. Pre-loaded apps. There’s a limit to how much you’re able to set up in advance -- Google accounts, for example, are out of the question. But allowing new users to set up their own wallpapers, ringtones, BlinkFeed services and a few common apps should go a long way towards making the smartphone setup process less painful.
Settings are saved to your HTC account, then, once you’ve signed into the HTC One with that same account, all your customizations are pulled down from HTC’s servers.
Music, Gallery and Beats Audio
As the branding on the back of the phone will remind you, the HTC One comes with Beats Audio software enhancements, and these can be enabled or disabled via the main settings menu. It’s possible we’re imagining this, but the Beats enhancements on the HTC One don’t seem to quite as overblown and excessively bassy as they’ve been in the past. Regardless, the effect is still noticeable -- there’s a welcome boost in volume and bass that’s clear whether you’re using headphones or the excellent front-facing BoomSound speakers.
The new HTC Sense music app is relatively spartan when it comes to visuals, but it’s just as full-featured as as ever. The music app comes with access to the Gracenote lyrics database, and these lyrics pop up on-screen when you enable the new visualizer effects. Similarly, artist images and album art are pulled down from Gracenote when you download or transfer a new album across to the HTC One. And there’s full DLNA support music app, too.
Naturally, DLNA support is also baked into the Gallery app. In addition to showing you your own photos -- and showing you animated previews of each event if you’ve been using Zoe mode. And as is becoming increasingly common, the Gallery apps hooks into Facebook, Flickr and LinkedIn to populate itself with photos from friends, too.
We’ll have more on the Gallery app in the camera section of this review.
TV and Movies
The HTC One is one of the many new Android devices shipping with an integrated IR blaster, allowing it to control TVs, sound systems and cable boxes. The phone’s TV capabilities are rooted in the Sense TV app, which is based on Peel. The setup procedure is pretty simple. Starting with your TV off, you’ll be asked to confirm a few details about your location and equipment branding, before calibrating the remote to work with your TV and assorted boxes.
The TV app shows you a grid of shows that are currently on, with a blue bar beneath indicating how long they’ve been running for. Tapping the show will trigger the TV app keys in the appropriate channel number. It’s a neat alternative to the traditional TV guide layout we’re all familiar with. What’s also useful is the ability to tell the TV app your favorite shows and have messages pop up in BlinkFeed when they’re showing. When you're using the TV app, you'll also get a notification widget allowing you easy access to the universal remote.
HTC Watch, the company’s own streaming service is also present, and the selection of movies and TV content available has been slowly expanding over the past year or so. We’re not sure you’ll find anything there that’s not on Netflix or Google Play, but having another source of streaming content certainly doesn’t hurt.
While other built-in apps include DLNA support, wireless streaming from the Watch app is reserved for HTC’s own Media Link HD peripheral.
HTC Sync Manager
HTC’s own synchronization app is available for HTC One owners, and there’s a Mac and PC version that’ll help you transfer music
The latest version of the app seems to be a marked improvement on earlier builds. HTC Sync no longer chokes on larger music libraries, and it’s relatively easy to import albums or playlists from third-party players like iTunes.
Contacts and calendar appointments can be synced too if you’re still using PC-centric clients for these.
Other bits
- As before, the HTC Sense contacts app can draw in contacts from multiple sources, including Google accounts, Twitter, Facebook and Skype and unify them into a single location. It also has the ability to import high-resolution photos from social networks too, which is nice.
- To expand notifications in Sense, you’ll need to pinch horizontally rather than dragging down. Unfortunately that’s not a particularly obvious gesture, nor is it easy to perform.
- The data usage control panel -- the bar chart showing mobile data consumption -- is hidden Settings > Wireless and Networks > More > Usage in Sense 5. That’s a shame, as it’s one of Android’s most useful features.
- HTC's stock keyboard is fast and responsive, and we were able to type pretty quickly on it thanks to its accurate auto-correction. If you're a fan of Swype-style keyboards, the "trace" option can be enabled in the keyboard settings.
- There’s a variety of lock screen templates available, just like earlier versions of Sense. The Weather lock screen, with its assortment 3D of animations, has been culled, however.
Considered alongside all HTC’s earlier software suites, Sense 5 is easily the fastest, the best designed and the easiest to use. If you weren’t a fan of Sense’s tendency towards 3D animations and pompous visual flair in the past, then you’ll welcome the refined look HTC’s brought to the table on the HTC One. Sense 5 also stacks up pretty well against vanilla Android. There’s still more going on in Sense, and it’s nowhere near as minimalist as what you’ll find on a Nexus, but it’s just as quick and just as stylish.
HTC One battery life
The HTC One is fitted with a 2300 mAh internal battery, which in numbers alone is about average for a high-end Android smartphone. There’s no way inside that aluminum unibody, so as you might’ve guessed, the battery is not removable.
We found the phone’s battery performance to be decent, but not outstanding. It’d easily last us a full day, just as the Sony Xperia Z and LG Nexus 4 have in the past. Some of that will depend on network connectivity, of course.
With moderate to heavy usage patterns consisting of browsing and social networking over LTE, HSPA and Wifi, music playback, photography and video recording, we clocked just under 14 hours of use before reaching the warning level of fifteen percent. With more conservative use, mostly restricted to Wifi, we reached the end of the day with around 30 percent left after 18 or so hours on battery. With all day spent on Wifi, we reached around 50 percent in the same timespan. We used the HTC One on DC-HSDPA on Three UK and LTE on EE, and we didn’t notice any significant additional battery drain when using 4G data services as opposed to good old HSPA. (That’s in line with other modern 4G devices we’ve reviewed, including the Xperia Z and Galaxy S3 LTE.)
HTC Sense doesn’t allow users to measure screen-on time directly -- or battery used by the screen -- but we suspect that gorgeous 1080p display is a responsible for much of the phone’s battery consumption, particularly outside where auto-brightness cranks the backlight all the way up. In fact, on its automatic setting, the screen was consistently brighter than most other Android phones. So there might be some battery savings to be made by manually controlling this setting.
Another predictable battery-guzzler is the “UltraPixel” camera and associated software set. Though straight-up still shots didn’t seem to drain our battery too badly, video recording and Zoe shots took a greater toll. Because of the way Zoe shots work -- recording 20 separate JPEGs and one MP4 video file, having any automatic upload services enabled (e.g. Dropbox) will further cut into your battery life. (To say nothing of mucking up your folder with dozens and dozens of images.)
HTC includes a prominent Power Saver widget in the notification shade at all times, allowing users to switch to a low-power mode to conserve power. Power Saver mode can slow the CPU, dim the display or shut off the data connection when the screen’s off. This is similar to the “Stamina Mode” found on the Sony Xperia Z, though there’s no whitelist to allow apps through the bar on background data. In any case, we’d avoid using this unless we were limping along with very little juice remaining, which is why we’d welcome the ability to remove the widget from the notification area.
To summarize, we were more than happy with the battery performance of the HTC One. Its battery life was a marked improvement over both the (international) One X and One X+, which failed to impress us in this area. But if you’re coming from a phone with really great battery life or greater battery capacity -- or expecting super-long battery life from HTC’s latest -- you may come away disappointed.
HTC One 'UltraPixel' camera review
The HTC One’s rear shooter is no ordinary smartphone camera. Eschewing the traditional megapixel race, the phone includes a 4-megapixel “UltraPixel” camera with much larger pixels -- 2 microns -- on the sensor itself. This, together with the f/2.0 aperture lens, is designed to make the device suited to low-light and indoor photography, where HTC believes smartphone photography goes on.
As well as an impressive set of optics, the HTC One includes a second-generation ImageSense chip. The successor to the chip that debuted in the One X last year is responsible for the HTC One’s fast capture speeds and general image-crunching duties.
So how do all those technical specs and buzzwords translate into real-world performance?
The HTC One records still images at 2688x1520 resolution at 16:9 aspect ratio -- that’s the maximum resolution, and as such if you want to shoot in 4:3, the phone does so by chopping off the sides of the image. That means you get the full benefit of the camera’s wide-angle lens in widescreen shots, and a narrower view in 4:3 mode. Just like last year’s One X, the HTC One is incredibly quick to capture shots, and there’s a burst shooting mode that can be activated by long-pressing the shutter key.
The main camera view is made up of the photo and video shutter keys, zoom controls, filter options, a flash control and the Zoe toggle key (more on that later.) All other settings are accessed via a slightly cumbersome list of options, some of which are expandable. And as the HTC One doesn’t automatically flip into macro mode or backlight mode as required, you’ll have to deal with this menu more often than you might like. (That’s a point in favor of competitors like Sony, which has an excellent “Superior Auto” mode to switch between relevant scene settings.)
HTC’s grand plan with its “UltraPixel” sensor is that the reduction in overall megapixels should be made up for by the overall increase in image quality. That’s true in many images, and especially noticeable in night photography, but it’s no stunning across the board.
Let’s start off with strengths -- the HTC One is probably the best low-light smartphone camera we’ve tested. Indoors or at night, the benefits of the “UltraPixel” sensor and f/2.0 lens are clear to see. HTC’s camera produces sharper, clearer low-light images than other Android competitors. Even shots from Sony’s Xperia Z, which has pretty good low-light performance, appear a blurry, noisy mess by comparison.
Similarly, the HTC One is an excellent macro performer -- though you’ll need to enable macro mode manually under “Scenes.” The same goes for HDR mode, which can produce some stunning landscape shots when used correctly.
In daylight, though, things get a bit more complicated. In conditions where there’s plenty of light to go around, the HTC One’s low megapixel count becomes a bottleneck. It is in no means bad but from a purely technical standpoint it doesn't knock your socks off.
Generally speaking, the HTC One is able to capture shots that look good when viewed on a laptop, tablet, monitor or TV with all the downsampling that that involves. But when blown up to full 4MP size it’s clear to see there’s some quite aggressive noise reduction and sharpening going on. Telltale signs like graininess and artifacting around dark areas in daylight images (e.g. branches of trees) demonstrate that even with this new sensor tech, photographic aberrations persist in full-sized images. That’s not true of every image, but it’s something you’ll notice if you inspect your photos close-up. Now lets be realistic the average users is never going to pick this even if they look for it.
The HTC One’s dynamic range is pretty narrow, and the camera struggles in outdoor scenes with dark and very bright areas. This is aggravated further by the phone’s inability to automatically toggle into backlight mode where necessary. If you’re shooting landscapes or anything with bright sky in the background, this can quickly become a major bugbear, as you’re forced to navigate the sprawling camera menu and select either Backlight or HDR mode. To HTC’s credit, though, its HDR mode is among the best out there -- extremely quick and ghost-free, and capable of producing seriously impressive images.
HTC probably isn’t aiming this camera at people who’ll use their smartphone photos at full resolution. In fact, we wouldn’t even include ourselves in that group. If you share images to the web, chances are the image you end up seeing will be 1- to 2-megapixels anyway. But we can’t help feeling that the UltraPixel camera just doesn’t live up to all of the pre-release hype. In the right conditions it’s impressive for sure, but it’s not the holy grail of smartphone photography.Nor is it the savior of smartphone video recording, even with Optical Image Stabilization (OIS) onboard. The HTC One’s video performance is generally decent -- and footage shot at 1080p looks good most of the time -- but there are too many niggling issues for our liking. The camera’s comparatively poor dynamic range takes a heavy toll on daylight footage in some instances, resulting in stuttering as it attempts to adjust to the changes in light level. There is an HDR video mode -- a feature we’ve seen before on the Sony Xperia Z -- though this falls victim to the same occasional frame rate reductions.
We are, of course, picking nits here. The phone’s video performance isn’t universally bad by any means, as you‘ll see in our sample reel. But we can’t avoid the fact that we’ve seen better daylight performance from the competition. The HTC One does excel in low light video, delivering near-unmatched clarity in night-time footage. It’s just a shame this isn’t the case across the board.
On the front-facing camera side, HTC brings to bear a 2-megapixel shooter with a BSI sensor and a wide angle lens. This means you can fit more people in each shot, and it holds up pretty well in low light too.
Zoes, Highlights and sharing
The HTC One debuts a new type of photo in HTC Zoe. Zoe mode, enabled by tapping the Zoe icon in the camera app, records 19 or 20 still frames at 4MP and three seconds of 1080p video at the same time, resulting in a “slice” of time being recorded rather than a single frame. At a practical level, this can help you catch time-sensitive shots, as each Zoe records five frames before the shutter is pressed, and 15 afterwards. And it’s also fun to view Vine-like snapshots of each photo.
But another main reason to shoot in Zoe mode is the phone’s automatic video highlight capability. The gallery app automatically arranges photos into events based on location and date, and the HTC One conjures up 30-second highlight reels for these events -- complete with background music and filters -- based on Zoes, videos and stills. Video highlights are generated on-the-fly, and there’s no way to disable this feature, though you can ignore it by viewing photos in a traditional folder arrangement.
In each event, pictures, videos or Zoes can be tagged as “Highlights,” which is supposed to tell the app to use them in the reel. This feature wasn’t working correctly in the firmware version we were using, though, and the gallery app continued to pick out shots at random for highlight reels. HTC says it’s aware of this bug and is working on a fix.
Videos, stills, Zoes and highlights can be shared through HTC’s (somewhat confusingly-named) Zoe Share service, which is essentially a web-based sharing system tweaked to handle the HTC One’s unique imaging output. Using Zoe Share on the HTC One is quick and easy -- a few taps to select the content you want to upload, and you’re done. Zoe Share then gives you a URL you can share using Android sharing intents via email, social networks and so on.The interplay between Zoes, Highlights and Zoe Share is probably the most unique and interesting part of HTC’s new photographic equation. The implementation isn’t quite perfect, but we can see how these features will be both enjoyable and useful to most smartphone photographers.
More: HTC One: Zoes and video highlights
In summary, HTC’s UltraPixel experiment shows promise, but on the HTC One it isn’t a resounding success. Nevertheless, at the very least we’d call the HTC One’s camera satisfactory, and there’s no denying that it excels in certain areas. What’s more, features like Zoes, highlights and Zoe Share are examples of real innovation in mobile imaging.
The bottom line
To pull itself back from the brink, HTC knows it has to produce something special. And the HTC One is exactly that. It’s an exquisite piece of design and engineering. From the hardware to the software, HTC’s new handset incorporates some of the very finest design work in the industry. It’s the best-looking, best-feeling phone we’ve used -- nothing beats the feel of HTC’s curved brushed aluminum chassis. The new Sense has been pared back, sped up and redesigned in ways that make it a huge improvement on earlier iterations.
The majority of HTC’s “buzzword” features also deliver. The BoomSound speakers offer unparalleled bass and clarity for smartphone speakers. Sense TV is a really useful app for dual-screen viewing. BlinkFeed isn’t perfect, but the implementation is good for a “version 1.0” feature.
We’re not overly keen on HTC’s two-button setup, though we’ve learned to live with it over the past week. On a related note, we’d still like the on-screen menu bar that occasionally pops up to die in a fire, though not all the blame for this crime against user experience design lies with HTC.
If there’s something to be disappointed about, it might be the much-vaunted “UltraPixel” camera. Which is not to say it’s bad per se -- in fact, it’s pretty good. But it’s a long way off being the silver bullet to cure all your mobile photography woes, and though its low-light performance is fantastic, it lags behind the competition in some other areas but only just but in low light it rips the others apart.
In spite of this, is it HTC’s best phone yet? Without question. And on balance, is it the best Android phone you can buy? For the moment, absolutely. Well see how the Samsung Galaxy 4 (the SG3s as some are calling it) stacks up but on initial impression it looks in most areas like the HTC One is a clear winner
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The New Tegra 4 CPU for Smartphones Is here and it's fast. It packs
Tue, Jan 8 2013 04:09
| Hardware, Smartphones
The New Tegra 4 CPU for Smartphones Is here and it's fast. It packs 72 GPU cores, 4 A15 CPU cores, and a built-in LTE.
In a (somewhat simulated) head to head test between a Nexus 10 tablet and and a Tegra 4 mystery machine, the latter loaded 25 webpages in only 27 seconds, with the older chip taking 50. Not many of us will be loading up 25 webpages simultaneously, but Nvidia is hammering beefed up browser performance here—as well as topping the iPad 4's A6X processor across the board. Nvidia says it's simply the fastest mobile processor in the world. Nvidia says.
The Tegra 4 will also have supercharged HDR photo rendering, Nvidia says, beating out the iPhone 5's abilities with better capture speeds thanks to all of those aforementioned cores working at once. In actual life terms, Nvidia says it'll be the difference between two seconds of rendering on the iPhone and 0.2 seconds on a Tegra 4-powered mobile camera.
One particularly nifty feature is "live HDR," which actually shows a video preview of the difference between a shot with and without HDR. Very impressive, and nothing we've ever seen before.
Nvidia is banking pretty heavily on the virtue of HDR here! Sometimes it looks nice, sometimes it looks tacky—but at least with a live preview you'll be able to tell beforehand.
A demo of Dead Trigger 2 running on Tegra 4 yielded some highly purty visuals—think early-PS3 era—though there was some slowdown. Still! This is phone and tablet tech. Fancy stuff.
No word on when we'll start seeing these things in our things. Soon!
In a (somewhat simulated) head to head test between a Nexus 10 tablet and and a Tegra 4 mystery machine, the latter loaded 25 webpages in only 27 seconds, with the older chip taking 50. Not many of us will be loading up 25 webpages simultaneously, but Nvidia is hammering beefed up browser performance here—as well as topping the iPad 4's A6X processor across the board. Nvidia says it's simply the fastest mobile processor in the world. Nvidia says.
The Tegra 4 will also have supercharged HDR photo rendering, Nvidia says, beating out the iPhone 5's abilities with better capture speeds thanks to all of those aforementioned cores working at once. In actual life terms, Nvidia says it'll be the difference between two seconds of rendering on the iPhone and 0.2 seconds on a Tegra 4-powered mobile camera.
One particularly nifty feature is "live HDR," which actually shows a video preview of the difference between a shot with and without HDR. Very impressive, and nothing we've ever seen before.
Nvidia is banking pretty heavily on the virtue of HDR here! Sometimes it looks nice, sometimes it looks tacky—but at least with a live preview you'll be able to tell beforehand.
A demo of Dead Trigger 2 running on Tegra 4 yielded some highly purty visuals—think early-PS3 era—though there was some slowdown. Still! This is phone and tablet tech. Fancy stuff.
No word on when we'll start seeing these things in our things. Soon!
Samsung 'sudden death' bug affecting Galaxy S III owners
Sat, Jan 5 2013 01:25
| Samsung, Andriod, Smartphones
Own a Galaxy S III that appears to be suffered some form of chronic failure suddenly and for no apparent reason? Samsung is aware of the problem, and is working on a fix. The issue, being referred to in the forums as "sudden death," seems to be relatively rare: a Samsung spokeswoman told Tweakers that the problem affects "only a very limited number" of devices. So far, we know the problem applies to users running the stock software, as well as custom ROMs. For whatever reason, too, these defective models are all 16GB variants, according to Samsung. In any case, Sammy says it will push out a firmware update to correct the problem, though the company hasn't said when that patch will be ready.
Ubuntu Phone System looks extremely cool.
Thu, Jan 3 2013 02:55
| Linux, Software, Smartphones
What the video from around 5:30 and you'll be treated to a walk thru a very unique and innovative new smartphone system. We all know Android and Windows phone and IOS or iPhone, and they are good systems but I have to say this is the first phone system I have seen recently that looks innovative and really does things a little different. It really uses every once of the screens space and swipes have been really well thought out. You can swipe from all 4 edges, right from one side to the other or touch your normal tinny icons on the status bar across the top to access things. This is logical and very fast at accessing things in a logical manor.
So watch the video and skip to 5:30 to see just the Ubuntu smartphone section. I'm not a Ubuntu user but this sort of innovation certainly makes me very interested.
Microsoft: Windows Phone 8 reboot fix. You'll have to wait till December.
Wed, Nov 28 2012 03:04
| Windows Phone, Software, Smartphones, Microsoft
Tired of your Windows Phone 8 doing random reboots? Microsoft is taking it's sweet time to fix the problem. According to a statement (below), an over-the-air fix is on the way sometime in December, reports All Things D. In the meantime, if you have a really bad case of the reboots, there isn’t much you can do other than bring your phone back to the store and try and arrange a swap. We’ll let you know as soon as we hear more.
Google Forgot About December
Mon, Nov 19 2012 03:07
| Software, Andriod, Smartphones, Google
SOFTWARE
By Richard Devine | Nov 18 2012 | 7:58 am | 16 COMMENTS
With new versions released of Android, there's bound to be a few little bugs hidden within. While Google will test, test and test again, there's always likely to be something that slips the net, many of which most users never come across. What we find in Android 4.2 however, definitely belongs on some kind of blooper reel. They forgot December.
Google Calendar is unaffected, so we're all good on that front. But, when adding events to profiles within your People application, there is no option to add dates in December. Loved ones birthdays, Christmas, New Years Eve, all don't exist, at least in this part of Android 4.2 anyway. If nothing else, it's pretty embarrassing. The issue has been reported to the Android bug tracker, and we can imagine that a fix will be rolled out in the not too distant future.
Windows Phone 8 Suffering Random Reboots and Battery Issues
Mon, Nov 19 2012 03:04
| Windows Phone, Smartphones, Microsoft
Windows Phone 8 users are starting to report early issues across HTC and Nokia handsets. In a thread over at WPCentral with 143 replies, a variety of HTC 8X users report that handsets randomly reboot while in use. A thread on Microsoft's own support forums has also gained 50 replies complaining about the issues. The Verge can confirm that an 8X we are testing has rebooted on more than one occasion.
Nokia Lumia 920 users are also reporting random reboots and freezes, with some complaining of poor battery life too. In a thread on Nokia's support forums, a number of users appear to be complaining of lock ups and resets with the Lumia 920. Battery life issues have led to some users wiping their devices in hope of a quick fix, unfortunately that seems to have resulted in some devices left stuck on a Nokia splash screen. In our own experience with several Windows Phone 8 devices, we've found that disabling the tap + send (NFC) feature results in improved battery life. We have reached out to Microsoft, HTC, and Nokia to discuss the issues and we'll update you accordingly.
HTC Droid DNA Looks Like An Amazing Smartphone
Thu, Nov 15 2012 05:01
| Andriod, Smartphones, HTC
HTC and Verizon have just announced the Droid DNA, a 5-inch sporting an incredible 1080p Super LCD3 display. Powering those pixels is the capable Snapdragon S4 Pro SoC, familiar to us as the APQ8064 with 4 Krait cores running at 1.5GHz and last seen in the Nexus 4. For modem, the Droid DNA is using MDM9615 which makes this HTC's first Qualcomm Fusion 3 based device. The Droid DNA also includes ImageChip and the usual ImageSense features, and brings the 2.1 MP F/2.0 camera we saw on the HTC 8X as well. There's 2 GB of RAM onboard as well.
The style of the phone alludes to its Incredible forebears, but only in the bright red accents. The design is sleeker, with a smooth back and thin profile. On the long edges of the phone are large red grills, though stereo speakers are not in order. What is available to audiophiles, is a 2.55v built-in headphone amp, not a common find in a smartphone but something that will go a long way to improving the listening experience.
Wireless charging is also being introduced to the Droid line for the first time. It's unclear whether this will be on the increasingly common Qi standard, but if Brian's growing enthusiasm for the technology is any indication, this could be a popular feature.
As is the norm, the HTC Droid DNA will be available on-contract for $199, and pre-orders start today with shipments expected by November 21st. We'll be hands-on shortly, and give some impressions of the device.
The HTC 8X is the best Windows Phone Hands Down.
Sun, Nov 4 2012 06:47
| Smartphones, HTC
Theres a bunch of new Windows phone 8 phones to choose from but frankly there is the HTC Windows Phone 8X, and then there is everything else. This handset isn’t just better than the Windows Phone competition if you include all the other smartphones ranging from the Samsung Galaxy S3, iPhone 5's and what else you choose it's still better. The HTC 8X, is the only smart phone on the market that edges past the iPhone 5 in terms of sheer beauty. It’s better looking, and it feels better in the hand, while offering the same benefits of a thin and tall design. Since hardware design was the iPhone’s biggest advantage over previous Windows Phone handsets, this is a huge accomplishment.
Compared to other flagship Windows Phones, there’s no contest. The Lumia 920 is a honking beast of a machine that makes even the Lumia 900 look a bit tweenish by comparison. And the Samsung ATIV-S, despite a surprisingly thin form factor given the size of its screen, is plain looking. Not ugly. Just not interesting.
The HTC 8X comes in three brilliant colors— deep blue, red, and yellow—plus black, and as with the Lumia devices, the color isn’t painted on, it’s baked into the unibody design, and simply gorgeous looking. More to the point, it’s the opposite of the iPhone in hand-feel: Where Apple’s machine has harsh edges, the 8X is soft and wonderful.
Long-time readers know I’ve become somewhat obsessed about smart phone camera quality. I’ve been taking photos with this thing since Monday and the picture quality is superb, easily the best of any smart phone I’ve ever owned. An impromptu camera test pitting the 8X against an iPhone 5 on Tuesday was inconclusive: The shots were nearly identical, which I take as a good sign. But I’ll be doing a more detailed comparison of the cameras in the 8X, the iPhone 5 and the Lumia 920. You can stay tuned for that, but it doesn’t matter. The 8X’s 8 megapixel camera is absolutely good enough for me, and when you combine it with the form factor advantages, the argument is simply moot. The 8x is the best overall Windows Phone 8 handset. And the best smart phone, period.
HTC does include a handful of apps on the phone. One I find surprisingly useful is simply called HTC, and I use it primarily to glance at the time, since it features a wonderfully large clock display on its tile. But this app can also be used as the lock screen background, which I’m using too, and there it features the local weather, which is certainly useful too.
HTC also includes converter, flashlight, photo editing, and Yellow Pages, apps—nothing too exciting if you’re familiar with Nokia’s rich Lumia-only apps library—and of course you get the AT&T apps prebundled, most of which I uninstall.
From a tech specs perspective, the HTC 8X is fairly leading edge for a Windows Phone. It has a 4.3 inch screen with Gorilla Glass 2 running at 720p HD resolution (1280 x 720). It features a 1.5 GHz dual-core QUALCOMM processor, 1 GB of RAM, 16 GB of non-expandable internal storage, works with GSM/GPRS/EDGE and HSPA/WCDMA networks, and comes with GPS, digital compass, proximity, and ambient light sensors.
The HTC 8X also includes a built-in amp, and using it each morning to listen to music and podcasts as I get ready for work, I’m stunned by how loud and clear the internal speaker sounds. But it also includes Beats Audio: Plug in headphones or speakers and crank it up, because it sounds fantastic. This is the best-sounding smart phone I’ve ever used.
Battery life has been on par with my Lumia 900 this week in heavy usage. And for once, this is real world usage: I’ve dragged this thing with me to four cities this week and really used the heck out of the device.
It’s not perfect. The HTC 8x lacks micro-SD expansion, and some may pine for that or at least more internal storage. The side-mounted hardware buttons—power, volume, and camera—are flush to the device and sometimes hard to press.
And … I’m pretty much grasping at straws here, trying to come up with something to criticize.
This phone is awesome. And once you see one in person, and hold it in your own hand, you’ll get it: Apple’s tired, repetitive hardware designs have finally met their match and the other Windows Phone handsets have been put to shame. The HTC Windows Phone 8X is the obvious choice. The only choice. And you’ll want one too.
Compared to other flagship Windows Phones, there’s no contest. The Lumia 920 is a honking beast of a machine that makes even the Lumia 900 look a bit tweenish by comparison. And the Samsung ATIV-S, despite a surprisingly thin form factor given the size of its screen, is plain looking. Not ugly. Just not interesting.
The HTC 8X comes in three brilliant colors— deep blue, red, and yellow—plus black, and as with the Lumia devices, the color isn’t painted on, it’s baked into the unibody design, and simply gorgeous looking. More to the point, it’s the opposite of the iPhone in hand-feel: Where Apple’s machine has harsh edges, the 8X is soft and wonderful.
Long-time readers know I’ve become somewhat obsessed about smart phone camera quality. I’ve been taking photos with this thing since Monday and the picture quality is superb, easily the best of any smart phone I’ve ever owned. An impromptu camera test pitting the 8X against an iPhone 5 on Tuesday was inconclusive: The shots were nearly identical, which I take as a good sign. But I’ll be doing a more detailed comparison of the cameras in the 8X, the iPhone 5 and the Lumia 920. You can stay tuned for that, but it doesn’t matter. The 8X’s 8 megapixel camera is absolutely good enough for me, and when you combine it with the form factor advantages, the argument is simply moot. The 8x is the best overall Windows Phone 8 handset. And the best smart phone, period.
HTC does include a handful of apps on the phone. One I find surprisingly useful is simply called HTC, and I use it primarily to glance at the time, since it features a wonderfully large clock display on its tile. But this app can also be used as the lock screen background, which I’m using too, and there it features the local weather, which is certainly useful too.
HTC also includes converter, flashlight, photo editing, and Yellow Pages, apps—nothing too exciting if you’re familiar with Nokia’s rich Lumia-only apps library—and of course you get the AT&T apps prebundled, most of which I uninstall.
From a tech specs perspective, the HTC 8X is fairly leading edge for a Windows Phone. It has a 4.3 inch screen with Gorilla Glass 2 running at 720p HD resolution (1280 x 720). It features a 1.5 GHz dual-core QUALCOMM processor, 1 GB of RAM, 16 GB of non-expandable internal storage, works with GSM/GPRS/EDGE and HSPA/WCDMA networks, and comes with GPS, digital compass, proximity, and ambient light sensors.
The HTC 8X also includes a built-in amp, and using it each morning to listen to music and podcasts as I get ready for work, I’m stunned by how loud and clear the internal speaker sounds. But it also includes Beats Audio: Plug in headphones or speakers and crank it up, because it sounds fantastic. This is the best-sounding smart phone I’ve ever used.
Battery life has been on par with my Lumia 900 this week in heavy usage. And for once, this is real world usage: I’ve dragged this thing with me to four cities this week and really used the heck out of the device.
It’s not perfect. The HTC 8x lacks micro-SD expansion, and some may pine for that or at least more internal storage. The side-mounted hardware buttons—power, volume, and camera—are flush to the device and sometimes hard to press.
And … I’m pretty much grasping at straws here, trying to come up with something to criticize.
This phone is awesome. And once you see one in person, and hold it in your own hand, you’ll get it: Apple’s tired, repetitive hardware designs have finally met their match and the other Windows Phone handsets have been put to shame. The HTC Windows Phone 8X is the obvious choice. The only choice. And you’ll want one too.
Microsoft currently testing its own smartphone, says WSJ
Fri, Nov 2 2012 07:23
| Windows Phone, Smartphones, Microsoft
Microsoft surprised the world earlier this year when it moved into producing its own computer hardware with the Surface, but the company's plans may not stop there. According to the Wall Street Journal's sources, Microsoft is currently testing a smartphone with Asian suppliers, although it's unclear whether or not the device will enter mass production. The phone reportedly has a screen size somewhere
PC Magazine System Benchmarks Results Show iPhone 5 is world's fastest smartphone.
Sat, Sep 22 2012 06:00
| iPhone, Smartphones, Apple
www.tech-sanity.com
Benchmarks that rate RAM, processor speed, browser speed, JavaScript and graphics capabilities of various smartphone published by PC Magazine let the publication to declare the iPhone 5 "the fastest smartphone in the land" and able to substantially surpass rivals like Samsung's Galaxy S III and Motorola's Droid Razr M, the latter of which was just released last week (the S III came out in June). The iPhone 5 was more than twice as fast as any previous iPhone model, even when they were updated to iOS 6.
Graphics and JavaScript appear to be the strong suits of the new iPhone, with its GPU (said in recent examinations of the A6 to be a triple-core setup) in some cases doubling the score achieved by the Razr M and the S III and offering substantial improvements in every area tested. The iPhone 5 had previously broken a record for smartphones in the JavaScript-testing SunSpider benchmark. Even more impressive was the improvement in the iPhone 5 when compared to earlier models of iPhone.
In both Browsermark (browser testing) and Sunspider, Apple's claim of "twice as fast" as the iPhone 4S was seen as no exaggeration. In the Geekbench suite, scores were generally more than double, and in one instance (the streaming memory test) results showed a full tripling over the iPhone 4S. As mentioned, graphics testing showed the iPhone 5 easily doubling scores achieved by the 4S, and the gap grows further when older models such as the iPhone 3GS are tested.
Compared to an original iPhone running iOS 3.1.3, the iPhone five is more than 20 times faster in browsing almost 20 times faster in graphics, and five times faster in JavaScript. Tests with Geekbench focusing on RAM, along with GLBenchmark (which measures graphics) could only be compared as far back as the iPhone 3G running iOS 4.2.1, but still showed the iPhone 5 as generally 10-15 times faster in RAM and between five and 10 times faster in graphics.
Though the award for "world's fastest smartphone" won't last long -- rivals are already planning next year's competitors -- the fact that the iPhone 5 exceeds by a substantive margin its top rivals in almost all measures of "speed" may be a crucial selling point heading into the holiday buying season. In addition to the advantages that come to the iPhone naturally from the company's "cool" factor and the improvements in iOS 6 down to the improved build quality of the hardware, being "the fastest" on the market -- and likely to keep that crown for a little while -- is (for some) the most important factor apart from price in making a buying decision amongst a rapidly-growing field of quality smartphones. It provides at least as much of an edge as does being the only new model with access to the world's largest App Store for a certain segment of the market. [via PCMag]
Benchmarks that rate RAM, processor speed, browser speed, JavaScript and graphics capabilities of various smartphone published by PC Magazine let the publication to declare the iPhone 5 "the fastest smartphone in the land" and able to substantially surpass rivals like Samsung's Galaxy S III and Motorola's Droid Razr M, the latter of which was just released last week (the S III came out in June). The iPhone 5 was more than twice as fast as any previous iPhone model, even when they were updated to iOS 6.
Graphics and JavaScript appear to be the strong suits of the new iPhone, with its GPU (said in recent examinations of the A6 to be a triple-core setup) in some cases doubling the score achieved by the Razr M and the S III and offering substantial improvements in every area tested. The iPhone 5 had previously broken a record for smartphones in the JavaScript-testing SunSpider benchmark. Even more impressive was the improvement in the iPhone 5 when compared to earlier models of iPhone.
In both Browsermark (browser testing) and Sunspider, Apple's claim of "twice as fast" as the iPhone 4S was seen as no exaggeration. In the Geekbench suite, scores were generally more than double, and in one instance (the streaming memory test) results showed a full tripling over the iPhone 4S. As mentioned, graphics testing showed the iPhone 5 easily doubling scores achieved by the 4S, and the gap grows further when older models such as the iPhone 3GS are tested.
Compared to an original iPhone running iOS 3.1.3, the iPhone five is more than 20 times faster in browsing almost 20 times faster in graphics, and five times faster in JavaScript. Tests with Geekbench focusing on RAM, along with GLBenchmark (which measures graphics) could only be compared as far back as the iPhone 3G running iOS 4.2.1, but still showed the iPhone 5 as generally 10-15 times faster in RAM and between five and 10 times faster in graphics.
Though the award for "world's fastest smartphone" won't last long -- rivals are already planning next year's competitors -- the fact that the iPhone 5 exceeds by a substantive margin its top rivals in almost all measures of "speed" may be a crucial selling point heading into the holiday buying season. In addition to the advantages that come to the iPhone naturally from the company's "cool" factor and the improvements in iOS 6 down to the improved build quality of the hardware, being "the fastest" on the market -- and likely to keep that crown for a little while -- is (for some) the most important factor apart from price in making a buying decision amongst a rapidly-growing field of quality smartphones. It provides at least as much of an edge as does being the only new model with access to the world's largest App Store for a certain segment of the market. [via PCMag]
HTC 8X and 8S Running Windows Phone 8 Looking Very Pretty.
Thu, Sep 20 2012 02:12
| Windows Phone, Smartphones, HTC
HTC announced the new Windows Phone 8X and Windows Phone 8S smartphones. The 8X and 8S represent a new focus on Windows Phone for HTC. Microsoft has committed to a heavy promotion of HTC's new devices, and it's even gone so far as to call them the "Signature of the Windows Phone 8 brand. HTC's new flagship Windows Phone. The 8Xs t packs a 1.5 GHz, dual-core Snapdragon S4 chipset and 4.3-inch 1280x720 display good for a PPI of 342 and It's light and thin as well. The tapered edges of and soft-touch finish of the make the phone easy to hold, though you do feel the edges dig into your palm a little when you grip it. The screen is beautiful. Deep blacks, and eye-popping colors that immediately impress you.The combination of the screens responsiveness, the beefed-up processor, and OS improvements really make for an experience that's fast and fluid. The 8X keeps pace with the Lumia 920 in nearly every category, and even bests it in a few. It has LTE, a gig of RAM, an 8-megapixel rear camera (with dedicated button), a 2-megapixel front camera, 1080p video recording, NFC, and Beats Audio enhancement with an "enhanced" headphone amp (of course). The one major downside to the phone is that it's only available in a 16 gigabyte storage capacity, and has no expandable storage. And while it does have a slightly smaller, but comparable, 1800 mAh battery and a slightly smaller screen than the 4.5-inch Lumia 920, those may not end up being negatives if battery life is the same and you prefer a smaller screen.
But that's not the only phone HTC has in tow; the HTC 8S is the cheaper, smaller sibling to the 8X with specs that reflect that across the board. Whether its the 4-inch, 800x400 Super LCD, the 1 GHz Snapdragon S4 CPU, the 512 megabytes of RAM, lack of LTE, or the 5-megapixel camera (with no front cam), there's no room for debate as to which phone is better. The one plus is that because it only has 4 gigabytes of storage, HTC included a microSD slot for system expansion. But those looking for a cheap-ish Windows Phone could probably find worse.
Looking at the 8X and 8S, with their loud color schemes and boxy designs, Nokia's design influence is apparent. It's almost as if HTC took Nokia's playbook, lifted the pages about design, and then made some strikingly Lumia-like devices. All of this with Microsoft's blessing, approval, backing, and on-stage support from Microsoft's CEO.
Nokia has put a lot into the Windows Phone platform. Unlike HTC, Nokia is betting its whole hand on WIndows Phone, and it has developed a number of differentiating software features for its Windows Phone smartphones. Nokia Drive, Nokia Music, and Nokia's Camera Lenses are all valuable software additions that Nokia brings to Windows Phone. HTC, on the other hand, is focusing mainly on hardware features to separate its Windows Phone 8 smartphones from others, and it hasn't done the extensive software development on the platform that Nokia has. Likewise, HTC does have its line of Android devices to fall back on, should Windows Phone 8 fail, but Nokia doesn't have a backup platform if things go south.
Both phones will begin shipping in November on AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile, in an array of very bright colors (reds, blues, yellows) or just black. Pricing has yet to be finalized, but HTC would hope to keep both phones under $200 with contract. [HTC]
Nokia Lumia 920, you have some serious competition here.
Nokia Lumia 920
Fri, Sep 7 2012 07:32
| Nokia, Smartphones
www.tech-sanity.com
The Nokia's Windows Phone event this morning, which showed off the new flagship Nokia Lumia 920 with a brief nod to the mode budget-friendly Nokia Lumia 820. Daniel Rubino from our Mobile Nations sibling site, WPCentral was there live to catch all the actions.
Along with some digs at Samsung (for their "first" Windows Phone 8 device being unfinished) and Apple (for putting needless metal elements in their antennas), Nokia threw the spotlight on location services, including their traditional maps products, transit directions (which will be offloaded to 3rd party apps in iOS 6), indoor directions, and some interesting if awkward Augmented Reality features. Inductive charging was also front-and-center, along with partnerships to bring compatible chargers to places like Virgin Atlantic lounges, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf outlets, and retails products like Fatboys.
Once again the materials look out of this world. Literally. Nokia stressed how you could pound nails with the Lumia 920. Literally. The screen is curved and gorgeous and intelligently tries to prevent glare when used outside. The assemblies are ceramic to prevent scratches, and the whole, solid unit looks built to last. Apple and Nokia are both making phenomenal, iconic hardware these days. No one else is coming close.
The most impressive part of the demo, however, was the Lumia 920 camera. Building off Nokia's PureView brand, it sports a massive, over-sampling lens with an f2.0 aperture that's essentially "floated" so it can capture more light, longer, and produce truly amazing images. A series of "lens" apps, including Microsoft's Photosynth allow for extended features and functionality as well.
It will be interesting to see if Phil Schiller, who's been handling the iPhone camera demos for the last few Apple events, can show off something competitive on September 12.
Microsoft's Joe Belfiore also previewed home screen tile customizations and a new feature of Windows Phone 8: Press the Home and Power button at the same time, and you get a screenshot. You're welcome, bloggers.
Steve Ballmer came out at the end to proclaim 2012 the "year of Windows", which was a bit odd since, from Microsoft's perspective, which year wouldn't be the year of Windows?
The biggest disappointment of the event, however, was that absolutely no pricing or launch date information was provided. Similar to the Microsoft Surface event, it smacked of something thrown together quickly to grab some b-roll from the iPhone 5, with neither the Windows Phone 8 feature set nor go-to-market strategy actually finished yet.
And that's too bad. Because those details matter. And you better believe that on September 12, Apple will announce a price and ship date for iPhone 5.
The Nokia's Windows Phone event this morning, which showed off the new flagship Nokia Lumia 920 with a brief nod to the mode budget-friendly Nokia Lumia 820. Daniel Rubino from our Mobile Nations sibling site, WPCentral was there live to catch all the actions.
Along with some digs at Samsung (for their "first" Windows Phone 8 device being unfinished) and Apple (for putting needless metal elements in their antennas), Nokia threw the spotlight on location services, including their traditional maps products, transit directions (which will be offloaded to 3rd party apps in iOS 6), indoor directions, and some interesting if awkward Augmented Reality features. Inductive charging was also front-and-center, along with partnerships to bring compatible chargers to places like Virgin Atlantic lounges, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf outlets, and retails products like Fatboys.
Once again the materials look out of this world. Literally. Nokia stressed how you could pound nails with the Lumia 920. Literally. The screen is curved and gorgeous and intelligently tries to prevent glare when used outside. The assemblies are ceramic to prevent scratches, and the whole, solid unit looks built to last. Apple and Nokia are both making phenomenal, iconic hardware these days. No one else is coming close.
The most impressive part of the demo, however, was the Lumia 920 camera. Building off Nokia's PureView brand, it sports a massive, over-sampling lens with an f2.0 aperture that's essentially "floated" so it can capture more light, longer, and produce truly amazing images. A series of "lens" apps, including Microsoft's Photosynth allow for extended features and functionality as well.
It will be interesting to see if Phil Schiller, who's been handling the iPhone camera demos for the last few Apple events, can show off something competitive on September 12.
Microsoft's Joe Belfiore also previewed home screen tile customizations and a new feature of Windows Phone 8: Press the Home and Power button at the same time, and you get a screenshot. You're welcome, bloggers.
Steve Ballmer came out at the end to proclaim 2012 the "year of Windows", which was a bit odd since, from Microsoft's perspective, which year wouldn't be the year of Windows?
The biggest disappointment of the event, however, was that absolutely no pricing or launch date information was provided. Similar to the Microsoft Surface event, it smacked of something thrown together quickly to grab some b-roll from the iPhone 5, with neither the Windows Phone 8 feature set nor go-to-market strategy actually finished yet.
And that's too bad. Because those details matter. And you better believe that on September 12, Apple will announce a price and ship date for iPhone 5.
Sony’s Xperia T Serves Up a 4.6-Inch Display, 13-Megapixel Camera and NFC Functionality
Thu, Aug 30 2012 05:52
| Smartphones, Sony
www.tech-sanity.com
Sony's latest flagship Android Smartphone is the Xperia T: a 4.6-inch, 1280x720 Bravia-powered smartphone equipped with not only a 13-megapixel camera, but also an NFC receiver for quickly connecting the phone to accessories and services at home and away.
The flagship Xperia T is the latest phone to be added to Sony's roster since its split with Ericsson last year. The phone comes installed with a skinned version Ice Cream Sandwich and also has a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor (likely the Snapdragon S4), and a gig of RAM. This wouldn't quite put it in the same league as a phone like the Samsung Galaxy S3—especially considering the lack of LTE—but it's not shabby either. [Sony]
Sony's latest flagship Android Smartphone is the Xperia T: a 4.6-inch, 1280x720 Bravia-powered smartphone equipped with not only a 13-megapixel camera, but also an NFC receiver for quickly connecting the phone to accessories and services at home and away.
The flagship Xperia T is the latest phone to be added to Sony's roster since its split with Ericsson last year. The phone comes installed with a skinned version Ice Cream Sandwich and also has a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor (likely the Snapdragon S4), and a gig of RAM. This wouldn't quite put it in the same league as a phone like the Samsung Galaxy S3—especially considering the lack of LTE—but it's not shabby either. [Sony]
Nokia Drive and Nokia Transport apps revealed
Sun, May 6 2012 09:07
| Software, Smartphones
www.tech-sanity.com
It's been just a month and a half since Nokia dropped updates to the Drive navigation and Transport public transit apps it created for Lumia Windows Phones, but the company is apparently hard at work on the next versions. WP7forum claims to have new details on the apps and screenshots to back them up. Nokia Drive 3.0 is reported to be able to "learn" your preferred routes as you drive, provide live tiles with live traffic information, manually adjust routes, and change the color scheme based on the time of day. Transport 2.0, meanwhile, is said to support 87 countries, add local search, search history, and performance optimizations. No word on when either update will arrive, but we'll be sure to let you know when we hear more.
Samsung Galaxy S III preview. It's big!
Fri, May 4 2012 02:01
| Samsung, Smartphones, Android
www.tech-sanity.com
Samsung's tried to bring its Galaxy S series in line with (and in some ways, further ahead of) what its team-up with Google accomplished. It's added some new quad-core Exynos processing juice, a 4.8-inch, HD Super AMOLED screen and a handful of Galaxy S III-only features in an earnest bid to maintain its place at the top of the Android pile. You'll find our detailed impressions and a hands-on video just after the break.
Hardware
Once enabled in settings, you can tap and hold the screen, rotate the phone horizontally and you'll be sent to the camera app. Using the same accelerometers, a new calling function will dial whoever's contact details you have displayed when you raise the phone to your ear. Keeping with the contextual phone skills, Samsung's Smart Stay feature makes the device detect (through the front-facing camera) whether a face is looking at it in order to switch the display on or off. A little eye icon would appear on the notification bar when it was seeking out our face. Similarly, Smart Alert will display any missed calls or notifications when you pick up the phone, using the built-in accelerometer. It's the sort of magic that HTC's been using for a while, but it does help the new phone to stand out from Samsung's existing phones that are starting to blur together.
S Voice is Samsung's latest effort to introduce voice interactions to its phone series, but unfortunately it wasn't working during our briefing. We've been promised that your commands will be able to unlock the phone, control the music player and capture photos. Samsung also told us that it's already working with third-party apps to build up similar functionality for those too. Like a certain voice assistant rival, it does require a data connection because voice patterns are processed in the cloud. S Beam was in a more generous mood during our hands-on, riffing from Google's Android Beam while using WiFi in tandem with NFC to share meatier files. Beaming through NFC peaks at around 400Kbps, but that's only for pairing and smaller files -- sharing media engages WiFi Direct at up to 300Mbps, according to Samsung. We saw a 10MB video file bounced between two phones in an instant. It's a very nice show-piece, although the necessity for all your S Beam sharing partners to upgrade to the Galaxy S III does inevitably taint that offering.
AllShare Play shares your media content with the big screen, while AllShare Cast will duplicate your phone's display for big-screen gaming. (Samsung told us that it's working on populating its own game hub with optimized titles, although it was still keeping quiet on any specifics.) Like S Beam, this is also broadcast through WiFi Direct to a compatible TV, rather than through DLNA -- although the handset does technically still support DLNA.
A new feature that best showcases the phone's new Exynos muscle is Pop Up Play, which plays a video file on top of any other app in its own window. Playback is limited to the native media player -- no YouTube greatest hits on top of your email just yet -- but the window can be moved around the screen and at its fixed size covers just under a sixth of the full screen.
To recap: this is a good-looking phone, with an impressive high definition Super AMOLED screen and a processor that looks likely to spar for top spot among Android devices. However, Samsung hasn't responded to the recent trend for stand-out build and materials and this new flagship feels a lot like all its older relatives; given the whole "nature" spiel, some smart new finish would have been nice. It's no doubt this lack of wow-factor hardware that has led Sammy to emphasize software progress instead, and indeed there are plenty of intriguing TouchWiz features that warrant further investigation on a finished handset -- assuming you're not a vanilla Android die-hard. Glacial hardware design progress aside, if Samsung manages to get these new features polished up and working flawlessly, the company might well have another bestseller. And yes, we'll take the Pebble Blue, please.
Samsung's tried to bring its Galaxy S series in line with (and in some ways, further ahead of) what its team-up with Google accomplished. It's added some new quad-core Exynos processing juice, a 4.8-inch, HD Super AMOLED screen and a handful of Galaxy S III-only features in an earnest bid to maintain its place at the top of the Android pile. You'll find our detailed impressions and a hands-on video just after the break.
Hardware
At first blush, we were a little disappointed that Samsung didn't intend to push the design envelope with its new flagship. That's not to say we were repulsed: it just looks a lot like an amalgam of all the Galaxy phones we've seen in the last year. It flies closer to the Galaxy Nexus than the Galaxy S II, with a shape and contour all too similar to Google's first Android 4.0 handset. In the hand, the 4.8-inch screen is counter-balanced by the thin bezel, resulting in a shape that is still comfortable to hold. It feels very light, a mere 133g (4.7 ounces -- just a smidgen heavier than the HTC One X), and measures 8.6mm (0.34 inches) deep across its central waistline. (That's right, there's no more chin.)
A glossy plastic coats both the front face and flat battery cover, with a particularly attractive finish on the Pebble Blue option, making it our early favorite over the Marble White. A slightly different (but still glossy) plastic follows around the edge of the device. Thankfully, the absence of a metallic chassis does nothing to hurt the feeling of quality or solidity in the build.
The phone retains the physical home button, though it's now slimmer and generally less visually obvious. It's flanked by a pair of capacitive buttons that light up and disappear, and as expected there's the camera module, flash and loudspeaker at the back.
The 8-megapixel camera looks to be very similar to what we've seen on both the Galaxy S II and Galaxy Note -- which means it's a pretty capable shooter, although we're withholding judgment until we can test it out it in a mix of scenarios. Instead of shaking up the camera hardware, Samsung's pushed forward with the software interface -- something we've gone into more detail here. In brief, the new camera app supports dual still and video capture, adds face tagging for existing contacts and boasts improved face identification and tracking.
The screen is a 4.8-inch HD Super AMOLED display. The bad news? The lack of a "Plus" in that name means it's PenTile, which means that pixelation is still visible despite the 306 ppi density, due to the sharing of sub-pixels. The good news is that the resolution is still really good, and should suffice for all but the most eagle-eyed -- although if you're still not sure you can check out our own microscopic comparisons right here. It's also nice to see that the panel is cocooned in Gorilla Glass 2, besting its relative's fortified face, and it also offered great viewing angles.
The Galaxy S III's beating heart is Samsung's new 1.4GHz quad-core Exynos processor, aided by a fresh GPU that is supposedly 65 percent faster than the companion Mali 400 graphics chip on the Galaxy S II. Unfortunately, we didn't have time to give GTA III a blast, nor run our typical benchmark apps, but in any case the model we played with was not final hardware. That said, we were able to grab a quick SunSpider browser performance score of just under 1,500ms, putting the phone below HTC's polycarb-clad wonder -- but lower is better, by the way. Whizzing around the native apps and web browser was as pleasant as we expected, pinch-to-zoom pinged into action, while multimedia playback was effortless, irrespective of the software additions that Samsung has thrown into the mix (more on those in a second).
The phone houses a removable 2,100mAh battery, with a wireless charging option already in the works. Next to the battery and space for a micro-SIM, you'll find an increasingly rare microSD slot, whose absence was one of the main criticisms leveled at the Google Nexus, not to mention the HTC One X. This expandability sits alongside 16GB, 32GB or 64GB of internal storage, depending on which variant you buy. Other connection options here include Bluetooth 4.0, WiFi Direct, DLNA, an MHL-compatible micro-USB port and headphone socket, with NFC connected to the battery unit.
Software
Samsung's pitch to us focused heavily on the software. Pure Android enthusiasts may wince at the sight of TouchWiz (overlaid on top of Android 4.0.4) and from the brief time we played with the device, Ice Cream Sandwich looks a lot like how it arrived on our updated Galaxy S II -- it's not close to a stock Android experience. Instead of messing with its UI, Samsung has concentrated on specific apps -- and plenty of new gesture functionality.
Five icons populate the base of the screen, including the app drawer, while the homescreen itself has a more typical four-icon-wide berth. "Inspired by nature, designed for humans" is the winsome philosophy behind the Galaxy S III. In terms of the nature thing, this basically means that the phone comes loaded with some splashy water graphics and sound effects as well as plenty of seasonal wallpapers (including some new smart wallpapers like a background news feed).
The built-in keyboard is perfectly functional; at this screen size there's simply a greater likelihood of hitting the letter you're after. The menus and icons are all drawn in Samsung's TouchWiz style, though there are some new additions, including lock screen app shortcuts. In fact, the lock screen is where Samsung's new "intelligent" smartphone starts showing its gesture antics -- part of its "designed for humans" mantra.
Once enabled in settings, you can tap and hold the screen, rotate the phone horizontally and you'll be sent to the camera app. Using the same accelerometers, a new calling function will dial whoever's contact details you have displayed when you raise the phone to your ear. Keeping with the contextual phone skills, Samsung's Smart Stay feature makes the device detect (through the front-facing camera) whether a face is looking at it in order to switch the display on or off. A little eye icon would appear on the notification bar when it was seeking out our face. Similarly, Smart Alert will display any missed calls or notifications when you pick up the phone, using the built-in accelerometer. It's the sort of magic that HTC's been using for a while, but it does help the new phone to stand out from Samsung's existing phones that are starting to blur together.
S Voice is Samsung's latest effort to introduce voice interactions to its phone series, but unfortunately it wasn't working during our briefing. We've been promised that your commands will be able to unlock the phone, control the music player and capture photos. Samsung also told us that it's already working with third-party apps to build up similar functionality for those too. Like a certain voice assistant rival, it does require a data connection because voice patterns are processed in the cloud. S Beam was in a more generous mood during our hands-on, riffing from Google's Android Beam while using WiFi in tandem with NFC to share meatier files. Beaming through NFC peaks at around 400Kbps, but that's only for pairing and smaller files -- sharing media engages WiFi Direct at up to 300Mbps, according to Samsung. We saw a 10MB video file bounced between two phones in an instant. It's a very nice show-piece, although the necessity for all your S Beam sharing partners to upgrade to the Galaxy S III does inevitably taint that offering.
AllShare Play shares your media content with the big screen, while AllShare Cast will duplicate your phone's display for big-screen gaming. (Samsung told us that it's working on populating its own game hub with optimized titles, although it was still keeping quiet on any specifics.) Like S Beam, this is also broadcast through WiFi Direct to a compatible TV, rather than through DLNA -- although the handset does technically still support DLNA.
A new feature that best showcases the phone's new Exynos muscle is Pop Up Play, which plays a video file on top of any other app in its own window. Playback is limited to the native media player -- no YouTube greatest hits on top of your email just yet -- but the window can be moved around the screen and at its fixed size covers just under a sixth of the full screen.
To recap: this is a good-looking phone, with an impressive high definition Super AMOLED screen and a processor that looks likely to spar for top spot among Android devices. However, Samsung hasn't responded to the recent trend for stand-out build and materials and this new flagship feels a lot like all its older relatives; given the whole "nature" spiel, some smart new finish would have been nice. It's no doubt this lack of wow-factor hardware that has led Sammy to emphasize software progress instead, and indeed there are plenty of intriguing TouchWiz features that warrant further investigation on a finished handset -- assuming you're not a vanilla Android die-hard. Glacial hardware design progress aside, if Samsung manages to get these new features polished up and working flawlessly, the company might well have another bestseller. And yes, we'll take the Pebble Blue, please.
Windows 8 -The Trojan Horse of Smart Phones
Mon, Apr 23 2012 08:10
| Windows, Smartphones
www.tech-sanity.com
Today I was reading a few reports on how Nokia seems to be going down the tubes. Evidently It's burning it's cash reserves and it's quarterly reports are not looking good. People seem to think they are in trouble, heading down a dead end road and that choosing WIndow's Phone and hooking up with an exclusive deal with Microsoft (which effectively has shut out any deals to load Android on their smart phones) was a big mistake.
I have to agree thats on the surface of things it's not looking great for either Nokia or Windows phone in general. But we need to remember that Microsoft, tends to be slow at moving and is often late to the game. But Microsoft also has a long history of destroying the competition when they finally get there. I can't see them backing off here at all. Sure Android has stolen a lot of the low end market which has been Nokia's traditional cash cow. Things do change though. I predict a transition is happening in the current smartphone market from a 2 horse race to one with a solid third horse nipping at the others heals and who knows maybe eventually pushing up front with the current leaders . Nothing stays constant in Tech. The public , as Nokia has found this quarter, can turn their back very quickly on a company they are loyal too and head off in another direction.
So what am I seeing here? Its seems that there is a Trijan horse lurking in the wings. One that could, as all Trojan horses are suppose to, slide in the back door looking all innocent, but then release a surprise that can cause a real stir. Ok I here most of you saying that I am being ridiculous here. This isn't going to happen, Nokia is going down and Android is gonna finish them off in the next 12 months. That Windows phone is dead in the water. Sure the Lumina is a nice phone but even the European carriers are saying, "no thanks". Give us Android.
My predictions is based on the imminent release of Windows 8. Over the next 2 years I see it unfolding like this.
Windows 8 will be released. It will be shoved in the have of millions of PC users who will have no choose when they buy a new system. They are going to grumble and then over time get use to and dear I say even begin to like certain things about the Metro interface. Metro being whats basically on a Windows Smartphone will start to become very familiar to people and they will find it a lot easier to accept the different interface it presents. They will start to see that this is awesome on a smartphone and a tablet, a lot more than it is on their desktop system. So there is the trojan horse. The Windows 8 Metro interface which is the Windows smartphone interface which is the Nokia smartphone interface (amongst other smartphone manufacturers) It'll take time, but it will happen. Microsoft knows how to come from behind, it has a money the marketing and most of all the weight of Windows desktop OS behind it. Thats a huge weight and realm of influence.
Today I was reading a few reports on how Nokia seems to be going down the tubes. Evidently It's burning it's cash reserves and it's quarterly reports are not looking good. People seem to think they are in trouble, heading down a dead end road and that choosing WIndow's Phone and hooking up with an exclusive deal with Microsoft (which effectively has shut out any deals to load Android on their smart phones) was a big mistake.
I have to agree thats on the surface of things it's not looking great for either Nokia or Windows phone in general. But we need to remember that Microsoft, tends to be slow at moving and is often late to the game. But Microsoft also has a long history of destroying the competition when they finally get there. I can't see them backing off here at all. Sure Android has stolen a lot of the low end market which has been Nokia's traditional cash cow. Things do change though. I predict a transition is happening in the current smartphone market from a 2 horse race to one with a solid third horse nipping at the others heals and who knows maybe eventually pushing up front with the current leaders . Nothing stays constant in Tech. The public , as Nokia has found this quarter, can turn their back very quickly on a company they are loyal too and head off in another direction.
So what am I seeing here? Its seems that there is a Trijan horse lurking in the wings. One that could, as all Trojan horses are suppose to, slide in the back door looking all innocent, but then release a surprise that can cause a real stir. Ok I here most of you saying that I am being ridiculous here. This isn't going to happen, Nokia is going down and Android is gonna finish them off in the next 12 months. That Windows phone is dead in the water. Sure the Lumina is a nice phone but even the European carriers are saying, "no thanks". Give us Android.
My predictions is based on the imminent release of Windows 8. Over the next 2 years I see it unfolding like this.
Windows 8 will be released. It will be shoved in the have of millions of PC users who will have no choose when they buy a new system. They are going to grumble and then over time get use to and dear I say even begin to like certain things about the Metro interface. Metro being whats basically on a Windows Smartphone will start to become very familiar to people and they will find it a lot easier to accept the different interface it presents. They will start to see that this is awesome on a smartphone and a tablet, a lot more than it is on their desktop system. So there is the trojan horse. The Windows 8 Metro interface which is the Windows smartphone interface which is the Nokia smartphone interface (amongst other smartphone manufacturers) It'll take time, but it will happen. Microsoft knows how to come from behind, it has a money the marketing and most of all the weight of Windows desktop OS behind it. Thats a huge weight and realm of influence.
Samsung Galaxy S III event in London on May 3rd
Mon, Apr 16 2012 09:48
| Samsung, Smartphones
www.tech-sanity.com
Samsung Mobile has just sent out the invite above to UK press, along with details of an event in London on May 3. It invites members of the press to "come and meet the next Galaxy." That'll be the Galaxy S III, then. Samsung says it plans on live streaming the event, which kicks off at 7pm local time (2pm EDT, 11am PDT), via its official Facebook page, too.
Samsung Mobile has just sent out the invite above to UK press, along with details of an event in London on May 3. It invites members of the press to "come and meet the next Galaxy." That'll be the Galaxy S III, then. Samsung says it plans on live streaming the event, which kicks off at 7pm local time (2pm EDT, 11am PDT), via its official Facebook page, too.
Nokia Lumia 900 Windows Phone Review
Wed, Apr 4 2012 02:32
| Smartphones
www.tech-sanity.com
Microsoft and Nokia have teamed up in the hope of offering an appealing third choice in the smartphone market. Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system has struggled to attract either buyers or app developers. But on April 8, Nokia and AT&T will begin selling the first high-end, 4G LTE, Windows Phone model released in the U.S., the Lumia 900.
The Lumia 900 looks rather different from other smartphones. It’s a solid, sturdy, single slab of rounded blue plastic—yes, blue—with a large, thin, bright screen that appears to lie on top, instead of being inset. (For the less adventurous, it also comes in black, and, in a few weeks, white.)
Plus, for an unspecified “limited time,” it costs just $100, half the typical $200 price of most other top-of-the-line competitors. That price requires a two-year AT&T contract whose fees start at $80 a month for a very minimal amount of data and voice minutes, plus unlimited texting. (It’s $60 without the texting plan.)
I’ve been testing the Lumia 900 and found that it provides the best home yet for the attractive Windows Phone software, but still doesn’t measure up to rival smartphones.
The screen is a roomy 4.3 inches—much larger than the iPhone’s—but the phone itself, while larger than an iPhone, isn’t as big and bulky as some recent Android models. I found it comfortable in the hand and the pocket.
When on an LTE network, the phone delivered download speeds of between 10 and 15 megabits per second in my tests, faster than most home Internet connections. Voice calls were clear and reliable, and the rear camera delivers 8 megapixel resolution.
Also, the Lumia 900 features the three biggest advantages of the Windows Phone platform—a handsome, distinctive, tile-based user interface; a mobile version of Microsoft’s Xbox Live gaming network; and a mobile version of genuine Microsoft Office, which allows you to edit documents and share them with PCs and Macs, or store them in the cloud.
But, overall, I consider the Lumia 900 a mixed bag. Unless you are a big Windows Phone fan, or don’t want to spend more than $100 upfront, I can’t recommend the Lumia 900 over the iPhone 4S, or a first-rate Android phone like Samsung’s Galaxy S II series.
I was underwhelmed by the battery life, the browser, and the quality of its photos.
Plus, the Windows Phone platform has only a fraction of the third-party apps available for its rivals—about 70,000, versus nearly 600,000 for the iPhone and more than 450,000 for Android.
It also has a weaker content ecosystem. For instance, there is no way to buy TV shows or movies directly from the phone, and far fewer magazine and newspaper apps are available.
And if LTE—which I consider the only true 4G network in the U.S.—matters to you, bear in mind that AT&T offers that service in just 31 markets, versus 203 for Verizon. In most places, the Lumia, like other AT&T phones, including the AT&T version of the iPhone, delivers a slower version of 4G, which is really just a souped-up version of 3G.
The Windows Phone software itself on this new phone hasn’t changed. Instead of multiple pages of icons, as on iPhone and Android, it offers a scroll of tiles that show information. And it still has “hubs” that combine information like contacts and social-media updates for people you know.
Still, despite its flaws, including the likelihood of a lot of scrolling to get to apps, it remains a refreshing change from the dominant competitors.
My biggest problem was with the Web browser, a mobile version of Internet Explorer.
Back in January, when I tested the same browser on an entry-level Nokia Windows Phone, it worked fine on both the cellular network and on my Wi-Fi network. But the Lumia 900 stalled frequently when rendering websites on my fast, home Wi-Fi network, though the phone did fine on LTE.
To make sure my Wi-Fi wasn’t faulty, I tried some of the same sites, in the same spot, on an iPhone, an Android phone and even an older Samsung Windows Phone. All worked perfectly. Nokia had no explanation for this problem.
I found that, in light use, the battery lasted through a typical day. But in heavier use, including lots of email usage and Web browsing, streaming a one-hour TV show via Netflix, and conducting an hour-long phone call, the battery drained more quickly and was almost gone by late in the afternoon. This was especially true if I was using LTE much of the time.
While the Lumia 900’s processor is single-core, not the common dual-core found on other high-end phones, I found the phone worked smoothly and quickly, and played videos fine.
The screen resolution of 800 by 480 is lower than the iPhone’s, and I found the display generally less sharp than the Apple’s. The screen visibility was a bit better outdoors than most other phones I’ve tested, but not dramatically so.
The camera, despite having the same resolution as the new iPhone, took notably worse pictures of the same scenes in my tests. To my eye, colors were oversaturated, and details were less sharp.
There were a few other issues. The Mac version of Microsoft’s Windows Phone syncing software wouldn’t recognize the Lumia 900, though the PC version did. The on-off button isn’t labeled, or easily distinguishable, from the dedicated camera button.
Bottom line: If you’re looking for a $100, high-end smartphone, or are a Windows Phone fan who has been waiting for better hardware, the Lumia 900 is worth considering. But the phone had just too many drawbacks in my tests to best its chief competitors.
Microsoft and Nokia have teamed up in the hope of offering an appealing third choice in the smartphone market. Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system has struggled to attract either buyers or app developers. But on April 8, Nokia and AT&T will begin selling the first high-end, 4G LTE, Windows Phone model released in the U.S., the Lumia 900.
The Lumia 900 looks rather different from other smartphones. It’s a solid, sturdy, single slab of rounded blue plastic—yes, blue—with a large, thin, bright screen that appears to lie on top, instead of being inset. (For the less adventurous, it also comes in black, and, in a few weeks, white.)
Plus, for an unspecified “limited time,” it costs just $100, half the typical $200 price of most other top-of-the-line competitors. That price requires a two-year AT&T contract whose fees start at $80 a month for a very minimal amount of data and voice minutes, plus unlimited texting. (It’s $60 without the texting plan.)
I’ve been testing the Lumia 900 and found that it provides the best home yet for the attractive Windows Phone software, but still doesn’t measure up to rival smartphones.
The screen is a roomy 4.3 inches—much larger than the iPhone’s—but the phone itself, while larger than an iPhone, isn’t as big and bulky as some recent Android models. I found it comfortable in the hand and the pocket.
When on an LTE network, the phone delivered download speeds of between 10 and 15 megabits per second in my tests, faster than most home Internet connections. Voice calls were clear and reliable, and the rear camera delivers 8 megapixel resolution.
Also, the Lumia 900 features the three biggest advantages of the Windows Phone platform—a handsome, distinctive, tile-based user interface; a mobile version of Microsoft’s Xbox Live gaming network; and a mobile version of genuine Microsoft Office, which allows you to edit documents and share them with PCs and Macs, or store them in the cloud.
But, overall, I consider the Lumia 900 a mixed bag. Unless you are a big Windows Phone fan, or don’t want to spend more than $100 upfront, I can’t recommend the Lumia 900 over the iPhone 4S, or a first-rate Android phone like Samsung’s Galaxy S II series.
I was underwhelmed by the battery life, the browser, and the quality of its photos.
Plus, the Windows Phone platform has only a fraction of the third-party apps available for its rivals—about 70,000, versus nearly 600,000 for the iPhone and more than 450,000 for Android.
It also has a weaker content ecosystem. For instance, there is no way to buy TV shows or movies directly from the phone, and far fewer magazine and newspaper apps are available.
And if LTE—which I consider the only true 4G network in the U.S.—matters to you, bear in mind that AT&T offers that service in just 31 markets, versus 203 for Verizon. In most places, the Lumia, like other AT&T phones, including the AT&T version of the iPhone, delivers a slower version of 4G, which is really just a souped-up version of 3G.
The Windows Phone software itself on this new phone hasn’t changed. Instead of multiple pages of icons, as on iPhone and Android, it offers a scroll of tiles that show information. And it still has “hubs” that combine information like contacts and social-media updates for people you know.
Still, despite its flaws, including the likelihood of a lot of scrolling to get to apps, it remains a refreshing change from the dominant competitors.
My biggest problem was with the Web browser, a mobile version of Internet Explorer.
Back in January, when I tested the same browser on an entry-level Nokia Windows Phone, it worked fine on both the cellular network and on my Wi-Fi network. But the Lumia 900 stalled frequently when rendering websites on my fast, home Wi-Fi network, though the phone did fine on LTE.
To make sure my Wi-Fi wasn’t faulty, I tried some of the same sites, in the same spot, on an iPhone, an Android phone and even an older Samsung Windows Phone. All worked perfectly. Nokia had no explanation for this problem.
I found that, in light use, the battery lasted through a typical day. But in heavier use, including lots of email usage and Web browsing, streaming a one-hour TV show via Netflix, and conducting an hour-long phone call, the battery drained more quickly and was almost gone by late in the afternoon. This was especially true if I was using LTE much of the time.
While the Lumia 900’s processor is single-core, not the common dual-core found on other high-end phones, I found the phone worked smoothly and quickly, and played videos fine.
The screen resolution of 800 by 480 is lower than the iPhone’s, and I found the display generally less sharp than the Apple’s. The screen visibility was a bit better outdoors than most other phones I’ve tested, but not dramatically so.
The camera, despite having the same resolution as the new iPhone, took notably worse pictures of the same scenes in my tests. To my eye, colors were oversaturated, and details were less sharp.
There were a few other issues. The Mac version of Microsoft’s Windows Phone syncing software wouldn’t recognize the Lumia 900, though the PC version did. The on-off button isn’t labeled, or easily distinguishable, from the dedicated camera button.
Bottom line: If you’re looking for a $100, high-end smartphone, or are a Windows Phone fan who has been waiting for better hardware, the Lumia 900 is worth considering. But the phone had just too many drawbacks in my tests to best its chief competitors.
IOS Runs Html5 Games Much Faster Than On The Android OS.
Tue, Mar 6 2012 02:32
| IOS, Samsung, Smartphones, Android, Apple
www.tech-sanity.com
Spaceport's (http://spaceport.io/) has just completed a new study on mobile game platforms that clearly shows that Apple's iOS runs HTML5 games three times faster than the Android operating system, reports "VentureBeat" (http://macte.ch/igwYf).
Spaceport.io created a benchmark dubbed PerfMarks to test performance at running HTML5 code. The benchmark tested a device’s ability to animate image movement. The report measured the number of moving images on a screen at 30 frames per second (FPS), a frame rate which provides a near-native user experience.
Repeated tests show that iOS performed far better at running animations than Android, notes "VentureBeat.
Here are a few of the results.
Pad 2 score 327
iPhone 4S scored 252
Samsung Galaxy Nexus smartphone scored 147
iPhone 3GS 53
Kindle Fire scored 25.
The new Android Galaxy Nexus was the only Android smartphone that could handle images at 30 frames per second, the article adds.
Spaceport's (http://spaceport.io/) has just completed a new study on mobile game platforms that clearly shows that Apple's iOS runs HTML5 games three times faster than the Android operating system, reports "VentureBeat" (http://macte.ch/igwYf).
Spaceport.io created a benchmark dubbed PerfMarks to test performance at running HTML5 code. The benchmark tested a device’s ability to animate image movement. The report measured the number of moving images on a screen at 30 frames per second (FPS), a frame rate which provides a near-native user experience.
Repeated tests show that iOS performed far better at running animations than Android, notes "VentureBeat.
Here are a few of the results.
Pad 2 score 327
iPhone 4S scored 252
Samsung Galaxy Nexus smartphone scored 147
iPhone 3GS 53
Kindle Fire scored 25.
The new Android Galaxy Nexus was the only Android smartphone that could handle images at 30 frames per second, the article adds.
Quad-core smartphones, battery issues and ecpensive
Wed, Feb 29 2012 11:53
| Smartphones, Android, Google
www.tech-sanity.com
Smartphones with quad-core processors that are able to deliver PC-like performance have finally been announced, but high prices and battery issues could potentially stymie adoption, analysts said on Monday.
Quad-core smartphones will be faster than dual-core mainstream phones, which are now flooding the market. However, the smartphones could be priced at a premium because of higher chip costs, and multitasking and running power applications could strain battery life, analysts said.
HTC’s One X smartphone
Quad-core smartphones with Android 4.0 were announced at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and are expected to reach market later this year. HTC’s One X, LG’s Optimus 4X HD and ZTE’s Era are based on the Nvidia Tegra 3 quad-core chip, and Huawei’s Ascend D is based on its own homegrown chip.
But beyond performance, the smartphones need to be competitive on power and price, analysts said. As dual-core smartphones take over from single-core phones, quad-core smartphones will likely be targeted at high-end users.
Quad-core chips are generally costlier than dual-core chips, and that will be reflected in the higher prices of smartphones, said Jim McGregor, chief technology strategist at In-Stat. Buyers may consider quad-core smartphones if they need performance, or are looking to use it as a hybrid PC device.
Smartphone shipments are growing through subsidies offered by carriers with contracts, and dual-core smartphones are taking over that market, McGregor said. In developing countries where phones aren’t subsidized, quad-core smartphones could be priced at a premium, which could stymie adoption in those areas.
Quad-core chips could also strain battery life, McGregor said. Smartphones are already burning battery with 4G radios and high-definition screens, and running resource-intensive applications through quad-core processors and other accelerators could usurp power, McGregor said.
Multiple cores in smartphones will ultimately be important, but it has to be appropriate to the phone design, said Jack Gold, principal analyst at J. Gold Associates. Applications need to use the four cores to squeeze out the best performance, battery life and user experience.
“If you are a high end gamer on your phone, and the application you run and the OS powering it actually know how to use the multiple cores properly, you’ll certainly get a benefit,” Gold said.
Smartphones with quad-core processors that are able to deliver PC-like performance have finally been announced, but high prices and battery issues could potentially stymie adoption, analysts said on Monday.
Quad-core smartphones will be faster than dual-core mainstream phones, which are now flooding the market. However, the smartphones could be priced at a premium because of higher chip costs, and multitasking and running power applications could strain battery life, analysts said.
HTC’s One X smartphone
Quad-core smartphones with Android 4.0 were announced at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and are expected to reach market later this year. HTC’s One X, LG’s Optimus 4X HD and ZTE’s Era are based on the Nvidia Tegra 3 quad-core chip, and Huawei’s Ascend D is based on its own homegrown chip.
But beyond performance, the smartphones need to be competitive on power and price, analysts said. As dual-core smartphones take over from single-core phones, quad-core smartphones will likely be targeted at high-end users.
Quad-core chips are generally costlier than dual-core chips, and that will be reflected in the higher prices of smartphones, said Jim McGregor, chief technology strategist at In-Stat. Buyers may consider quad-core smartphones if they need performance, or are looking to use it as a hybrid PC device.
Smartphone shipments are growing through subsidies offered by carriers with contracts, and dual-core smartphones are taking over that market, McGregor said. In developing countries where phones aren’t subsidized, quad-core smartphones could be priced at a premium, which could stymie adoption in those areas.
Quad-core chips could also strain battery life, McGregor said. Smartphones are already burning battery with 4G radios and high-definition screens, and running resource-intensive applications through quad-core processors and other accelerators could usurp power, McGregor said.
Multiple cores in smartphones will ultimately be important, but it has to be appropriate to the phone design, said Jack Gold, principal analyst at J. Gold Associates. Applications need to use the four cores to squeeze out the best performance, battery life and user experience.
“If you are a high end gamer on your phone, and the application you run and the OS powering it actually know how to use the multiple cores properly, you’ll certainly get a benefit,” Gold said.
HTC One X hands-on
Mon, Feb 27 2012 07:02
| Smartphones, Android
www.tech-sanity.com
If you thought HTC's phones of the latter half of 2011 were good, wait till you get a load of the first half of the 2012 crop. The flagship model for HTC's new "HTC One" line is the HTC One X. Code named Endeavor, it's sporting a 4.7-inch 720p Super LCD 2 display that looks as good as you can imagine (especially in the horrible lighting we had to endure).
The back, home and multitasking buttons are capacitive and aren't a part of the screen, so you actually get more real estate than you might expect. That's a double-edged sword because it can make it that much harder to reach from corner to corner. The phone is made of a special polycarbonate -- basically meaning it's plastic, but it's bad-ass plastic. It feels pretty good, though it is a tad slick.
The One X is either running a quad-core Tegra 3 processor, or a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, depending on whether it's got an LTE radio. (AT&T's version will rock Snapdragon.) The 1800 mAh battery on the One X is not removable.
The real stars of the show, however, are the 8MP rear camera with HTC's new ImageSense technology, and Sense 4.0. The former means you can take better pictures (and take them faster). And the latter means you get more of a stock Android experience, while retaining that feeling that you're using an HTC. The menus are nicely skinned, and widgets go on the home screens more like previous versions of Android and Sense, and not like default Ice Cream Sandwich.
If you thought HTC's phones of the latter half of 2011 were good, wait till you get a load of the first half of the 2012 crop. The flagship model for HTC's new "HTC One" line is the HTC One X. Code named Endeavor, it's sporting a 4.7-inch 720p Super LCD 2 display that looks as good as you can imagine (especially in the horrible lighting we had to endure).
The back, home and multitasking buttons are capacitive and aren't a part of the screen, so you actually get more real estate than you might expect. That's a double-edged sword because it can make it that much harder to reach from corner to corner. The phone is made of a special polycarbonate -- basically meaning it's plastic, but it's bad-ass plastic. It feels pretty good, though it is a tad slick.
The One X is either running a quad-core Tegra 3 processor, or a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, depending on whether it's got an LTE radio. (AT&T's version will rock Snapdragon.) The 1800 mAh battery on the One X is not removable.
The real stars of the show, however, are the 8MP rear camera with HTC's new ImageSense technology, and Sense 4.0. The former means you can take better pictures (and take them faster). And the latter means you get more of a stock Android experience, while retaining that feeling that you're using an HTC. The menus are nicely skinned, and widgets go on the home screens more like previous versions of Android and Sense, and not like default Ice Cream Sandwich.
Hands-on with the Sony Xperia P and Xperia U
Mon, Feb 27 2012 06:45
| Smartphones, Android
www.tech-sanity.com
Sony today announced the Xperia P and Xperia U -- two new additions to its Xperia NXT range, which bring the aesthetics of its 2012 flagship to mid and entry-level smartphones. Both devices feature dual-core CPUs and the familiar angular design from the Xperia S, in a smaller form factor with a couple of interesting new personalization quirks.
We've got early video walkthroughs of the Xperia S and Xperia P after the break, along with first impressions of both phones from Sony's pre-MWC event today.
The Xperia U replaces last years Neo as Sony's entry-level smartphone. Aside from the design changes, Sony's brought some impressive hardware to the table, with a 1GHz dual-core Ericsson chip and a 3.5-inch WVGA "reality display" screen. Followers of high-end Android hardware might turn up their noses at WVGA on any device, but on a 3.5-incher, photos, videos and the UI still look crisp, and color quality is among the best out there.
Sony's touting personalization as one of the major selling points of the Xperia U. The color of the notification light bar at the bottom of the phone can be changed to match whichever skin you're using, and Sony plans to sell replaceable bottom caps for the phone in several colors (we saw yellow, white and black at Sony's event today).
The Xperia P sits between the U and the S in Sony's 2012 line-up. It's powered by the same dual-core chip as the Xperia U, but sports an aluminum chassis that feels great, and fits really nicely in the hand. With 4 inches of qHD resolution, the Xperia P's screen should represent a nice balance for mid-range buyers, too. Speaking of the display, Sony's introducing its new WhiteMagic technology with the Xperia P, which is designed to improve visibility in bright sunlight. Little information was on offer about how this actually works, but the results when the device was placed under a high-intensity lamp were plain to see -- icons and text in the UI remained clearly visible.
Sony today announced the Xperia P and Xperia U -- two new additions to its Xperia NXT range, which bring the aesthetics of its 2012 flagship to mid and entry-level smartphones. Both devices feature dual-core CPUs and the familiar angular design from the Xperia S, in a smaller form factor with a couple of interesting new personalization quirks.
We've got early video walkthroughs of the Xperia S and Xperia P after the break, along with first impressions of both phones from Sony's pre-MWC event today.
The Xperia U replaces last years Neo as Sony's entry-level smartphone. Aside from the design changes, Sony's brought some impressive hardware to the table, with a 1GHz dual-core Ericsson chip and a 3.5-inch WVGA "reality display" screen. Followers of high-end Android hardware might turn up their noses at WVGA on any device, but on a 3.5-incher, photos, videos and the UI still look crisp, and color quality is among the best out there.
Sony's touting personalization as one of the major selling points of the Xperia U. The color of the notification light bar at the bottom of the phone can be changed to match whichever skin you're using, and Sony plans to sell replaceable bottom caps for the phone in several colors (we saw yellow, white and black at Sony's event today).
The Xperia P sits between the U and the S in Sony's 2012 line-up. It's powered by the same dual-core chip as the Xperia U, but sports an aluminum chassis that feels great, and fits really nicely in the hand. With 4 inches of qHD resolution, the Xperia P's screen should represent a nice balance for mid-range buyers, too. Speaking of the display, Sony's introducing its new WhiteMagic technology with the Xperia P, which is designed to improve visibility in bright sunlight. Little information was on offer about how this actually works, but the results when the device was placed under a high-intensity lamp were plain to see -- icons and text in the UI remained clearly visible.
Video hands-on with the Huawei Ascend D quad
Mon, Feb 27 2012 06:40
| Smartphones, Android
www.tech-sanity.com
We're live at Huawei's Ascend D series announcement, where the manufacturer's just taken the lid off its first quad-core smartphone, the Ascend D quad. The device sees Huawei challenging top-tier Android manufacturers with a device offering super high-end specs in just about every area. Read on to find out what we thought of the phone, along with the first video of it in action.
Central to the D quad's power is its quad-core CPU, a custom part created by Huawei and its partners -- this promises high performance power when needed, and energy efficiency when idle. Physically, the device is your typical black slab -- unassuming enough to be easily mistaken for the Galaxy Nexus, but good looking, and it feels good in the hand thanks to the soft touch back. The Ascend D quad is pretty thin, but not excessively so -- Huawei's already got that based covered with the Ascend P1 S. Interestingly, though, it's offering a version with an extended battery as standard alongside the regular D quad -- the D quad XL, promising multiple days of use on a single charge.
In terms of software, Huawei has kept things pretty close to vanilla Android. There are a few changes to be sure, but the manufacturer hasn't messed with Google's well-crafted user experience. In our brief time with the device, what we saw was a very fast smartphone that also works well as a gaming device. We got a brief look at Riptide, and the combination of the 330ppi 720p display and that quad-core CPU resulted in a beautiful, fast gaming experience.
Read more below for gallery
Sony Xperia ICS beta ROM adds radios, new UI and more
Fri, Feb 24 2012 01:37
| Smartphones, Android
www.tech-sanity.com
Sony has released an updated beta ROM for a selection of its 2011 Xperia phones, based on Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. This latest (and unsupported) release builds on the alpha version released back in December with new functionality. This includes elements of the "UXP NXT" user interface powering new phones like the Xperia S -- you'll notice the new app dock and live wallpaper in today's video -- and familiar ICS features like camera shortcuts and music controls on the lockscreen.
Certain radio firmware has also passed certification since Sony released the alpha ROM, meaning mobile data and FM radio support is now enabled, though Wifi and Bluetooth are still unavailable. And needless to say, as it's a pre-release ROM, Google apps (including face unlock) are not included. Nevertheless, we expect it won't take too long for enterprising hackers in the Android community to shoehorn this functionality back into the device.
If you want to get in on the pre-release action, you'll need an Xperia Arc S, Xperia Ray or Xperia Neo V that's fully up-to-date with the latest official software. For download and installation instructions, check the source link -- or if you want to see how the ICS update is shaping up without messing with your device, we've got the official preview video after the break.
Sony has released an updated beta ROM for a selection of its 2011 Xperia phones, based on Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. This latest (and unsupported) release builds on the alpha version released back in December with new functionality. This includes elements of the "UXP NXT" user interface powering new phones like the Xperia S -- you'll notice the new app dock and live wallpaper in today's video -- and familiar ICS features like camera shortcuts and music controls on the lockscreen.
Certain radio firmware has also passed certification since Sony released the alpha ROM, meaning mobile data and FM radio support is now enabled, though Wifi and Bluetooth are still unavailable. And needless to say, as it's a pre-release ROM, Google apps (including face unlock) are not included. Nevertheless, we expect it won't take too long for enterprising hackers in the Android community to shoehorn this functionality back into the device.
If you want to get in on the pre-release action, you'll need an Xperia Arc S, Xperia Ray or Xperia Neo V that's fully up-to-date with the latest official software. For download and installation instructions, check the source link -- or if you want to see how the ICS update is shaping up without messing with your device, we've got the official preview video after the break.
Motorola Droid 4 quick review
Thu, Feb 16 2012 02:06
| Smartphones, Android, Google
Motorola Droid 4 review
After two years and four hardware iterations, the Motorola Droid 4 is the pinnacle of the line that brought Android into the living rooms of America, if not the world. That's it. Plain and simple. If you're looking for an Android phone with a sliding keyboard, there is none better, insofar as the keyboard goes.
The Droid 4 isn't a radical departure from its predecessors. You've got a keyboard, and you've got a screen, though both have undergone further tweaking that keep it in the style of other current Motorola smartphones like the Droid RAZR and Droid RAZR MAXX.
But that's not to say the Droid 4 is the perfect smartphone. Oh, we're going to sing its praises, to be sure. But it's also got some quirks that leave us scratching our head.
After two years and four hardware iterations, the Motorola Droid 4 is the pinnacle of the line that brought Android into the living rooms of America, if not the world. That's it. Plain and simple. If you're looking for an Android phone with a sliding keyboard, there is none better, insofar as the keyboard goes.
The Droid 4 isn't a radical departure from its predecessors. You've got a keyboard, and you've got a screen, though both have undergone further tweaking that keep it in the style of other current Motorola smartphones like the Droid RAZR and Droid RAZR MAXX.
But that's not to say the Droid 4 is the perfect smartphone. Oh, we're going to sing its praises, to be sure. But it's also got some quirks that leave us scratching our head.
HTC Sensation and XE to get limited early preview of Android ICS 4.0 in Europe
Thu, Feb 16 2012 02:03
| Smartphones, Android, Google
www.tech-sanity.com
We've just received word from HTC that it'll be releasing what it's billing as an "early access preview" of its Android 4.0 upgrades for the Sensation and Sensation XE handsets in Europe. The company says that it hopes users will "play with it and enjoy getting used to the ICS experience with Sense," which implies that there'll be changes to HTC's skin in this build — something we've been expecting for quite some time anyway. You won't just be able to download the build at will — HTC will initially only be offering it to members of its Elevate beta program — and T-Mobile subscribers using the Sensation 4G won't be included. That's a shame, but there's a silver lining: the company says that it'll be doing similar previews for other phones in its portfolio in the future. Meanwhile, look for the Sensation and Sensation XE builds to roll out to selected individuals "in the coming days."
HTC's move is likely in response to a groundswell of interest for Android OEMs to be more upfront about their upgrade plans; we've already seen Sony do something similar for several of its models (albeit on a wider scale). Motorola, meanwhile, is being honest about its laggy ICS upgrade schedule — but so far, no public previews.
We've just received word from HTC that it'll be releasing what it's billing as an "early access preview" of its Android 4.0 upgrades for the Sensation and Sensation XE handsets in Europe. The company says that it hopes users will "play with it and enjoy getting used to the ICS experience with Sense," which implies that there'll be changes to HTC's skin in this build — something we've been expecting for quite some time anyway. You won't just be able to download the build at will — HTC will initially only be offering it to members of its Elevate beta program — and T-Mobile subscribers using the Sensation 4G won't be included. That's a shame, but there's a silver lining: the company says that it'll be doing similar previews for other phones in its portfolio in the future. Meanwhile, look for the Sensation and Sensation XE builds to roll out to selected individuals "in the coming days."
HTC's move is likely in response to a groundswell of interest for Android OEMs to be more upfront about their upgrade plans; we've already seen Sony do something similar for several of its models (albeit on a wider scale). Motorola, meanwhile, is being honest about its laggy ICS upgrade schedule — but so far, no public previews.
More smartphones than computers shipped in 2011
Sun, Feb 5 2012 09:43
| Smartphones
Microsoft currently testing its own smartphone, says WSJBy Sam Byford on November 2, 2012 12:51 am Email @345triangle98COMMENTS34LikeTweet140This page has been shared 140 times. View these Tweets.85inShareMicrosoft surprised the world earlier this year when it moved into producing its own computer hardware with the Surface, but the company's plans may not stop there. According to the Wall Street
Windows Phone 8 detailed: dual cores, Skype Integration and NFC
Fri, Feb 3 2012 01:51
| Windows, Smartphones
Microsoft currently testing its own smartphone, says WSJBy Sam Byford on November 2, 2012 12:51 am Email @345triangle98COMMENTS34LikeTweet140This page has been shared 140 times. View these Tweets.85inShareMicrosoft surprised the world earlier this year when it moved into producing its own computer hardware with the Surface, but the company's plans may not stop there. According to the Wall Street