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Smart phone, how about a commonsense phone.

Like most people here I love my smart phone, but I still feel there's not a lot of common sense in the design. I'm talking particularly about android which is what I know about.
Battery life.
For me, I don't think the pleasure of owning a slim and light phone, is worth the misery and annoyance of every day having my battery poop out in the evening which is when one needs of the most. The thing that frustrates me, is that a 20 to 25% larger battery would only add about 15 or 20 g to my phone.
Placement of power button.
For me most of the time when I touch my phone, it is lying face up on a table or chair arm, or my lap. Having a power/home button which point upwards, like the Apple or Samsung phones, I find really convenient and easy-to-use. It is particularly useful on tablets as well. It also means, your fingers are instantly near the menu and back button.
Volume control.
Okay this suggestion is a bit out there, but I don't think it would be a bad idea to have a capacitive strip along the side or top of the phone, facing the front, to give instant volume control. YouTube particularly is always a different volumes and I find fiddling with the side volume controls, or drop-down menus just not exactly user-friendly.
Internal memory.
How much memory do you need? Answer = however much you want, probably a lot and very reasonably priced with the option to use your own microSD card. The fixed amount of memory in some phones, in my view is a straight off a moneymaking scam. What's more I can't even buy the amount of memory that I want usually. The Moto G comes in an 8 and 16 gig model I know it's a budget phone, but I'm used to 70 gigs thank you very much.
Removable battery.
I like having a removable battery, I love the idea that in a crisis or and extreme busyness I could just slap another battery in and keep going. But also I know that lithium batteries have a limited lifespan. And I don't want the worry of a future large expense of the battery fails.
Getting rid of hard buttons, in favour of in app menus.
I find it more ergonomic to use capacitive buttons down at the bottom of the phone than reaching up to the top corners, because that's where my fingers are. I'm talking to you HTC.
Full power phone with a smaller screen size.
Large screens a great for web browsing and films. But I've downsized to 4.3 inch screen because as a phone fanatic I find it more ergonomic when doing a lot of texting and other stuff. There is no full power or full featured android phone in this screen size. I really wish there was.
Conclusion.
I would really appreciate it, if the phone companies would focus on features and phone design that really care for the consumer, with particular attention to ergonomics, based around how our hands are designed, so we don't have to constantly reach all round the phone, giving ourselves RSI in the process. Instead of going for style and slickness and trying to score points against other manufacturers by shaving off millimetres. There is only one manufacturer which comes close to giving me most of the things I want, that is hardly consumer heaven. I know it's a fairly undeveloped market, but I wish things would hurry up and anyone could get whatever phone they wanted with whatever features they wanted.

+1 Battery, many of these reasons are why I use my S2 more than my OneX.

sandm4n said:
+1 Battery, many of these reasons are why I use my S2 more than my OneX.
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Hi, I've just upgraded from an S2 to an S4 mini. Had the extra power battery pack in the S2 and rooted, absolute dream phone. Actually the only reason I'm upgrading, is that I had call quality issues. It's a bit depressing watching the battery tick on my new phone. Actually side-by-side the S2 looks more impressive with its extra screen width. I think the S2 is definitely a Hall of Famer. Actually my friend has also got a one X, and the lack of battery power drives him nuts.

What do you think of the A9?

I think it's got a cute camera, but all around it just... sucks. The battery is even worse than my Nexus 5, and the phone is just ugly, especially in the front, in my opinion.

Actually I like the design much better than the M9, not too worried about the battery, and it seems HTC has finally overcome it's greatest flaw in its camera.

Wish it has a dual SIM function (it's important in SE Asia and developing countries) and waterproof.
Otherwise, it's pretty nice.

I just can't believe they are still plastering a fugly logo on the front taking up valuable screen real-estate. I'll never buy another HTC as long as they keep doing that. At the very least they got rid of the "hardware" buttons... except then they replaced it with a larger hardware button copying samsung and apple. The waste of space is just terrible. Nexus 6 has slightly more than half an inch in top/bottom bezeling combined while these things look like they are rocking 1.5 inches or more!
Not to mention it's looks like a sad copy attempt at newer samsung/iphone styles - hardly unique at all. I don't think the copy-cat ploy is going to work for the third guy doing it. I'd bet money that this is yet another flop.
http://www.xda-developers.com/the-a9-is-not-the-hero-htc-needs-nor-the-one-it-deserves/

Xenosis said:
I just can't believe they are still plastering a fugly logo on the front taking up valuable screen real-estate. I'll never buy another HTC as long as they keep doing that. At the very least they got rid of the "hardware" buttons... except then they replaced it with a larger hardware button copying samsung and apple. The waste of space is just terrible. Nexus 6 has slightly more than half an inch in top/bottom bezeling combined while these things look like they are rocking 1.5 inches or more!
Not to mention it's looks like a sad copy attempt at newer samsung/iphone styles - hardly unique at all. I don't think the copy-cat ploy is going to work for the third guy doing it. I'd bet money that this is yet another flop.
http://www.xda-developers.com/the-a9-is-not-the-hero-htc-needs-nor-the-one-it-deserves/
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I don't think the design is necessarily a bad thing. It may be emulating Apple, but it's still metal and it will appeal to quite a number of people, if not for the design then for the build quality alone. With that being said, the battery is most likely gonna drag the phone down, unless they can do what the Moto G is doing with their battery, which by the way is larger than the A9.
Also, I hope there are capacitative back and recent apps buttons to complement the physical home button. Otherwise, the home button kinda becomes redundant, even with a fingerprint scanner, because you have the full set of controls on the screen right above the home button.

Using HTC 8 years now but couldn't find new model for me. Like the design but inside phone is not what you expecting from phones these days.
Just to hang for time that HTC makes serious phone I switched to OnePlus 2.

HTC A9
Very bad design, I think they need to change thier concept designer and CEO then they try to find another inspiration like One M7 & 8 and I think they will not be able to do that until they think out of Apple hater Box

bennaye said:
I don't think the design is necessarily a bad thing. It may be emulating Apple, but it's still metal and it will appeal to quite a number of people, if not for the design then for the build quality alone. With that being said, the battery is most likely gonna drag the phone down, unless they can do what the Moto G is doing with their battery, which by the way is larger than the A9.
Also, I hope there are capacitive back and recent apps buttons to complement the physical home button. Otherwise, the home button kinda becomes redundant, even with a fingerprint scanner, because you have the full set of controls on the screen right above the home button.
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Bad? nah. Sad? I think so. Who needs more of the same thing? It's because they are failing that they decided to copy what they thought would be a safe bet. Personally I'm not even too bothered by the small battery as I pretty much always keep my phones around 50% and up as wherever I am there is usually a place to charge them. Fast charging will make that even more feasible. (Probably their logic)
In my opinion, the fingerprint scanner should be on the back of every phone, like many are already doing, not the front. Or even on the side makes more sense. It should be in a place that is easy to access with only one hand. The bottom of the front of the phone makes it so you have to support it with the other hand while swiping to do it comfortably.
My point is that any capacitive/hardware buttons that can be done in software are redundant and they are especially atrocious when taking up screen real estate. When done in software, the screen can be 1/3 inch to 1/2 inch larger.
When I got my One m7 way back, I thought it was awesome and compared to what was out there, it was. That is until other phones came out that were the same size but had smaller bezels, didn't waste space with a giant logo and capacitive buttons. A clear successor in design IMO.
Maybe it's just me but since everyone can do nice specs, a decision on a phone comes down to smaller things and for me, screen size/quality is one of the most important. The way the front of the phone looks is important, and how well utilized the space is is important. HTC has always done a horrible job utilizing space well so far as I've seen.

I hate it. The design is fine but why? Don't copy Apple just to get a few new users to switch. Stick with the M8 style design with some differences. Bezeless? The specs are not that great. They even removed boomsound wtf. (unless it is considered a mid range phone).
They need to spend some money and get ultra specs. They need a 4k screen, ultra boomsound speakers that are really loud with a pop out speaker like the old HTC Surround while keeping it a thin phone, Snapdragon 820 with 2 gh and 3-4 gigs of ram, a 25 ultra pixel rear camera with Nikon DLSR sensors to bring the ultimate in picture taking and making it the best camera phone ever even better than some stand alones, 6 ultra pixel front facing cam, 3500 MaH battery. Now if they did that, I'd buy that in a heart beat or are these features too unrealistic?
HTC needs to realize people care about what is written on the specs sheet next to the phone in a phone store. People see low numbers (even though the processor may optimize it to make the low numbers feel like higer for example battery MaH) they will go to another phone that has higher numbers on the specs sheet.

I just really hope they change their mind about their design philosophy to me its not a good change, but I applaud the hardware and the fact they have marshmellow running on it already

MsEvyLynch said:
I hate it. The design is fine but why? Don't copy Apple just to get a few new users to switch. Stick with the M8 style design with some differences. Bezeless? The specs are not that great. They even removed boomsound wtf. (unless it is considered a mid range phone).
They need to spend some money and get ultra specs. They need a 4k screen, ultra boomsound speakers that are really loud with a pop out speaker like the old HTC Surround while keeping it a thin phone, Snapdragon 820 with 2 gh and 3-4 gigs of ram, a 25 ultra pixel rear camera with Nikon DLSR sensors to bring the ultimate in picture taking and making it the best camera phone ever even better than some stand alones, 6 ultra pixel front facing cam, 3500 MaH battery. Now if they did that, I'd buy that in a heart beat or are these features too unrealistic?
HTC needs to realize people care about what is written on the specs sheet next to the phone in a phone store. People see low numbers (even though the processor may optimize it to make the low numbers feel like higer for example battery MaH) they will go to another phone that has higher numbers on the specs sheet.
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I don't agree with you on this, HTC hasn't copied from Apple. But it is other way round.

This is the design that HTC has pioneered and continued to evolve. There is a reason why iPhones and Samsung devices now look like they do, because HTC has a superior design. They always seem to fall short when it comes to specs and marketing.

Xenosis said:
My point is that any capacitive/hardware buttons that can be done in software are redundant and they are especially atrocious when taking up screen real estate. When done in software, the screen can be 1/3 inch to 1/2 inch larger.
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My point was that since HTC already went with a physical home button at the front which doubles as a fingerprint scanner, they might as well include the other capacitive buttons. Having just one button on the front seems kinda pointless. But I do agree that the fingerprint sensor should be on the side or on the back.

MsEvyLynch said:
I hate it. The design is fine but why? Don't copy Apple just to get a few new users to switch. Stick with the M8 style design with some differences. Bezeless? The specs are not that great. They even removed boomsound wtf. (unless it is considered a mid range phone).
They need to spend some money and get ultra specs. They need a 4k screen, ultra boomsound speakers that are really loud with a pop out speaker like the old HTC Surround while keeping it a thin phone, Snapdragon 820 with 2 gh and 3-4 gigs of ram, a 25 ultra pixel rear camera with Nikon DLSR sensors to bring the ultimate in picture taking and making it the best camera phone ever even better than some stand alones, 6 ultra pixel front facing cam, 3500 MaH battery. Now if they did that, I'd buy that in a heart beat or are these features too unrealistic?
HTC needs to realize people care about what is written on the specs sheet next to the phone in a phone store. People see low numbers (even though the processor may optimize it to make the low numbers feel like higer for example battery MaH) they will go to another phone that has higher numbers on the specs sheet.
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Dude, first of all, anything that has to do with Nikon sucks. Second of all, complaining like that just makes you look bad.

herzig.grant said:
Dude, first of all, anything that has to do with Nikon sucks. Second of all, complaining like that just makes you look bad.
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I'm not complaining, I'm just stating what HTC needs to do to get back where they need to be. Going this route is just making it worse for them.

Honestly I think it is a dumb a** phone and it seems like HTC is in self destruct mode

MsEvyLynch said:
I'm not complaining, I'm just stating what HTC needs to do to get back where they need to be. Going this route is just making it worse for them.
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Yeah you have a point.

I've used HTC phones basically for almost every upgrade I had. I found their build and quality to always be top notch. What I liked about HTC is that you can almost always unlock the bootloader and go the custom rom route and the boomsound speakers. The One A9 ditched everything to try to get more people to like HTC. What I want is a HTC phone with top notch specs 5.1-5.5" screen, I could care less about finger print scanning but sure whynot, a nice shooter with OIS and a competitive price point and I think they should be able to get back. Sense skin on the HTC is what makes the experience unique.

nice especially the design though I'm not impressed with its built and other stuff. sticking with the N5 ndysf

Best thing about HTC these days is still Sense interface. Stock android, Samsung etc...OS/look/feel is garbage. I remember when I first got the Nexus, the one with the led trackball..years ago. I almost dumped that thing in 1 day until I found the ability to get an updated Rom with better apps/design and look/feel of the phone. HTC was a saving grace. Get rid of Blinkfeed, keep the clean/polished apps of Sense and interface...and put some real serious hardware in the phone.
Only good thing about this is going to be marshmellow/developers and the ability to have all carriers supported and unlocking out of the box in the US. Otherwise, from the forums, you can see how support of the M9 and later variants have decreased over the years.
Don't know. Maybe sell the M9 and try the A9...I don't do much with my phone, and the little I do, I really need a better polished interface that Apple/MS have done well for years versus the Android.
Shoot, been playing with Candy 5 on my M9 which is pretty close to Marshmellow and standard Android, what a piece of garbage interface/apps they still produce Google....pretty pathetic considering.
Unfortunately, I'm on Verizon for the next year...likely jump ship in 14 months and go back to something like ATT/Cricket and universal/GSM phones. Good thing my wife/kids have iPhones that will work on any network already. Just need to dump my VZW M9 and move on with my life...gheez. The mobile/cell phone business is really a joke with many manufacturers, such a cluster these days and so many options, most Android.

I wish I knew this before buying the HTC U Ultra (Owner review)

Preface: I am posting this here because I think it will be buried otherwise, and I want it to reach as many people as possible, since personally I wish I knew all of this before buying it.
…And kind reminder: If you feel you are an HTC combatant, please click the Back button and save yourself, and probably myself, from getting aggravated.
This review was prompted because I feel like swimming in a sea of superficial “reviews” online, which are mostly advertisements rather than real reviews, and a lot of peculiarities are unearthed only after the device is used for a sufficiently lengthy period of time.
The HTC U Ultra, in my humble opinion, is a double-edged sword (one of the edges is pointed towards the owner, sadly).
The screen is spacious at 5.7” and even though the phone is very large it can be managed in one hand, if you make a concerted effort. The overall size is exacerbated by the 2nd screen on top, which is reasonably useful, i.e. not utterly pointless.
The screen is a very good IPS-variety screen, with moderate brightness (visible enough in bright daylight). Note that the Oreo update, I believe, did considerably increase the maximum brightness, which could be very useful when the need comes, but absolutely not recommended for long-term use because of the borderline insufficient battery capacity. At least, the option to blast out the brightness in a pinch is there.
Performance is overall very good to great, games play well, day-to-day internetting, newsfeeding, facebooking, vibering (or whatever messaging app floats your boat) is great, and so is the multitasking.
The sound from the bundled headphones is outstanding (in combination with the proprietary HTC USonic EQ shenanigans), provided you like deep sub-bass and high brilliance without muffling the vocals (as I do). The sound is definitely V-shaped. The downsides of the headphones are that (a) they don’t have volume buttons, which, given the size of the phone and the inherent difficulty related to getting it out of the pocket to increase or decrease the volume, is moderately frustrating, (b) they are of the USB-C variety, which means you can’t simply plug them into most other phones or HiFi devices, and means that (c) you can’t charge your phone and use the headphones simultaneously, which, however, I wouldn’t do, since I would like the battery to have as longer life as possible, given the difficulty of replacing it (1 – the phone is a glass sandwich which means I can’t just pull the battery out and slap a new one in; 2 – HTC service centers, at least where I live, are few and far between, and 3 – the availability of spare batteries and the costs related to replacing the battery leave a lot to be desired). A negative too is that there is no USB-C to mini-jack adapter in the box, which means you have to buy one, which is easier said than done - a lot of those being sold do not work with the HTC U Ultra (unless you use apps such as Sound About or tinker with the OS) and the original HTC adapter is very hard to buy anyway, most places listing it as out-of-stock. Let’s not forget that routinely plugging cables into the USB-C connector on the phone (one for charging, another for USB-C headphones) will surely shorten the already-not-that-great durability of the said USB-C connector on the phone (and again the glass sandwich which makes it hard to replace said USB-C connector comes to mind). Also, here in Bulgaria people are not buying phones every year and the probability of me being at a place where someone could lend me their USB-C charger to top up my battery midday or mid-party are close to nil, so I have to carry my USB-C cable too.
The battery is not for power users. At 3000 mAh it is not well-suited to the power requirements of that huge and very high resolution screen (2560x1440 + 160x1040, that’s a lot of pixels). Overall, I get 3.5-4.5 hours of screen-on time from a full charge over one day, with some gaming and camera use. If you don’t use the stock camera (the phone automatically maxes out the screen brightness in the stock camera app, and you cannot turn it down, very dumb idea), don’t play games, and use the phone only on WiFi and not on 3G/4G, probably 5 to maximum 6 hours of screen-on time would be possible.
The digitizer of the phone uses snap-to-grid which cannot be switched off which is in effect when the finger is moving slowly. I tried very very hard to figure out the purpose of this seemingly dumb idea, and couldn’t find any sensible reasons for it, and also could not find any other phone with that function. I wonder why... The result is that some games, which require very precise finger movement, are much harder to play on the HTC U Ultra than on any other phone I have tried (granted I have not tried any other HTC phone).
The body of the phone is pointless, a.k.a. pretty. (To me it’s not even that pretty, apart from the logo-less fully black front glass, which I adore. But I digress.) That possibly resulted in the less-than-needed battery capacity and the fact that the phone seems extremely fragile. There is no wireless charging (which I personally don’t need) as an excuse for the glass back. HTC couldn’t even manage to make the sandwich seamless, you can definitely feel ridges where the glass meets the metal, and this even makes the phone uncomfortable to hold for prolonged periods of time. The saving grace (ironic as it may be) is that the hard-plastic case provided in the box makes the phone much more comfortable to hold and much less slippery, whilst also possibly protecting the glass back from shattering when dinged. This hard-plastic case almost entirely defeats any and all prettiness goals there may have been, so why not just make it out of that material, at that increased thickness, and then you could even cram in that much-needed larger battery… Oh, right, every other maker’s phones are made of glass too; prettiness above utility (certainly not my thing).
The second screen has some useful perks, such as having a “widget” of most used contacts or most used apps (then why have a dock too, hmm…), you can pick up the phone and the second screen will activate so you can glance at the time, battery charge, etc., you can activate the flashlight or control your music app from it. Also, and something that I particularly like, incoming notifications pop up on it, which means they don’t pop up over what you are currently doing. Yay!
There are problems with the fingerprint scanner (On Nougat, at least, have not used it since the Oreo update). Sometimes it just refuses to do any scanning but still activates the screen when touched. You are then required to enter your PIN to unlock the phone and then the scanner would work again as if nothing ever happened.
The vibration motor does not vibrate, it buzzes instead. I’m not attempting a pun or a joke, it is indeed a buzz. This feels super cheap, even compared to my 5 year old LG Optimus G Pro (great haptic feedback!). I thought it was a fault of my unit initially. Then I spoke to other owners of Ultras. Thankfully, I got used to it. That does not mean I don’t dislike it anymore.
The screen is not calibrated to sRGB standard but something much wider in terms of color gamut (allegedly DCI-P3, I don’t have instruments to test, or maybe and most probably they just wanted it to be “like Samsung”…). This cannot be corrected anywhere in the OS (you can correct the white point, though, which is good). If you like eye-popping colors you’re in luck, and conversely, if you like more natural colors – you’re certainly out of luck. The reds, especially, are rather eye-watering. On the other hand, the screen has very high clarity with no appreciable over-sharpening, rather high brightness (after Oreo update), low minimum brightness thus can easily be used in pitch black environments, and very little color inversion when viewed at angles (e.g. when showing your friends your awesome photos and videos). Of course, as any IPS screen, it is the brightness which rapidly drops when the phone is tilted, but the picture does not become yellowish or purplish, or grey instead of black. Which is very good.
The sound from the rather inaptly named BoomSound speakers is anything but Boom. The Xiaomi Redmi 4X (~ EUR 100) or the Huawei P8 Lite (2015) easily trounce it in terms of sound quality (especially bass). The sound is also rather imbalanced, most of it coming from the bottom firing speaker (which is also very easy to inadvertently cover and mute whilst holding the phone horizontally). At least it is rather loud, can create a sense of spaciousness when held horizontally and overall it is not “bad” like on many other phones I’ve heard. What is not good at all, however, is that it has an undefeatable volume ramp-up curve, which means that any sound is produced with the volume being gradually increased in the beginning, omitting the initial attack. For songs, such as for example Brain Stew by Green Day, this could be rather hilarious (or to me, rather aggravating). Unsurprisingly then, there is no attack from most notification sounds. So, the good thing is the phone’s notifications could never startle you which means you won’t get a heart-attack if you forgot to reduce your notification volume. Yay… I guess…? Nah, this is just plain dumb and awful.
I wish HTC engineers knew what “centering” means. Then the capacitive buttons wouldn’t have been in the places where I least expect them to be during my day-to-day use of the phone. They are not in the middle of the chin centrally, they are not in the middle of the chin vertically, they are just simply not in the middle of anything. I thought I’d easily get used to that. I was wrong. Their sensitivity zones are also barely extending beyond their graphical symbols. Thus, I have to depress them with my entire thumbs to make sure I’ll catch them. Sneaky bastards. Even turning on the constant backlighting of the buttons does not help as much as I thought it would.
The capacitive scanner/homebutton is also a double-edged sword – easy to use when you want to, but also very easy to accidentally touch and activate when you don’t want to – especially during heated gaming this stinks a lot.
The camera may not be obliterating any DxOMarks any time soon, but to me it is really really good. For one, the wide aperture, combined with the OIS, means you get good night and indoor shots, which I sorely desire. It is fast to snap a picture, it can be activated with a double-click of the power button, it shoots great and reasonably stable 4K video, and even more stable FullHD video if you can sacrifice the clarity of 4K. Great sound recording too! (for the videos) Overall, the camera experience feels “flagship”. Also, given that the phone is with a Snapdragon 821, Google’s ported cameras work pretty well (mind you, there are bugs, sometimes the apps just close, sometimes they don’t produce the intended results, if any at all). When using Google’s ported camera apps the HDR photography results are quite phenomenal (at least to me) and even a lot better than the stock camera app (which is very good to start with) especially for high-contrast and night-time/indoor shots. Also, portraits come out pretty stunning (provided the app doesn’t crash, of course, but that’s not a fault of the phone).
A caveat is that both the front and back cameras of the phone are very prone to flares. It certainly looks like the image is being reflected by something inside (the lenses or the sensor assembly, I have no idea which exactly) and then this reflection gets picked up by the sensor. For instance, at night when shooting shops’ neon signs, I can easily see the vertically flipped ghost flares of those signs. I, personally, am not overly bothered and find those flares more interesting than troublesome, though. Some surely might not.
All in all, it is the high-quality spacious screen (side note: a 5,8” 18.5:9 screen has ~5 cm2 smaller area than a 16:9 5.7” screen, not counting the 2nd screen on the Ultra too), the awesome headphone sound, the great camera quality and experience that make this phone worth the ~ EUR 275, provided you can live with its shortcomings, which are quite a few in my view. You’d be really hard pressed (I’m pretty sure it is impossible but maybe the ZTE Axon 7 could do the trick) to find such a screen, such sound or especially such a camera on any other phone retailing for ~ EUR 300 brand new. At its original price I’d never buy it, though.
But, if you want off-the-charger longevity, a screen with realistic colors, really good speaker sound, durable body and good ergonomics, this is certainly not your phone, even at its current price.
To me it is quite the bipolar experience – sometimes it overjoys me with its sound or camera chops, sometimes it makes me want to smash it against the wall for its absurdly stupid quirks (Which I believe someone thought were “good design ideas”. No, they are not good at all.)
So it is quite the paradoxical one – it can be both extremely good value and extremely bad value, depending on what you want. Hopefully my personal observations can help you make your own well-informed choice.
Love it or hate it. I don’t see any middle ground.

Glad to see another bulgarian with htc u ultra. I thought that i am alone. Reading the title i expected another rant against htc but in fact the review is very good and completely confirms what i observed for the 5 months with this phone. I am not fan of games and the good screen, headphone sound quality and camera are very important for me so i am quite happy with this phone. I am not so heavy user so battery lasts between 1 and 3 days (usually 2) and i also have power bank with me supporting quick charge so battery life is not a problem for me. Generally i am quite happy with the phone at that price but definitely would not pay the initial price which was over 500 eur. Regarding the type c to 3.5mm adapter - i bought original one from here and it is working very good:
http://www.citytel.bg/adapter-htc-from-3-5-mm-to-usb-type-c-dc-m321

Great review, I agree with most of yours notes. I just wanted to add, IMO - currently there is no better phone for the price it goes these days.

Agree with some fancts, bottom line is at the current price, you cant get anything better.

The Speaker of this phone is pure cancer. My old Galaxy s6 and my business(forced) Iphone SE were way better. I'm not even able to hear Music while cooking etc. IT just fu*** the ears. This is without a doubt the worst phone I've ever bought. I really should have bought the honor 7x

I am a HTC Combatant and die hard, but your review is clear and very honest. Thumb Up! All the negative point you gave really need to be reviewed and improved by HTC. I'm facing the same issues. Overall I like the phone for my everyday use..
Thanks. This honest review will definitely help

FatManYelling said:
The Speaker of this phone is pure cancer. My old Galaxy s6 and my business(forced) Iphone SE were way better. I'm not even able to hear Music while cooking etc. IT just fu*** the ears. This is without a doubt the worst phone I've ever bought. I really should have bought the honor 7x
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I had an Honor 8 for six months. It was awful. Just didn't like it. Camera, interface, sound... The U Ultra is a far superior phone for a similar price.

You Sir should do phone reviews. very detailed, objective and honest review!
Thank you!

Hello, I own a Moto G4 Plus and I'm going to replace it very soon. Your review helped very much, as I can't decide between a HTC U Ultra and a Moto G6 Plus, as they both retail for the exact same price currently, at least here, in Romania. On one hand, the U Ultra is closer quality to a flagship, has a nice screen, good processor (maybe a bit old, I'll admit it) and a very good camera, at least when compared to competitors from the same year. On the other hand, the G6 Plus has near stock Android, treble support, a very easy to unlock bootloader, and still has a nice screen and decent camera and processor. I really cannot decide between those, as I am looking at the U Ultra's shortcomings as potential deal breakers. What would be your recommendations? Thanks!

For me its no brain picking the right phone.I would allways buy older flagship instead of similar placed midranger.
Yeah Ultra have some bad things battery is short-ish but all other things are beter.Build quality,sound on headphones is awesome,phone is fast no lags,slowdownds or anything like that.Camera is good and screen is ok for me.
But ur the one who needs to pick.
Only thing questionable now is Android Pie.

Thank you for this review. I ordered HTC U Ultra yesterday. Price was pretty cool - 200€. Can't wait to test it!

Tell us about your daily driver

So as the title suggests, let's hear about your current daily driver, how do you like it so far? What kinds of features do you appreciate most? What do you think is missing?
Also, let's talk about your least favorite devices as an added hono bonus.
Might as well get it started, my current daily driver is an LG V30, H933 to be exact. It's a very well rounded phone, and for up to 90% of the tasks, it's managed to replace my laptop. Battery life is more than enough for me, even with brightness set on auto and screen resolution on 2880 x 1440, the cameras are real nice, and the wide angle shooter is just addictive to mess with, great stock camera app too. Audio quality is superb, I just love the HiFi quad DAC and even the speaker is well above average imho. Finally as expected from any flagship, performance is great, and while activating battery saver mode does introduce a difference, for most tasks you still don't notice much lag.
I'm gonna say I appreciate the ip68 rating and the ruggedness of the phone, it's already taken a small drop and survived no problem, but that was enough motivation for me to get a UAG plasma case. I also put a screen protector on it initially, but dust kept accumulating around the edges and eventually making its way under the protector I got fed up and removed it. As long as you have a decent case that has raised lips both the front and rear glass should be fine, but now I never keep the phone in the same pocket as coin or keys.
Also it turns out that in case you damage the glass, it's quite cheap to replace (15 dollars from what I've heard).
As for phones I never see myself using as daily drivers, the latest iPhones certainly make the list. On top of almost complete lack of customizability and control over the phone, lackluster stock camera apps for (a photographer like me at least), and ridiculous pricing, Apple's desperation to sell their phones (or rather force them down your throat) is becoming pathetic. The 8 and 8 plus are rather fragile, and the iPhone X, while admittedly better, isn't better by much, and the worst part is that if you crack the glass on any of these phones, it'll cost so much to replace if you don't have apple care, you might as well just get a new device, which, in all likelihood, is exactly what Apple wants you to do. Between that, and introducing OS updates that intentionally throttle the performance of their older phones, whatever little appeal Apple's devices had, is now imho gone.
Another phone I would avoid is the Motorola moto z2 force/play, the plastic screen not only feels cheap, but is also very prone to scratches. The moto G5s plus is a better budget device than the play of you ask me.

Please remove the SQUEEZE feature and the GIANT CHIN(from the leaks) in the Pixel 3

I am not a direct Pixel user, but one of my friends has the Pixel 2. Right off the top, I will mention that the camera and the stereo speakers are phenomenal. But everything else, not so much. The only thing I would like to suggest here is that Google removes the 'Squeeze' feature. It is so darn gimmicky. He doesn't even use it. Also removing that might reduce the cost by a bit and may also help in getting thinner bezels. I can only guess that removing the squeeze might allow them to curve the display on the edges to get a more Infinity Edge like display, which most, if not all of us like better than some gimmicky squeeze feature. Also, the main purpose of the notch(rumored on the Pixel 3) is defeated if there is a huge chin on the bottom. Instead, they can put a little notch on the bottom and add a stereo speaker there. That will be a different design rather than the same iPhone X copy like designs we see everywhere. Those will more 2018 like qualities, the year of revolutionary designs(Find X, Nex).
We are progressing towards a world of seamless operation. Bezels are being removed so that we actually forget about the smartphone itself and get immersed in the experience. Wireless charging, the same thing, we don't have to act physically with the chordage to charge our phones, charging simply happens when we put it away. Water resistance, we don't have to take care of our smartphones separately in a rain or underwater. They work with us seamlessly under water. Even face unlock so that we don't even have to touch the mobile to unlock it, besides being "Safer". Such should be the idea with the squeeze feature. It WILL die in the next couple of years, if not this year itself.
My point here is, we have to act physically with the squeeze feature. That just pushes us in the opposite direction of the progress in technology we are making. We have to physically act with the smartphone, in a world where we are having to interact lesser and lesser with our smartphone and everything is becoming seamless. I can bet that the Squeeze feature WILL be a flop if Google continues to pursue it in vain. They should instead do some cost-cutting so that the device Pixel 3 becomes more available to the public and definitely double down on their quality control. Hope a Google launches a customer friendly phone in 2018 rather than an Android-friendly phone. Will be waiting eagerly to buy this one myself upgrading from the OnePlus 5, if it's actually worth the money.

sreejit.2011 said:
I am not a direct Pixel user, but one of my friends has the Pixel 2. Right off the top, I will mention that the camera and the stereo speakers are phenomenal. But everything else, not so much. The only thing I would like to suggest here is that Google removes the 'Squeeze' feature. It is so darn gimmicky. He doesn't even use it. Also removing that might reduce the cost by a bit and may also help in getting thinner bezels. I can only guess that removing the squeeze might allow them to curve the display on the edges to get a more Infinity Edge like display, which most, if not all of us like better than some gimmicky squeeze feature. Also, the main purpose of the notch(rumored on the Pixel 3) is defeated if there is a huge chin on the bottom. Instead, they can put a little notch on the bottom and add a stereo speaker there. That will be a different design rather than the same iPhone X copy like designs we see everywhere. Those will more 2018 like qualities, the year of revolutionary designs(Find X, Nex).
We are progressing towards a world of seamless operation. Bezels are being removed so that we actually forget about the smartphone itself and get immersed in the experience. Wireless charging, the same thing, we don't have to act physically with the chordage to charge our phones, charging simply happens when we put it away. Water resistance, we don't have to take care of our smartphones separately in a rain or underwater. They work with us seamlessly under water. Even face unlock so that we don't even have to touch the mobile to unlock it, besides being "Safer". Such should be the idea with the squeeze feature. It WILL die in the next couple of years, if not this year itself.
My point here is, we have to act physically with the squeeze feature. That just pushes us in the opposite direction of the progress in technology we are making. We have to physically act with the smartphone, in a world where we are having to interact lesser and lesser with our smartphone and everything is becoming seamless. I can bet that the Squeeze feature WILL be a flop if Google continues to pursue it in vain. They should instead do some cost-cutting so that the device Pixel 3 becomes more available to the public and definitely double down on their quality control. Hope a Google launches a customer friendly phone in 2018 rather than an Android-friendly phone. Will be waiting eagerly to buy this one myself upgrading from the OnePlus 5, if it's actually worth the money.
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Since you are not a Pixel user how can you speak about features like that? I have a google home so have disabled voice match on my pixel. I use the squeeze function all the time and find it one of the benefits of my phone. As with all features ymmv but I would be disappointed if squeeze was removed.
Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

Welcome to XDA... enjoy the forum. Too early to worry!

Many people absolutely do not want a Samsung-style curved edge display. If that is what you want, why not just buy a Samsung?
Personally I don't use the squeeze feature, but only because Google artificially limit it to just being a virtual Bixby Button and I don't find Google Assistant useful to me. But if I did use Assistant I'd probably prefer that to reciting some hotword or long-pressing the home button, so overall I'd still count it a pro to have it. And there are plenty of other things you could do with it that would be useful to different people, but you need to root to do that. So letting people choose what to do with it would be a better solution (a couple of pressure sensors will add very little to the cost of the device, by the way).
I also don't understand what you mean by the word "seamless", which is a vague enough word that different people could use it to mean completely different things (and you seem to use it for unrelated things yourself). But you seem to have an aversion to touching a phone to control it, but touch remains the primary interaction for typing messages, launching and controlling apps, selecting focus targets in photos, whatever, so I don't see any big advantage in removing options (and using voice control for all of that would make public spaces a nightmare).
I also don't see the sense in your argument that not touching a fingerprint scanner is some huge advantage: I can use my FP scanner to unlock my phone when I start to pull it from my pocket, so any face recognition system is slower and more intrusive to my operation. Sure, add face recognition in addition if you want, but more options are better than choosing what you like and forcing everyone to use that (or buy from someone else).

While I agree that the bezels are too big (top/bottom) some bezel is needed...I would rather have a little bezel with front-firing speakers than the alternative (no bezel except for camera and bottom-firing speakers). I also do not like the curved displays. They make it near impossible to get a good screen protector on. Gorilla Glass 5 reviews are not good when it comes to durability (scratches) and I'd rather wear the oleophobic coating off of a screen protector (that can be replaced) than the actual screen. I may be in the minority but my ideal phone design is a thin, simple rectangle, with flat screen and small bezels (for speakers). Performance (screen, battery life, speed, sound) are a lot more important to me than curved this and that, glass back, etc.

Not a Pixel 2 user, hasn't used Pixel 2 features, advises on what people who actively use Pixel 2's features shouldn't be using.
Wow.
I could link you back to your home in the S9 forum, but as someone who has never used the S9 I'm waiting for them to remove the curved edges before I'll use the S9 forum.

I actually use the squeeze feature/ active edge every day for Google Assistant or to mute calls. Those that don't use active edge can disable it. And it doesn't need to be removed for thinner bezels. I'd address more of your points but most don't even make sense. Seems like you aren't aware that we've seen leaks for the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL. The smaller Pixel 3 is supposed to have slimmer bezels than the Pixel 2 and no notch.
Sent from my ONEPLUS A3000 using Tapatalk

I use the squeeze feature more and more frequently now. Just yesterday out running I made a quick note to myself by just squeezing the phone and talking into it. Inuse it for memos, appointments, reminders. etc
The more you use it the less gimmicky it becomes and the more useful you realise it is. Pick up the phone, squeeze it, talk, whats hard about that?

One use for the squeeze feature that is never advertised is how you can snooze your alarm with it. Think about it, when you want to sleep for 10 more minutes, why open your eyes to slide your finger across a screen when you can simply squeeze the phone with your eyes closed?
But yes, smaller bezels (no notch and no curved displays) is what we all look forward to with the pixel 3. Third try is the charm.