Everything You Need to Know About the New HTC One

Announced on February 19th, the HTC One is the successor to the HTC One X, HTC's former flagship device that was met with much fanfare, but was ultimately a commercial failure.

Faced with stiff competition from Apple's iPhone 5 and Samsung's Galaxy S III, HTC made significant strides in developing the HTC One. Codenamed M7, early rumors and leaks before its official announcement revealed it would feature Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean, Sense 5 (HTC's own UI skin), a quad-core processor, 2 GBs of RAM, a 4.7" 1080p display, and a 13 megapixel camera that was later revealed to be false.

Previous SlideNext Slide

At its official unveiling, HTC said the One will be released in 80 countries with 185 carriers beginning in March 2013. This is the largest smartphone launch in HTC's history.

Carriers in the U.S. will include AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Sprint, and selected regional carriers.

Hardware

• Featuring an aluminum uni-body design with a curved back, HTC stated it takes roughly 200 minutes to machine the back for each phone.

Previous SlideNext Slide

• The front is dominated by its 4.7" 1080p Super LCD 3 display with 468ppi covered with Corning Gorilla Glass 3. HTC has implemented SoLux technology in its display for better-enhanced picture quality. The display is also laminated to reduce the air gap between display. This is the highest pixels-per-inch on any smartphone display.

Image Credit wonderhowto.com

• The HTC One runs a quad-core 1.7 GHz Krait 300 with an Adreno 320 GPU and a Qualcomm APQ8064T Snapdragon 600 chipset – these are the latest chipsets for next-gen smartphones.

• Instead of utilizing a camera comprised of megapixels, HTC takes an alternate route by introducing the UltraPixel—pixels that are twice the size of what is traditionally found in camera sensors. HTC says users will have better quality pictures in a smaller file size as the 1/3 inch backside-illuminated CMOS sensor is able to take in 300% more light. All the bells and whistles are featured HTC's new camera including: optical image stabilization, enhanced 360 panorama, HDR mode for photos/videos, and full 60 fps 1080p video recording. HTC says their new ImageChip 2 technology will allow users to capture anything in HDR.

Image Credit wonderhowto.com

• Front-facing camera shoots at 1080p and has 88-degree wide-angle lens.

• Smart Flash is an additional camera feature where the camera will be able to automatically pick from five different flash settings depending on the distance of the object photographed.

• Dual speakers are placed on the top and bottom on the front of the HTC One to deliver rich sound with deep bass. HTC is calls this feature BOOMSOUND.

Software

• HTC Sense 5 is featured on the HTC One. Previous versions of Sense UI were criticized as being too bloated, but this is no longer the case. Sense 5 has a simplified UI that resembles Windows Phone's tile UI. It is relatively bloatware-free to address criticisms of HTC's past Android phones. Instead of HTC's iconic HTC flip clock and weather widget, the new UI now features a simplified minimalist weather widget.

• The app tray has also been revamped. The newly-designed app tray now allows for making folders, is resizable, shows more or less apps, and is highly customizable.

• Blink Feed makes its first appearance on the HTC One as a content aggregator. Making use of RSS feeds and other content hubs totaling 1,500 sources, users will be able to add their favorite news sites and quickly glance at them when on the go. It is relevant infomation at a glance, hence the name "Blink Feed".

• Zoe Camera is HTC's new "Event Engine" where users can record short videos (similar to Vine app) and upload to HTC's own video sharing site Zoe Share, as well as to Facebook.

For more tech specs or release information visit the HTC One SoftModder forum!

Images courtesy of Ars Technica