Camera
There is only one camera to concern you
here, and it is the 5MP camera at the rear. It comes with HTC’s dedicated
ImageChip/BSI sensor, with f/2.0 aperture and 28mm lens. There is autofocus,
which seems to be fast for photos (not as fast as for videos), but you can tap
to focus if you want something to be noticed with more special attention or when
the phone does not auto-focus (this never happened to us in the tests).
In the camera app, there are the same
features we've seen on other phones with Sense 4.0. That means you have the
ability to take pictures while recording video, and continuous shooting mode,
by holding down your finger. The latter of these two features worked very well,
with photos captured faster that appear in the gallery immediately. Menu
settings, flash, and "mode" are always on the screen, and allow you
to jump to HDR, Panorama or any other preset scenes (landscape, close-up ...
etc.) easily. If you like to do something special to your photos, vintage
effects, sepia, vignette, etc. are still here to help you.
The
colors tend to be washed out.
As for photos, we often find them
interesting, with good low-light performance in HDR mode. Not everything was as
sharp as expected when we were shooting in Auto mode at night, and sometimes
the colors tended to be washed out. But in more ideal conditions (for instance,
a bright room, with static objects), of course, you would be able to make a
satisfying photo.
Regarding video, unfortunately there is no
HD mode, still with WVGA resolution, or 800x480. We recorded some sample clips,
as you will see below, it loses the battle to some 720p rivals with more pixels
(these are the specs for which the One V was the winner), but you can still
record some useful video to share with friends, on YouTube for normal memories,
but with memories that are more important, you would want to use something
else.
Software
Located somewhere beneath the Sense UI is Android
4.0. Therefore, we are not totally inferior in terms of the core software. And
while the company has not confirmed whether Desire X will be Jelly Bean, it is
not excluded – not as the Desire C and the One V, both of which were disqualified
after HTC announced that they did not have enough RAM.
Located
somewhere beneath the Sense UI is Android 4.0.
As for the large quantity of Sense
software, we gave some thoughts about it in our review, but to summarize it, it
is the first clear improvement compared to the previous versions. Rather than
repeating what are liked and disliked as before, we will look at it from the
perspectives of the Desire X. The first thing to mention is that, while the UI
often feels cohesive, and mixing well with the Android-specific features, if
you're familiar with the old Ice Cream Sandwich, Sense can make you slow at
first. That's especially true on the phone like this one where there is
relatively little power of the processors (we will talk in more detail later).
On the other hand, if you are migrating from another version of Android, or the
older version of Sense, then you will definitely feel at home. Those who do not
come from the Android platform will likely find it easier to penetrate the universe's
operating system. The menu options are often located intuitively, and features
such as the lock screen utility help it feel modern.
HTC
Desire X’s apps
There are some simple changes that we love,
such as the mini-weather utility that appears in the schedule to present to you
the weather forecast for each day in the near future, and the 3D-rotating home
screens increase a little modern flavor. As mentioned, these quick shortcuts
from the lock screen would be something to save great time for many people. One
minor shortcoming we found was that the email notification takes longer to
purge if you delete a new mail on another device. You can think many messages have
been sent to the phone and then find out that it is the message that you deleted
approximately 1 hour ago.
One last notable software feature is Beats
audio mode. The partnership between HTC and Dre headphones has taken place for
some time, and it has got the opposite reaction. Even the Desire X has a Beats
logo on the back of it, so we thought it would not only be a rapid test. We
played music, then plugged it into the PC, recorded video with Beats on, and did
the same with this feature off. Our main complain? Beats makes big things. We
would like to know more about what is happening, so we checked the waveform,
and used the spectrum analyzer on the track to see the audio changes in
real-time, both of which can be seen in the following image.
The
waveform of sound produced by Beats
As you can see, at the bottom, you
immediately know when Beats is enabled (the thickest part of the wave) and when
it is not activated. This thickness represents the volume, and many decibels
(about 4 to 5). The above presents a snapshot of signals. The lower line shows
no clear features, while the higher, lighter curve is the line when Beats is on.
It is quite clear that there are large increases around 100Hz and below range
(bass) and 1 kHz (mid-high). This represents a curve that you can introduce to
an EQ multi-band on the stereo system at home if you want to increase the bass.
In conclusion, it increases sound much the same way the other preset equalizers
on the other players. Great if you like it loud.
