The HTC One

The Android smart phone marketplace has become extremely crowded as both domestic and foreign manufacturers churn out new devices on what seems to be a daily basis. From a pure supply and demand standpoint, one would think that this would be good for the consumer. However, this has not been the case, especially in regards to HTC’s product line.

HTC has been feeling tremendous pressure from both investors and consumers to rifle out new devices on a constant basis, in order to compete with the likes of Motorola, Samsung, and LG. This rushed production schedule frequently leads to half baked devices (see HTC Evo 3d and HTC Evo View).

HTC hopes to alter this trend with the introduction of the HTC One product line, which debuted about a week ago at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. The HTC One is comprised of the S, V, and the X. The X is the flagship device, and we expect most of our readers to be primarily interested in this device, as it packs a 1.5ghz quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3 processor. The X is one of the first smartphones on the market to come loaded with the Tegra 3 processor. The S is a similar device to the X, except it “only” comes loaded with a 1.5ghz dual-core processor. The V is the weakest device in the lineup, and is basically a rebranded HTC Legend.

The HTC One line is one of the first smarthone series that comes loaded from the get go with Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4.0). However, unlike the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, which comes packed with a stock/root build of ICS, the HTC One line will be equipped with HTC’s Sense 4.0 skin. The Android purist will likely be ticked off by this factor, and might opt to go with the Nexus for this sole reason, but many consumers won’t mind HTC’s slight modification of ICS, as it now frequently improves the usability of the OS for most non-technical oriented users.

However, the choice of product naming for this line provokes some confusion. Why would HTC name all three of the new phones “One” with another letter following it? The One X? One V? One S? Although I may be slightly thrown off by their naming scheme, it is shockingly similar to Motorola’s Droid. Droid? X? 2? 3? 4? X2? RAZR? I guess you can compare the naming schemes, but to me it seems unusual.

HTC had fallen behind in 2011 to Samsung and was not producing many good phones that were big sellers among consumers. With the One, they hope to turn their performance around from last year’s lackluster showing. Hopefully the HTC One line will be able to do just that.

Jay Booshay & Sherwinator

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