Tag Archives: HTC Sense

HTC One M9

Leave a reply

HTC’s 2015 flagship which continues on the HTC One M8 design, featuring a premium unibody metal design, giving off a stylish look.

Most notable for the appearance is the Front-facing stereo speakers which was a standout feature of the phone. Offering clear audio from the phone, It was like a little concert in your pocket. That was an awesome design choice and HTC have managed to blend the speaker design into the phone.
Powering the phone is the Snapdragon 810 processor with 3GB of RAM, originally running Android 5, later updates introduced Android 7. 32Gb of storage is included, and it can be expanded using a microSD card.

The M9 had some issues with getting hot under the collar. That shiny, beautiful metal body had a downside: it sometimes turned into a portable oven. Now, don’t get me wrong, a bit of warmth is okay, but overheating can be a deal-breaker, especially if the phone heats up when you’re not doing anything too taxing. I hate to think how hot this phone gets when under full use with a plastic case attached.

Launcher + Notifications

HTC Sense is the default user interface for the handset, You’ve got this neat home screen with customizable widgets and themes. The themes can give your phone a whole new look and feel, and if you’re into making your phone truly yours, this is a big win.
HTC Sense Home is supposed to be smart and intuitive, changing your apps based on your location and habits. It’s like your phone’s playing mind reader. It’s a cool concept, but it doesn’t always nail it. Sometimes, you just want your apps right where you put ’em, right? And having to search for them kind of defeats the purpose of it.

The lock screen with a row of shortcut icons at the bottom. YOu can swipe up from these icons to go directly to them when the phone is unlocked, allowing for easy access to the app. You can also customize the layout and which app icons appear on this screen.

Blinkfeed also makes an appearance, but I have mixed feelings about it. It’s a news aggregation feature right on your home screen. It’s nice to have all that info at your fingertips, but sometimes, I just want a clean slate when I unlock my phone. Maybe it’s my inner control freak, but I want to decide when and where I consume my news. But hey, it’s there for those who want to stay on top of things and it can be disabled.

The notification drop down, which also provided access to phone functions

List of apps that are installed on the handset.

Shows any recently open apps that you can quickly switch back to, or apps that are currently running in the background. You can choose from a card or a grid view layout as seen below. Screen pinning can also be enabled from here.

Lastly some shots of the initial setup application

Oh look, a system update for Android 7. I guess this handset hasn’t been used for a few years.

Applications

HTC had created their own set of applications for common phone functions and preinstalled a few third-party apps.

Music: A fully featured music player is included which can playback your standard music formats. There is also an option to playback from a DLNA server, provided you are connected to a Wi-Fi network. This had no problems playing back from a WDMycloud NAS, but album art was missing and it would play the same track again, there was no sequential playback unless you manually skipped to the next track.
There is also a trippy visualizer, but this only works for locally stored music files, DLNA tracks have no visualizer.
Still, HTC went to a lot of effort for their music player, though you can’t change the pitch like in the LG G4’s music player.

Kid Mode: HTC’s answer to Windows Phones’s Kid’s corner. Here you can pin specific apps to restrict access to the phone.

News Republic: A news aggregation app that used to come pre-installed on some Android devices, including some HTC smartphones. It was developed by a company called News Republic, which aimed to provide users with a comprehensive and personalized news reading experience.

HTC Print Studio: HTC Print Studio was to enable users to create physical prints of photos and images directly from their HTC device, kinda like Snapfish. In addition to standard photo prints, HTC Print Studio sometimes offered the option to order various print products, such as photo books, greeting cards, calendars, and posters.

HTC Help: This app provides troubleshooting and hardware testing to see if there are any faults with the device. You can also view the power usage of individual apps. There are also How-to guides on how to use various features of the phone.

HTC Dot View: This is a special case that’s attached to the phone that adds a protective front cover with a bunch of holes. By using the dot view app, you can customize the standby screen and patterns, which would show the current time and if there are any notifications.

Peel Smart Remote: The M9 has a built-in IR transmitter that allows the phone to control a TV or Set-top Box, similar to what the LG G4 had featured.

Photo Editor: basic editing tools such as cropping, rotating, and straightening images to adjust their composition, plus a variety of filters and effects. You can also change the brightness and colour balance.

Polaris Office 5: View and open documents and spreadsheets on the phone itself. This also has compatibility with Microsoft Office formats.

Zoe Video Editor: Zoe is a video editor and social media app created by HTC, the smartphone manufacturer. It’s designed to allow users to easily create and share short video clips with various visual effects and music. Zoe was initially introduced as a feature on some HTC smartphones and later became a standalone app available for download on various Android devices.
You can edit and enhance video clips with a range of editing tools. Users can trim, splice, and arrange clips to create a cohesive video. The app offers various visual effects and filters that can be applied to video clips. These effects can change the look and mood of the video, adding creative and artistic touches.

Voice Recorder: Simple voice recorder app that supports recording in a variety of audio formats from AMR to ACC. Most phones should support both of these formats.

HTC Power To Give: Some sort of distributed computing app that downloads small workloads to process. Very similar to Folding@Home for the PS3 and PC.

Scribble: A scrapbook-like app that allows for drawing and freehand text. You can drag with your finger, or a stylus (Which isn’t included with the phone) for more accuracy. Samsung and LG have included similar apps in their Android handsets for sharing created images.

Emergency Alerts: Displays any emergency alerts, not much to say since we hardly get any natural emergencies over here. I would imagine this would notify of any disasters or riots of peace nearby.

FM Radio: Simple FM radio that supports auto-tuning and RDS. Radio stations can be saved by tapping on the heart button for easy access.

Gallery: Where photos and videos captured by the camera reside, here you can easily edit or share, or organize into an album.

Flashlight: Turns on the LED flashlight, with a nice skeuomorphic torch on screen,

Clock: View different timezones, set an alarm or 5, and access the stopwatch or a lap/countdown timer.

Car: Enabled Car mode which allows earlier access to phone functions when you are driving

File Manager: Browse and access files on both the internal memory or the SD card.

Weather: Shots of the weather app, which uses the Accuweather API

Widgets

A few custom widgets come with the phone, many are linked to the bundled apps.

  • The music widget will either show the currently playing track, or any recently played tracks.
  • The Peel app can also be set as a widget, allowing for quick control without having to open the app.
  • People widgets let you set quick access contacts to easily call or send a message, similar to how contacts could be pinned to the Windows Phone home screen.
  • The Sense widgets will show you frequently or recently used apps that the phone will learn over time
  • A weather clock widget that come with a variety of clock faces, tapping on it will open the app to access the stopwatch or set an alarm. A variant of the widget will display multiple clocks for different time zones.
  • Data dashboard lets you quickly enable and disable certain phone features like the wifi, this is redundant since the notification bar can be used for this

Settings

A view of the main settings screen

HTC Connect lets you share content via DLNA or screen mirroring. A variety of protocols are supported including Apple’s Airplay, Chromecast, Miracast and Blackfire.

HTC Mini+ was a compact device that linked to the phone for easier access, kind of like a smartwatch. It’s marketed as an easy way to get access to the core features of the phone without having to use the actual handset, like if you wish to make a quick phone call or send a text message.

The personalize section lets you change the appearance of the phone and the notifications that it sounds. Themes can be downloaded and applied to the phone which changes the sound, wallpaper and menu fonts. Like the LG G4, the bottom navigation bar can be customized with additional icons being added in addition to the Home, Back and Tasks buttons.

The phone comes with a variety of gestures, in response to the Galaxy S4. You can enable and disable specific gestures that can be used to trigger phone functions. Glove mode increases the sensitivity of the screen to allow it to pick up input from users wearing gloves.

Lastly a look of the themes and wallpapers that shipped with the phone.

This can happen if you charge the phone whilst connected to a USB 2.0 port. The device needs more than 500mA for optimized charging.

Conclusion

Overall, the HTC One M9 was a looker, no doubt about it. It had that premium feel, it oozed style, and it was like holding a piece of art in your hand. But it did have some quirks, like the heat issue and the button placement. Nevertheless, it was a solid design for its time. HTC knew how to make a phone that was both functional and easy on the eyes.

Shutting down the One M9, done by holding the power/lock button.

HTC One X

Leave a reply

No, not the Xbox One X

The HTC One X was released in 2012 and was a flagship smartphone from HTC at that time. With its sleek and stylish design, with a polycarbonate unibody and a 4.7-inch Super LCD2 display, The phone is light and easy to hold, and the display is large and clear even in outdoor environments.

The HTC One X is powered by a quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor and 1GB of RAM. It runs Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, which is upgradable to Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean. The phone offers smooth and snappy performance for its time, with fast app loading times and seamless multitasking. The phone was powered by a quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor clocked at 1.5 GHz, which was a high-end processor at the time of its release as most smartphones only featured dual-core processors. It also had 1GB of RAM to help with multitasking, a respectable amount for the time. The Tegra 3 processor featured a fifth battery-saver core that kicked in when the phone was idle or performing low-intensity tasks to save power. When more processing power was needed, the other four cores would activate to provide smooth performance without any intervention from the user.

The second page of the home screen, along with the task switcher that shows recently opened apps, and lets you quickly switch between apps.

HTC Sense

The HTC Sense UI (User Interface) is a custom skin or overlay that HTC uses on top of the Android operating system on its smartphones. It is designed to provide a unique and personalized user experience for HTC users, and it includes features and enhancements that are not available on stock Android.

The app menu will show all installed apps on the phone, this can be customized to show apps that have been recently opened, in alphabetical order or in a custom order. The grid size can also be customized. Also the notification section, tapping on the grid button on the top right will switch to the quick access section where common features can be toggled on or off like the WiFi or Bluetooth, and the phones ringtone profile.

There is also Blinkfeed which collates updates from supported social media apps used on your phone (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram) and news updated from your preferred networks. I can’t help but feel its design was inspired by the Windows Phone design language.

The lockscreen which is unlocked by sliding upwards, doing so raises the clock upwards which is very similar to the Windows Phone lock-screen behavior. Different lockscreens can also be set according to your preference,

  • Productivity – Shows information from email and calendar apps
  • Photo Album – Shows images in your photo albums
  • Music – Shows and lets you play music in your library directly from the lock screen
  • Or it can be configured to display a specific widget, like the weather

The main settings screen which divides into different sections (Wireless & Networks), Personal, Phone)

Beats audio, which was a selling feature of the phone, This was before Beats was acquired by Apple. It’s supposed to be an audio equalizer that has a specific preset, though I can’t say it makes much of a difference.

Media Link: The Media Link setting, that acts as a screensharing utility that requires the Media Link device which plugs into your TV’s HDMI input. I guess this was a predecessor to Miracast that is featured on all modern phones. The bundled tutorial showcases the ability to play movies and videos from the phone, ideal for displaying videos recorded from the camera, but I can’t imagine using it to cast Netflix (Some people actually do this, just get a streaming stick/box for fucks sake) Also remember most, if not all TV’s from this period were not ‘smart’ in that they could receive video over a network.

Multitasking is possible where the media will play on the big screen whilst you open another app, at least until the handset overheats. Still, it shows this was a very versatile smartphone.

Some additional screens, including the default wallpapers HTC shipped with the phone

HTC Applications

As part of the HTC sense user interface, HTC also provided their own apps for common functions of the phone. These all conform to the same design language, achieving a consistent design across the pre-installed apps.

Messages: Your standard SMS app which can also handle MMS messages, both being presented in a threaded view.

Car: for use when driving, present an easily accessible interface for using the GPS navigation and music/radio apps which are powered by Tunein. The BBC podcasts appear to work but are a few months out of date, the others no longer function. The menu can be customized to add apps that are not there by default.

Mail: HTC’s own email client that had support for Gmail, Yahoo! Mail and Hotmail (Outlook). Other email providers can be used by setting the correct POP3/IMAP configuration. Microsoft Exchange can also be used.

Clock: For setting the time or different timezones, of which HTC has configured a few for you. Here you can also set multiple alarms that can be a standalone or recurring. A stopwatch and a timer are also provided which mimics an old alarm clock.

Stocks: Check your stocks of which the information is delivered from Yahoo Finance.

Calendar: Typical calendar app to set reminders and events. This will sync with the calender of your email provided if one is supported, otherwise this can be set to sync with HTC Sync manager, an application for your desktop PC.. Default view can be either Day, Week or Month.

Camera: The handset features an 8-megapixel camera with autofocus and LED flash. The camera is capable of capturing high-quality images and 1080p video, with good colour accuracy and sharpness. It also has a front-facing camera for video calls and selfies.

Notes: Supports both text notes and handwriting/freehand notes. Also gives access to the voice recorder feature.

Low battery notification, which gives you a shortcut to the battery-use application that shows apps that have consumed the most power

Preinstalled Apps

EA Gamebox: Gives us links to EA’s mobile games that you could download to your device including Dead Space, The Game of Life, Tiger Wilds, FIFA12 and Need for Speed Hot Pursuit.

7digital: Popular music store, an alternative to the iTunes or AmazonMP3 for purchasing music. This also serves as a music player as I can play both download music off the store and any local files you transfer from a PC.

SoundHound: Music discovery tool that can detect and identify music playing my listing and sending a sample. Useful to identify a track that is unknown.

Tunein Radio: Radio player directory, used to discover and listen to internet radio stations

Dropbox: Cloud file storage app that can sync with multiple devices.

Polaris Office: Mobile office productivity suite to open documents, this can auto integrate with both Dropbox and SkyDrive (Now Onedrive) or open files off USB storage.

Standard social media apps are also included like Twitter and Facebook

Widgets

Like other Android handsets, HTC have included a few default widgets that can be placed on the Sense UI, most of these will link to existing apps on the phone and incorporate some of their functionality. You can have up to 8 different panels containing widgets or app icon shortcuts fro easy access. Switching between panels is as easy as swiping left or right.

The contacts widget lets you place your top 9 contacts, of which can be pinned for quick access. Kind of like a speed dial of sorts but you can customize what to do when you select them, either open the contact card or directly call or message the contact instead.

The weather and clock widget which will show the weather according to your phone’s location, when pressed will just take you to the clock app.

The music widget lets you quickly play the last played track and also lets you pause and skip tracks directly. Pressing on it will open the HTC music app.

Conclusion

Overall, the HTC One X was a great smartphone for its time, offering excellent performance, a good camera, and solid battery life. However, it is now outdated and may not be suitable for users who require the latest features and technology. Trying to use it as a daily driver 10 years later will be a challenge, whilst you can still connect and sync a Google account, the amount of Play store apps that can be installed is very low, with Twitter, Facebook and even Google’s own Youtube apps no longer being supported. Oddly Youtube Music and Kids can still be installed.

The browser side isn’t much better, the latest Google Chrome dates from 2015, whilst Dolphin Browser 12.2.9 is the latest supported. You have to remember a lot of modern Android apps are not ARM64, and his handset is only 32bit.