HTC One Preview: The New HTC Flagship

So HTC is back with a new flagship smartphone, aptly named the HTC One. Will this be HTC's saving grace? The HTC One features a 4.7-inch Full HD Super LCD 3 display, powered by a 1.7GHz quad-core Snapdragon 600 processor, and a new version of its proprietary launcher, the HTC Sense. It will also come with an UltraPixel camera with a unique 4-MP equivalent resolution, dual front-facing stereo speakers called the HTC BoomSound, a live home screen called HTC BlinkFeed, and the HTC Zoe system, which combines still photos and videos. The flagship smartphone will be released globally in March 2013. I really hope HTC will not disappoint us with the new HTC One.

Image by Slashgear

Measuring in at 137.4 x 68.2 x 9.3mm and 143g, the HTC One is built from a solid block of aluminum, with some few magnesium and plastic details. When it comes to connectivity, almost everything is covered. There’s LTE support (800/1800/2600) as well as HSPA+, WiFi a/b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0 with aptX, GPS/AGPS/GLONASS, and the usual array of sensors: motion, digital compass, gyroscope, and ambient light detection. The quad-core processor is paired with 2GB of RAM and either 32GB or 64GB of internal storage. Sadly, there is no microSD card slot. The HTC One is also powered by a 2,300 mAh battery, which is non-removable.

Before we go to the other features, check out HTC One's promotional video below:


The smartphone would not be uniquely HTC without the Beats Audio, which comes with individual amplifiers for headphones and speaker. HTC also claims that the speakers of HTC One are 4x louder than that of competition. Audio input is updated as well with a dual-microphone system that is suited both to regular volumes and high-volume environments.

Oddly, when it came to the flagship's primary camera, HTC has seemingly taken a wildly different track. In pure equivalence terms, the HTC One tops out at 4-MP resolution. But that is because of HTC’s “UltraPixel” technology, which focuses on individual pixel size, not how many pixels can be packed into an increasingly dense sensor. The HTC One camera's custom sensor uses 2.0 micrometer pixels (4um square) almost double the size of the pixels in an 8-megapixel phone camera, and with more than 313-percent the light-gathering potential of a 13-megapixel sensor. There’s also 2-axis optical image stabilization, an f/2.0 aperture lens, HDR audio for the Full HD video recording – which is also supported by the 2.1-megapixel front-facing camera, and a new ImageChip, HTC’s proprietary camera DSP. That can handle real-time HDR video, for instance, at 60fps in 720p resolution (or 30fps at 1080p).

Image by Slashgear

"Simultaneous photo and video capture is used in one of HTC’s key software introductions in the One: Zoe photography. The One will allow you to fire off stills or video separately, as always, but you can also shoot Zoes: a combination of a 3.6s video clip (0.6s kept from just before you hit the record button, then 3s from that point on) in 1080p resolution, and twenty burst stills (five before the button is pressed; fifteen after), again at full resolution. There’s also a highlight reel topper, a 30s-long, automatically curated summary of the content in that Event; you can choose from six different themes (each with its own filters, musical backing track, and overall mood) and hit remix to instantly juggle the edit. Press the share button, and you can upload an MP4 to YouTube, Facebook, or any other sharing service Android supports."

Image by Slashgear

HTC has also come up with BlinkFeed for the HTC One, a Flipboard-style endless scrolling list pulling content from online news providers, your own Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Flickr feeds, news from local apps, etc. And as usual, HTC Sense 5 pares back the iconography in keeping with the underlying Android 4.1.2 (the Android 4.2 update will come soon) and does away with most of the unnecessary gradients and 3D effects of previous iterations.

It all makes for an ambitious device, and the HTC One is shaping up to be a strong performer from HTC – arguably its best handset to-date. Do you think the HTC One will be successful and help HTC regain its lost market share? Does HTC One stand a chance against juggernauts like Sony Xperia Z, the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S IV, and Apple's iPhone 5? All remains to be seen. Good luck, HTC!

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Til then...

xoxo Nash