HTC Unveils Revamped HTC One

adeelarshad82 writes "Earlier today, HTC unveiled a revamped version of its One smartphone. The new HTC One has a 4.7-inch full HD 1080p display which is powered by a 1.7-GHz, quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 processor and a customized version of Android. The new phone includes support for NFC, Bluetooth 4.0, and DLNA for wireless streaming to a TV or computer. Measuring 5.4 by 2.7 by 0.36 inches, the phone weighs around 5 ounces. According to the specs, the phone will come with either 32 or 64GB of storage and 2GB of RAM, and it's backed by a non-removable 2300mAh battery. Unfortunately the phone doesn't include a memory card slot and has just two ports: a headphone jack and a MicroUSB that doubles as an MHL output for HDMI TVs. HTC One's 'UltraPixel' camera is nothing to sniff at either. HTC is trying to replace megapixels with 'ultrapixels,' cutting down the size of photos but using much larger individual pixels to sharply reduce noise and improve low-light performance. In a quick comparison with iPhone 5 and Galaxy S3, One's images were far clearer and brighter. The HTC One runs Android 4.1.2 with HTC's new Sense 5."

Comments

Re:A lesson for HTC

[AmiMoJo]

I'll give you HTC's responses. Note I'm not endorsing them, just telling what they will say. My personal comments are included.

1) Allow users to remove / not load HTC Sense and opt for the pure Android experience. Sense is lovely, but sometimes I don't want to use up resources on it.

Sense is what differentiates our phones, all our apps are designed for it and would need modifications to fit in with the vanilla Android theme, our phones have industry leading performance etc.

Comment: Apparently future versions of Android (Key Lime Pie?) will allow manufacturers to more easily skin the OS and optionally allow users to turn the skin off.

2) Make your phones (more) hacker friendly.

Lots of work for 0.00001% of our users, and lots of headaches from the people who think they know what they are doing but don't and brick their phones instead. Seriously, Samsung went to the trouble of introducing a counter that tracks how many times you installed an unofficial ROM because people kept bricking their phones and returning them.

Comment: We are a niche market, but well served by Google and some really rather good Chinese phones.

3) Stop it with the non-removable batteries and lack of external SD card slots.

We make lots of money on battery replacement and charging £50 for an extra 8GB of storage.

Comment: Okay, they wouldn't use those words, but that's what it boils down to. The only option is to boycott I'm afraid. Speak through your wallet.

4) UPDATES for Android!

It does what it does when you buy it. If you want new stuff buy a new phone.

Comment: Again future versions of Android are supposed to improve this situation, and again the only solution is unfortunately to vote with your wallet.

You need the dev community to support your phones.

Those guys are a support nightmare for us. We really want them to leave us alone.