Headlining a
new, simpler, HTC is the HTC One X. It leads the charge of a trio of handsets
in the HTC One series and brings with it specs that are impossible to ignore. It
is, perhaps, a defining phone for 2012, one of the first to arrive that offers
everything this year is about.
But does the
HTC One X do enough to satisfy those who have become a little weary of the HTC
way? Has Sense 4 evolved enough to accommodate everything that Android offers,
without the feeling that HTC is squashing the OS under its heel? We've been
living with HTC One X to bring you a full and thorough review.
Design
HTC has made
no bones about how important design is. It has been one of the foremost
principles in the creation of its most recent phones, something that Scott
Croyle, VP of design at HTC's design agency, recently outlined to us.
Separating
designer and marketing speak from reality is of course important. The good news
is that the contours of the One X make it a comfortable and secure phone to
hold. The chassis - although naturally large, thanks to the huge display- feels
secure in the hand and that comes down to the polycarbonate body and some
clever lines.
The curve of
the back makes the One X sit nicely in the hand, while the angular lines -
which wouldn't look out of place on a BMW - provide grip points within the
recesses of your digits. That said, there is no avoiding the fact that the One
X is a massive phone, and that will be an issue for those with smaller hands,
just like the HTC Sensation XL before it.
The One X
measures 134.36 x 69.9 x 8.9mm and although large, it's nice that HTC has put
some effort into making this phone slim. As such, it doesn't bulge in your
pocket. It also weighs only 130g, which is surprisingly light. Lighter, indeed,
than the Sensation XL and XE.
We like the
way the body meets the screen. The sharp contrast between the white of the case
and the black of the screen bezel is clean and minimalist. But there is no
battery access, no microSD card slot, nothing. All you have is a small tray for
the micro-SIM card. It's very different in that sense from previous HTC
devices, where you've been able to remove the entire back of the phone to
access the innards.
The result
is a seamless design. It's futuristic, with micro drilled holes, rather than
recessed grills, for the speakers, and a matte finish on the rear which stays
mercifully free of fingerprints. We were concerned that the white version of
the phone might become grubby, but having been put through its paces, it's
still looking as good as new.
Hardware and controls
Launching as
an Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich device, the HTC One X has three touch
controls across the bottom of the display.
There is a
standby/power button on the top along with the 3.5mm headphone jack, the volume
rocker sits on the right-hand side and the left offers the Micro-USB - which
also supports MHL if you want to use it as an HDMI output. That's it for
physical controls and connections, resulting in a clean and minimalist
arrangement.
Under the
skin things are much more comprehensive. Sitting at the core of the HTC One X
is the new Nvidia Tegra 3 quad-core chipset. This is clocked at 1.5GHz and
backed by 1GB RAM. There is 32GB of internal memory but, as mentioned, no
opportunity to expand local storage, which is too bad for those that want to
move an existing card loaded with content on to the device.
But that
appears to be the new trend in Android. What was once one of the benefits of
the platform has been stripped away; while we find it annoying that top-tier
Android smartphones are losing this convenient option, it isn't a huge problem,
it just means you need to put in the time initially loading your device with
content and accept that your limit might be slightly lower than previously.
Elsewhere
the One X benefits from the normal wireless connectivity, but you'll find that
Bluetooth 4 is enhanced with apt-X for higher quality Bluetooth audio (with
compatible devices) and NFC is packed in too, so you'll be able to use Android
Beam and Wi-Fi Direct functions.
Stunning screen
The display
of the HTC One X is stunning. Measuring 4.7-inches on the diagonal, it's one of
the largest around, before you get to the slightly unmanageable size of a
device like the Samsung Galaxy Note.
It also gets
the HD tag, with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. That gives it a pixel
density of 312ppi. The high resolution means that fonts are sharper, fine
details resolve better and everything - from the app icons to the menus - looks
better than lesser devices.
The sheer
size adds to the impact of this great display. It's not the first big device
from HTC, but the resolution adds the missing piece to the puzzle that the
Sensation XL and the Titan lacked.
But it isn't
just the resolution that we like in the One X. HTC has worked to reduce the air
gap between the physical display and the surface you touch. This has also been
a trend of late, something that Sony Ericsson did remarkably well with on the
Xperia Arc, and it looks wonderful here too.
The colours
produced by the Super LCD display are impressive and there is enough brightness
to stay usable in bright sunshine. We found the automatic brightness coped
well, adjusting with enough gusto to keep things comfortably visible.
The result
is that the One X makes other devices look average. Set alongside something
like the Sensation XE, which is impressive in its own right, the One X looks
like a real step forward.
HTC Sense 4 meets Android 4
The HTC One
X launches with Ice Cream Sandwich as its operating system, making it among the
first new devices to do so. It might seem a small point, but in a world where
the slightest delay in updating draws criticism from customers, it gets HTC off
to the right start.
Of course,
HTC has never just let Android be Android, so you'll find it heavily customised
with Sense 4. This is the latest version of Sense, incorporating much of what
has rolled into Sense 3.7 (which you can read about in detail here). The aim,
HTC maintains, is to make sure that it doesn't take anything away from native
Android with the changes it makes.
Landing on
the home page, that much is obvious. It is a cleaner, more dynamic, arrangement
than previous HTC devices, washing away the restrictive launcher and obsession
with "personalising" everything. Ironically, the new Sense can be
personalised to a greater degree than previously, thanks to the new layout.
A central apps
tray icon is flanked by spaces on each side into which you can drop shortcuts.
These also accept folders, so rather than dropping icons on your home screen
you can just create a folder in the launch bar. It's nice, tidy, convenient,
but also common across most new Android devices.
But behind
this upfront easing of HTC Sense, you'll find that it tinkers on just about
every level as it always has. Visually, much of Android 4's character has gone.
You rarely catch a glance of the blue Tron-esque look of native Ice Cream
Sandwich, so although this is a lighter touch, it's instantly recognisable as
HTC Sense, with all its widgets and features.
The first
startup of the device invites you to sign in to a huge number of preinstalled
and linked services - Facebook, Twitter, Evernote, Dropbox, SkyDrive and so on.
HTC has done a deal with Dropbox giving you an additional 23GB of storage when
you sign in, although this lasts only for 24 months, presumably until you get
your next HTC device.
With all
this signing in, you'll find these services ready to roll on the device, along
with a fair amount more. One of the nice features is being able to search for
apps within the apps tray, returning instant results as you type. If you love
apps, you'll love this feature for routing out that obscure program you can't
find.
The lock
screen offers a wide range of features, with the convenient unlock options.
Unlike previous versions of Sense you don’t get to choose the apps you can
unlock to. Instead it takes the launch bar shortcuts and offers you those. So
if you have a folder, you unlock directly to that folder.
You also get
music controls from the lock screen, as well access to the notification bar. As
previously, the notification bar is richly populated, although you don't get
recent apps offered here any more, because Ice Cream Sandwich brings with it
the recent apps button and a new approach to multitasking.
HTC Sense 4
tweaks this too. In Honeycomb and native Ice Cream Sandwich, the recent apps
view presents thumbnails that will scroll up and down the page vertically. HTC
Sense 4 turns this into larger screen grabs that scroll horizontally. It's six
of one and half a dozen of the other: the HTC approach perhaps looks better,
but the native Android approach fits more on the display, so is arguably faster
to use.
Returning to
notifications, Sense 4 still gives you a rich notifications area. This is also
accessible from the lock screen, so you can instantly see missed calls or
messages and unlock the phone to take direct action. You get a convenient
Settings button, so you can quickly access the menu. Gone is the slightly
fiddly dual-tabbed notifications area of previous versions of Sense, making
things not only tidier, but faster to access.
Sense 4
generally sticks to Android 4 app-control conventions. Obviously the menu
button has now gone, so settings are accessed via the in-app button, usually
depicted with three dots. HTC has put in the effort to conform to this, so
you'll find the menu in the top right-hand corner in Sense's modified apps,
giving a nice level of consistency across the experience.
There is
still one thing we really don't like though, and that's HTC's insistence on
pushing its "Locations" over Google Maps. Once you have addresses in
your contacts or calendars, this will link through to maps, but the default is
HTC's own service, which is lacklustre, to say the least.
Fortunately
there is an app to fix that for you and a quick download of Select Other Map
for HTC will fix the problem.
With all the
screen space available, it might come as a surprise that in general use you
don't get more space on the screen. One thing you'll quickly notice is that the
homepage will take only as many icons as previous devices like the Sensation
XE, and that's 16. This is because the screen is divided into spaces and these
spaces are now larger, as are the app icons.
The other
thing you'll notice is that the keyboard is now massive, with an added run of
cursor keys across the bottom. As a result, you get to see less of the webpage
or message you're writing than you might expect. Install a third-party
keyboard, like SwiftKey X (pictured above), and you'll get a little more space
back again.
We have no
problem typing on smaller keyboards and we didn't find that making it larger
improved the experience. At least you have plentiful choices from the Play
Store, or HTC's swipe input that you can also enable.
The browser
has also had some tweaking. You get Flash support which can be toggled in the
options, as well as the desktop view option that's standard in Ice Cream
Sandwich. You also get a neat "read" option, that strips everything
out apart from the text, so you can read without images or adverts. It doesn't
work on all pages (and we can't figure out why) but giving the space and the
fine rendering of detail, we're not sure if you'll use it.
Browsing is
slick and fast and we found that Flash content was handled well, but the limit
of six tabs maximum at any one time is a little restrictive.
Media, darling
We've
touched on the music player and this is an area where HTC has made a few more
changes. The music player is richly featured and enhanced by Beats Audio.
Connect your headphones and you'll get the option to disable Beats, but we'd
recommend you leave it on, because it sounds fantastic.
The Beats
enhancement, however, cannot be adjusted; you can't tailor the effect to your
liking and it’s noticeably bass heavy. One of the launch claims of the new One
series is that Beats Audio is device wide, so you benefit whether you're
watching BBC iPlayer or listening to Spotify. In some cases, the Beats icon
will appear on the notifications bar so you know this is true, but this isn't
the case for some apps, like BBC iPlayer, so it's difficult to discern whether
Beats is doing anything or not. However, we had no complaints about the audio
quality, whatever we were doing.
One of the
other neat changes to music in Sense 4 is that Music is now a hub, rather than
a single app. Open up music and you'll get access to local music files as well
as other music services. We installed Spotify and found it was automatically
added, but you can also add your own app shortcuts manually. This means you can
drop the music shortcut on a home page and in one click you are through to all
your music options, which is really smart.
The music
hub also gives you a list of recently played tracks, with the option to queue
or create playlists. You can access media servers here too, it's a nice
convenient approach to handling all your music in one place.
Previously
Sense was rather messy in dealing with network content, with a number of
different access routes and apps which essentially all did the same thing. Now
things are slightly more simplified, with the option to access "media
servers" from within Gallery or Music via the in-app menu.
Within the
Gallery, the dropdown menu offers access to all your different services, so you
can navigate through to view friends' albums as well as your own from the
Gallery. Accessing your media server offers up file/folder navigation, finally
arriving at thumbnails, which is fast enough. You don't get the option to save
locally from network sources, however.
Although we
had no problems getting network music and photos to play, the One X resolutely
refused to play almost all video. We suspect this is a problem either with our
review device or a software bug, as older HTC devices will play these videos
with no problems.
However,
video content looks fantastic when it does play.
HTC has
included the option to share content from its phones for a while, but now it's
introduced a gesture-based "throw" feature. Assuming you have the HTC
Media Link HD, you'll be able to swipe your One X to mirror on your TV.
Unfortunately we didn't have this accessory to test, so we can't comment on how
well it performs, apart from the demo we've seen previously.
However, the
three-finger swipe will also work with Bluetooth. Swipe a music track and it
will offer to throw it to a connected Bluetooth device. We fired our music over
to the Creative ZiiSound T6 system, which also supports the apt-X codec, with
great results. It's worth noting that when the One X is playing through its own
external speaker it won't engage Beats Audio, but when you connect to a
Bluetooth device it does.
You also get
Watch in the mix if you want to buy your movies from HTC, although there are
many othr options, including Google itself, if that's what you're after. The impressive
thing, although little is unique to HTC, is that all this media action (aside
from the Media Link HD) comes straight out of the box. The experience is
cleaner than before so we have less to complain about.
Camera
HTC put the
camera at the top of the pile when it announced the One X, but so did every
other manufacturer. With an 8-megapixel sensor on the back, the One X has an
updated and much simpler camera interface making it faster and easier to take
stills or video, with both buttons on offer all the time.
The camera
is very fast to capture your photos in normal conditions. Focusing is fast in
daylight and often you'll find the camera is focused and ready as you line up
your shot, rather than having to wait for the thing to find a focal point after
pressing a button. Touch focusing means you can pick any point to focus on if
things aren't quite right. Face detection also works really well, meaning faces
are usually in focus when you take the shot.
Continuous
capture is offered by holding the on-screen button. This will then present you
with the shots to select the best one to save. It's ideal for those moments
when something exciting is happening and you don't want to miss the action:
people jumping into a pool, animals doing stupid things, an attempt at a
ridiculous stunt, etc.
But be
warned. The rapid shutter style clicking it makes as it fires off shots doesn't
actually correlate to an image being captured: the sound effects make it sound
like it's capturing faster than it actually is.
Also, we'd
much rather a persistent green focal point acknowledgement so you know where it
is focused. Although you can usually see which subject is in focus, as you
don't get the "press and hold" to focus option, there can be a slight
feeling that you're not always in control: in this sense, it is trumped by the Sony
Xperia S in the camera department.
Generally
speaking the results are very good in daylight conditions. Our test shots were
perhaps a little pink, probably down to some saturation tweaking in the phone
as the JPEG is being produced. You can alter the saturation manually, which may
make faces look more natural. It's worst in low light when flesh tones can look
a little too red - never a great look.
Low light is
still a problem, slowing down focusing and, even when the LED flash fires,
there is a lot of noise marring detail. But that's true of all phones, so we
can't be too critical. We still refute claims that this will replace a compact
camera, but you'll get some cracking shots from the One X.
Full HD
video capture, at 30fps, garners some nice results. However, we also found this
had something of a pinky tinge. The audio capture from our samples wasn't
fantastic, but it was in fairly difficult conditions. Focusing in video is good
however, adapting as the scene changes, but also with the option to touch focus
if things aren't quite right.
You can also
capture stills while shooting video, which is a clever option and one made
possible thanks to HTC's inclusion of both buttons rather than a fiddly slider.
There is an
HDR option which does work, but as it takes two shots and combines them, you need
to keep the phone perfectly steady and have no movement, or you'll get a lot of
ghosting.
There is a
front-facing camera for video calling, although we found the quality wasn't
great and again it suffered from over-saturation - exactly the sort of thing
you don't want when video calling indoors - and stills don't come out well
either.
Finally on
the camera, we like that there's a camera link directly from the Gallery and we
also like the capture option from the video player - so if you want to grab a
still of a movie, you simply hit the button.
Performance, calling, battery
So far we've
said little about the actual performance of the One X. Sure, it does a lot, but
does it do it well? In a word, yes. This is a silky smooth Android experience,
the power of the One X and the improvements in Android and Sense 4 make this an
excellent smartphone experience. Many new devices demonstrate some stability
problems, but we've found the HTC One X to be pretty much free of problems.
It's easy to
forget that this is also a phone, but happily we can report that we experienced
no problems with calls during our time with the phone. Callers come across loud
and clear and we didn't experience any problems with reception.
But with all
this power and a huge screen, you'd expect the battery to be the area where the
phone critically fails. The 1800mAh cell might not be the largest when set
alongside rivals from Motorola, but it performs pretty well in reality. It saw
us through a long working day with plenty of calls and data use, along with
typical use of the camera and some HD video capture, offering around 13 hours
of use.
If you work
it hard, play a lot of games on your commute, constantly listen to music or
make lots of calls, you'll see the battery fall away, but it's better than we
expected. On light days, we've had no battery worries at all, but you'll still
be charging every night.
