HTC One X

It is astounding how HTC makes brilliant looking phones, one after the other, as if the designing process is a well planned production line in itself! The latest flagship phone, the One X, walks down the same path.

Look & Feel
The HTC One X is a looker, and there is no doubting the effort that the Taiwanese manufacturers’ design team has put in for this phone. Judging by the design, the form factor and the quality of materials used, the One X feels quite premium. For a lot of people, a phone with some metal component to the build is an essential indicator to the solidity of the build quality. See and hold the One X once, and all those assumptions will be dispelled. Even though this falls squarely in the big-screen smartphone category, the One X isn't uncomfortable to use or unwieldy to hold.

To understand most elements of the design influence, you need to look at the phone placed vertically on a flat surface, from side on. The slimness literally shouts silently. What you will also notice is slight curve on the top and bottom. The only issue with this slimness is that the 8MP camera protrudes out at the back, and when placed flat, the phone rests on a part of the clicker.

While it is plastic throughout, we believe it is the unibody design that lends it the solidity. We first saw this a few years back on the HTC Legend, and while the design didn’t really catch on then, it never really went away. Off late, we have seen this with a lot of phones, with the Nokia Lumia 800 being a prime example. The review unit sent to us had the enamel white finish, which wasn’t glossy and thankfully so, for it isn't a fingerprint or scratch magnet. However, this colour does have the problem of getting dirty very quickly, and you’ll have to be quite careful about that.

The front of the One X looks very minimalistic, particularly when the display us turned off. Amidst the sea of black is a 4.7-inch display and three touch sensitive keys - return, home and what is essentially a task manager. The right spine has the volume rocker, and left one has the micro USB slot. There is no dedicated camera key, which is a bit of a surprise.

To sum it up, the One X is a well-sculpted phone, and clearly, the designers have put their heart and mind into it. It feels like a premium phone to hold and use, which is critical considering what you will eventually be shelling out for it. We would strongly recommend the grey one though, since the white will not be for the cleanliness freaks out there!

Features & Performance
A 1.5GHz quad core processor powers the HTC One X, and this is the first super phone to be launched in India. Not to forget, this is paired smartly with 1GB of RAM. Logically, it should be a scorcher in terms of performance. To test and compare, we ran a series of benchmarks. And for the sake of comparison, we pitted it against the Samsung Galaxy Note which is (or at least was) the fastest Android smartphone till the One X came along. First benchmark we did was Quadrant, and surprise surprise - the One X was slightly slower than the Note. Just to be sure, we restarted the One X and ran the benchmark again. Same result. Logged it while trying the hardest to remain unfazed, we moved to the next set of benchmarks. Not a surprise that the One X blitzed the charts!

In the real-world usage scenario, the One X feels like any dual core powered smartphone, for the most part. However, most apps load quicker, and games are definitely a smoother experience. But why we raised this question about real life performance is because of some statistics - despite having 1GB of RAM, the task manager clearly shows that the free RAM is never more than 250MB. The background processes, and lots of them for that matter, eat up a whole lot of RAM, which basically brings the One X down to the level of a Motorola Razr or a Galaxy Note, in terms of one aspect of the performance. This even we realized once we had a bunch of apps open in the background, and the UI became perceptibly sluggish. Having said that, you would absolutely love the snappiness while playing games or even loading apps.

When stressed, the rear panel does become a bit warm, particularly when gaming or watching videos, the area around the Beats Audio logo becomes a tad warm. Not uncomfortably so, but that will have an impact on the battery life, and you will feel it on your palm.

Specifications

Platform:                 Android 4.0.3; 

Processor:               Tegra 3 quad core 1.5GHz; 

RAM:                     1GB; 

Display:                  4.7-inch Super IPS LCD2 (1280 x 720 pixels); 

Storage:                  32GB, no memory expansion slot; 

Camera:                 8MP with 1920 x 1080p (1080p) videos; 

Battery:                 1800mAh 


Pros: 

• One word - powerful
• Very good display
• Slim chassis
• Built well, even though it is just plastic
• Looks fantastic

Cons:

• Battery life is disappointing
• A dash of metal would have given it a premium look
• HTC Sense crashes at times