At 4.6-inches the new HTC One X is among the biggest new iPhone competitors, but are Android 4 and Sense 4 enough to make it one of the best?
Android Central has a complete HTC One X review up for your reading pleasure, along with a thorough Sense 4 walkthrough showing us everything that's new and exciting about what just might be, frankly the most exciting new phone from HTC since the Nexus One (notice the similarity in branding?)
Phil Nickinson is pretty much enamored with the HTC One X, loving the display, camera, power, and Sense 4 interface, even if the non-removable battery, lack of a microSD card and giant 4.7-inch screen might not be to everyone's taste.
The leader of the next-generation HTC One series of smartphones has been a breeze to use. Android 4.0 has been improved upon with HTC Sense 4 while still retaining the overall look, feel and function of Ice Cream Sandwich, which in and of itself has an excellent user experience. The camera is a high point, Beats Audio makes music sound better, and you get a bunch of online storage thrown in for free. HTC easily has a winner in the One X.
User swappable batteries and expandable memory used to be two of the things Android users said they preferred over the sealed iPhone appliance model, so it's interesting to see HTC lose those as a differentiator. They've joined the massive screen size brigade, however, something Apple probably won't be doing any time soon.
Vendor specific interfaces are the subject of a lot of disagreement in the Android community, with some disliking them intensely compared to the stock Google experience, and others finding them far more accessible and user friendly. So how did Sense 4 rate?
This latest version of Sense actually is a step backward (or forward, depending on who you ask) in that HTC has ditched the completely custom launcher, instead going with a more traditional (and customizable) scheme, more akin to what's in stock Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. Some features native to ICS have been allowed to shine through, and others have been enhanced. And many of the customizations we've come to know and love in previous versions remain.
Samsung will no doubt be releasing a Galaxy S III at some point, and now that Google owns Motorola, Droid might once again do and do well. And of course, Apple will almost certainly be bringing a new iPhone to the table again this fall. Things change fast in the Android universe and Apple can change the game within the span of a single keynote.
But for right now, kudos to HTC for getting back in the game. They probably won't match the sheer sales numbers of the iPhone 4S but they don't have to — their competition right now is other Android manufacturers. And for the first time in a while, they look like a serious contender.
Check out the video below, hop on over to Android Central for tons more HTC One X coverage, and then come back and tell us what you think. How does the HTC One X stack up to the iPhone 4S?
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