The HTC One and Sense TV

The HTC One has everything in it (except HTC opted to exclude the kitchen sink). Don't believe me? It even has an IR Blaster! An IR Blaster is a device that emulates an infrared remote control to autonomously control a device that is normally controlled only by remote control key presses. In laymen's terms - we're talking about a remote control built into your phone through the power button.

I was excited to hear that they added remote control capabilities into the HTC One, that way I don't need to find a remote (which is generally misplaced). I just have to know where my phone is and I always know where my HTC One is located at.

The app works really well and is very easy to pair with your TV. I've had some problems with it pairing with certain things like a digital TV converter box, and certain TVs. Another problem I have is just changing channels goes up in the channels, but doesn't go to channels that actually have shows on them. That's because for example, channel 5 has nothing on it, but 5.1 does. This probably has something to do with the transition to all digital TV or something with my Vizio TV. As HTC develops their Sense software more I'm positive the kinks will be worked out!

The UI of the app is clean and simple to use and has the necessary buttons to navigate through all the menus and channels. All you need is one device and you control all your TVs in your house! Changing to different programmed remotes is easy and has a TV guide that syncs with the cloud. Swapping back and forth between channels is extremely easy as you can just pull down the notification and you'll see recent channels that you've been on with a little thumbnail of what show is on that channel. 

You can favorite shows and get reminders for upcoming shows in BlinkFeed, which make Sense TV more than just a universal remote app. It's an entire assistant to help you watch what you want to watch. If you don't already have an HTC One, you might want to hold off on chucking all those universal remotes and replacing them with the HTC One. For HTC One owners, you really could!

Sense TV: ★★★★★★★★★☆ (9 of 10)

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The HTC One and Battery Life

One of the things that worries a lot of smartphone users is how long their device will last day to day. My general rule for battery life is if it can get me through an entire day (from when I wake up to when I sleep, so about 18 hours or so), then it is enough battery life for me. I'm telling you now, don't hold off from buying the HTC One if you main or only concern is the battery life, either because you think it won't have enough or because it doesn't have a removable battery. It's not an issue for me, and I'm betting, it won't be for you. The 2,300mah capacity battery is great! You'll be missing out on beautifully crafted device full of useful features.

The one problem about rating battery life for smartphones is that every person uses their phone differently. So I may get 18 hours which is really good because I'm using my device for all sorts of things and it still gets long battery life, someone else could get 24 hours but barely be using it. I've used the HTC One S, Nexus 4, HTC Sensation, HTC One, and the LG G2x. The HTC One easily outdoes all of them in terms of battery life. It does so while also having a quad-core processor, 1080p screen, crisp boomsound, and a large 4.7" screen! So that's something to really be impressed by. I would say that the HTC One in comparison to the Nexus 4 has about 30% better battery life under my battery usage. Which is great. Also the battery goes strong for video playback. Check out this video bellow where I took the HTC One for a spin playing videos non stop until it died. For more details on the test check out my blog post about it.

Pretty good, right? People don't always use their phone for endless playback though. So moving on to some real world battery samples. I use GSam Battery Monitor to get my battery statistics. Bellow is my very first day of battery use after getting my phone. The default Sense battery information is pretty scarce so the information isn't that great, but it shows 16 hours of usage time. The picture on the right is with GSam Battery and is more useful as it shows that I had the screen on for about 2 hours 20 minutes. All of my battery tests are done with my brightness set to 50% for the majority of time, bluetooth always on (connected to my Pebble Smartwatch), GPS off, WiFi on, Auto Sync on as needed, and battery saving mode on (with only cpu power ticked).

So having 2 hours and 20 minute screen on time and still being able to have the device being used and unplugged for 26 hours is pretty good! So after over a month of data collected my average battery life is around 22 hours! This battery result is from today, but the battery usage for this particular usage cycle is pretty low because I had GPS on for awhile going around town getting information for Sensorly so I can map more T-Mobile LTE locations. But even then, I still managed to make it through the day!

The other aspect about battery life is how long does the battery take to recharge from really empty to completely full. As for the HTC One, it takes a longer than usual amount of time. It will take almost twice as long as any other phone I've owned. Around 3-4 hours for a full charge. Although the HTC One has the Snapdragon 600 processor, which supports the QuickCharge feature, but it looks like HTC opted out. One possible reason why, is because the battery is not easily replaceable and having longer charge times allows for better battery health.



Giving a clear rating for battery is hard. On one hand I get great battery life, but on the other hand I know that the battery isn't replaceable and that there are other smartphones out there with bigger capacity batteries. Take for example the Galaxy S4 and the Galaxy Note. So taking into account all that, my rounded up score is something I stand behind.


Battery Life: ★★★★★★★★★☆ (9 of 10)

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The HTC One and BlinkFeed

So I've had my HTC One since April 16th, so I've had a good amount of time to play around with the device  and know the device well enough to give my impression of it. What the device does well or doesn't do well is what I'll be sharing. So instead of clumping together everything into one post, I want to take the time to really get deep into the core of each aspect of the phone. I'll be starting with the areas HTC chose to highlight about the device: BlinkFeed, Design, Ultrapixel Camera, BoomSound, Sense 5, and the IRBlaster/Sense TV.

In the this post I'll go over BlinkFeed in all of it's eloquent glory and give my impressions of it. First off a youtube video where HTC showcases BlinkFeed just to give a quick idea of what BlinkFeed is in case you don't know yet.

The idea behind BlinkFeed is a good idea, and the design of it is crisp, smooth, and beautiful. The problem that I have with BlinkFeed is I like to sift through my information in a Google Reader approach. This means having the ability to mark stuff as already viewed, and to view EVERYTHING in chronological order. It does a really good job of almost being a replacement to Google Reader (and I need one fast since the service is closing soon. Why GOOGLE WHY!?!). I'm hoping that HTC stays committed to BlinkFeed since it has a lot going for it.

I love that if you tap on the notification bar it will bring you to the top of BlinkFeed. This also works in the app drawer of Sense 5. Pretty nifty feature. I wish though that I could get rid of the weather portion of BlinkFeed if I so chose to do so. Same way I would like the app drawer to be a little larger grid and to get rid of the permanent weather widget. The transfer animations are smooth though and despite some features missing that I would like. I find myself using BlinkFeed more than I anticipated.

BlinkFeed: ★★★★★★★★☆☆ (8 of 10)

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My Next Smartphone: The HTC One

With new devices being announced or coming out right about time, a lot of people are considering new smartphones. You have the Galaxy S4, Sony Experia Z, LG Optimus G, and many other options. I'm ready to upgrade from my HTC One S and moving to a device whose name subtracts the S from it's moniker, but there's so much to the actually device that is added. Yes, I'm talking about the HTC One - my next device.


The HTC One

The spec sheet of the HTC One is quite a lengthy one and has a whole lot of power behind the device. The central power behind the device comes from it's amazingly powerful Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 600, quad-core CPU @1.7GHz. But that's not all the device has to it. I'll give a quick run down of some of the specs bellow but head on over to the spec page for a more in-depth look. It meets the requirements of my next phone, which were to have a 720p screen or higher, NFC, 2GB ram, quad core and LTE

DISPLAY: 4.7 inch, Full HD 1080p, 468 

RAM : 2 GB DDR2
NFC, Bluetooth 4.0, 2300 mAh Battery

, LTE, AC WIFI

However, the big features of the phone though aren't really expressed well on a spec sheet. The key areas that HTC really shines out on this phone is with the build quality, the camera, the sound experience, and the sense features. I'll be able to give a more first hand experience once I get my hands on the device, but initial reviews have been very promising.


Build Quality

Now the build quality of the device makes the device look very premium and has been compared to that of what Apple has been known for, especially with the unibody aluminum iPhone 5. The HTC One has a lot of time being put into the outside aesthetics of the phone. Check out the video bellow to see just how much work goes into each and every HTC One. The end result after a lengthy manufacturing process is stunning.

Camera: HTC Zoe

The camera is another area that HTC stepped up their game. Now if you just take a simple look on a spec sheet the camera is a 4MP sensor. People would be quick to write off such a low megapixel camera in the days of 8 and even 13 megapixel cameras in smartphones. The truth of the matter though is megapixels aren't the only thing that helps produce an excellent image. HTC's 4 megapixel sensor is what they are dubbing the ultrapixel. The ultrapixel is able to capture more light and therefor is able to give better low light images and more accuracy to true colors. It's able to go head on with 8 and even 13 megapixel smartphone cameras. 

Although some are seeing a degradation of clarity because of the lower megapixel count, check out some comparison shots and decide for yourself. I'll do my own shoot out once I get my hands on the device.

The other thing HTC has done with the camera experience is they have included a bunch of camera settings. They have the new HTC Zoe which takes shots and videos and merges them into one presentation and then there are a whole bunch of filters and editing that you can do right from the phone. For example you can remove unwanted photobombers with just a click...or at least that's how easy they say it will be.


Sound

HTC has it's usual beats audio included with the new HTC One but it has gone beyond that in two important areas. The first is by including now just one but two front facing speakers on the device, located bellow and above the screen. They have named this BoomSound. A little bit of a cheesy name, but what really matters is does it improve the experience. Everything points to a resounding yes.

The next thing HTC has done in terms of sound quality is they have greatly improved the microphone and sound recording experience. Instead of using a single membrane microphone they use dual membrane microphones which takes two different sound recording. Then after the two signals have been combined, background noise is greatly reduced, which increases the overall sound quality of the recording. After all, no one wants to huddle around a phone to hear a distorted concert. You can read more about that on their blog post over here.


HTC Sense

Now I've never been the biggest fan of HTC Sense, even though I've owned several HTC Android phones. With the new version of Sense HTC has brought the UI more in line with what Android 4.0 design language looks like. The colors of Sense still leave somethings to be desired (I really am a fan of the way stock Android looks now), but beyond that you'll think twice...or more, about modding the device and getting rid of Sense. There's some really cool features built into Sense: Blinkfeed, Sense TV, HTC Zoe, Music App, and more.

HTC Blinkfeed: A Windows Phone styled widget built into the homescreen that collects 

updates from news or social media sources and puts all that information in one location.

Sense TV: Sense TV is one of the features that I'm really excited. The HTC One has a

IR Blaster beneath the power button so you can actually control your TV with your phone!

HTC One Music Player: The new music player has a built in lyric player, put that in

combination of the beats audio and BoomSound and you got a nice media player!

It looks like HTC is stepping up it's game and I can't wait to give my thoughts on the device once I actually get it in my hands. Another thing I hope HTC has learned is to support the developer community. I hope getting S-OFF is easy and that as a result there will be a large developer community behind it. What does help is that it seems like HTC is steering away from producing so many variants, that way developers can focus their efforts on one amazing device.

If you have any questions about the device that you would like me to answer once I get the device or anything you would like included in my full review of the device feel free to leave a comment bellow. 

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