HTC heats up smartphone race, looks to redefine photography
Smartphone maker HTC is looking to breathe new life into its fortunes with its latest product. HTC One, a 4.7-inch phone with the best display in the market at 468 pixels per inch, was launched in Sydney on Thursday.
With this phone, HTC has taken a big step away from the megapixel race. The camera is rated at just four megapixels, but HTC says that does not matter because it has a large sensor, bigger than that in some compact cameras. This ensures high picture quality.
HTC One is powered by Android Jelly Bean, running the firm’s custom skin — Sense 5. This version of Sense brings radical improvements to the phone. The most noticeable change is called Blinkfeed.
Building on the features in Windows Phone and BlackBerry 10, HTC Blinkfeed lets users integrate all their social networks, calendar, email accounts and displays these with news updates. It is the default home screen on HTC One.
Another feature of Sense 5 is HTC Zoe, the new gallery app. It captures a short video, letting users choose the best frame and save it as a picture. Users can also remove unwanted objects from the picture easily. Zoe can also make a short movie from your pictures and videos; it adds background music on its own. Other additions include a new music player app that adds new visualisations and pulls lyrics from the web, and Sense TV, an app that doubles as a remote.
The phone will be launched in India in March.
(The reporter was in
