“The HTC 10 is a notable flagship!“
Did you know HTC was the first company to launch an Android smartphone?
HTC G1 or Dream, as it was called, led to a world where Google’s Android managed to beat Apple at its own game of smarter ‘phones’. However, over the year, HTC was relegated back as Samsung became the numero uno manufacturer, while Chinese companies breathed down its neck with aggressive pricing.
However, the year 2016 marks when HTC’s trying to change the things massively. With the launch of 10, it has come up with a worthy flagship which scores on all the important criteria, but can it impress?
In terms of the design language, the HTC 10 features a familiar metal body carved out a single aluminium. What’s interesting however, is that the curves are reduced at the back, yet the phone is quite handy. It’s ideal for a single-hand usage with its 5.2-inch display, which is accompanied by dual speakers above and bottom.
On the right, you get the power button, which has a texture along with the volume button. There’s a 3.5mm audio jack and a USB-Type C port at the bottom.
The display is quite crisp thanks to the 2k resolution. It also reproduces good colours, and can be viewed with ease under the direct sunlight. To save it from scratches, there’s a layer of Corning Gorilla Glass.
Being a flagship, you don’t need to worry about the hardware of the HTC 10. It offers high-end specs, with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor and 4GB RAM. It won’t hang no matter how many apps you run in the background. Gaming wasn’t an issue either, and we were able to play 3D heavy games for a long duration. The 32GB storage can be extended further up to 2TB with the use of a microSD card.
For software, the HTC 10 comes with company’s own Sense UI, which is based on Android 6.0 Marshmallow. It’s quite similar to a stock Android interface, since HTC has removed all the bloatware and duplicate apps. There are a very few preloaded titles, and in terms of UI changes, there are only cosmetic modifications. You do get the BlinkFeed screen to give you at a glance view of news and social notifications.
HTC has always struggled with its cameras for the flagship, but it has managed to turn things around with the 10. It has a 12-megapixel camera at the back, that delivers good pictures, in all the situations. Even in low-light conditions, you can turn on the LED flash to capture the object. Here are some camera samples for you to enjoy.
Selfie lovers would like the 5MP camera at the front, which comes with OIS. What this means is that your images or videos from the secondary camera will be able to counter the hand movements. Don’t worry, there’s OIS support for the rear camera as well. For videos, the main shooter is able to record 4K videos as well as slow-motion captures.
HTC might have given up the BoomSound moniker, its speakers are every bit as powerful. You get loud and clear output, and that’s the case when you listen via earphones as well, thanks to an in-built DAC.
For connectivity, the HTC 10 has the usual options. You get support for 4G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS.
Overall, HTC 10 is a solid effort, and you can see that it aims to score the perfect 10. It’s priced around Rs 45,000, which is similar to other flagships. However, the problem for the HTC 10 isn’t that it’s bad, it’s just not good enough to match the competition. The Samsung Galaxy S7 is priced around the similar segment, and offers a better experience – especially on the camera front, and features like waterproofing.
