htc news, reviews & info

HTC confirms multitasking tweaks for One X

By Jason Yip on May 17, 2012

There’s been a lot of noise at xda-developers about the changes HTC made to the multitasking behaviour on the One X compared to the stock ICS rom. Other than the obvious tweaks like the horizontal, card-like arrangement, there’s also memory and task management differences. Users have noticed that their background apps have been terminated too aggressively, and many complained about it. HTC responds saying that the multitasking is operating as intended by HTC and confirms that it is part of the Sense UI. This may be why battery life is extremely impressive on AT&T’s One X. If you don’t like your apps being killed suddenly, you can install custom ROMs after rooting your phone.

AT&T’s One X has a restricted bootloader, HTC responds

By Jason Yip on May 6, 2012

HTC has been one of the companies that unlock their bootloaders on its Android devices for the consumer; however, today XDA-Developers forums and MoDaCo discovered that the AT&T HTC One X variant has a locked bootloader. Upon reaching HTC for comments, it responded with this:

HTC is committed to listening to users and delivering customer satisfaction. Since announcing our commitment to unlockable bootloaders, HTC has worked to enable our customers to unlock the bootloader on more than 45 devices over the past six months. In some cases, however, restrictions prevent certain devices from participating in our bootloader unlocking program. Rest assured, HTC is committed to assisting developers in unlocking bootloaders for HTC devices and we’ll continue to unlock additional devices in the future.”

Although we aren’t exactly sure what the “restrictions” are, we believe that it is one of AT&T’s policies. We don’t know for sure yet, but when more information comes up, we’ll be sure to tell you.

Apple granted a patent for in-call app switching, reloads for patent wars

By Jason Yip on December 21, 2011

After Apple’s win over HTC and starting yet another battle with Samsung, Apple has added another weapon to their arsenal. The company has been granted a patent for a “portable electronic device with graphical user interface supporting application switching”. This basically means a multitasking smartphone. Since this basically covers almost all the smartphones on the market, a device accused of infringement would have to copy almost every nook of the design to be considered stepping on the wrong side of the line. Although that sounds hard, Apple’s lawyers are probably looking high and low for devices that would infringe the patent and help Apple succeed in court.

ITC on Apple’s side: bans sale and import of some HTC phones

By Jason Yip on December 20, 2011

The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) has issued a ruling on Apple Inc.’s side, banning the sale and import of certain HTC phones in the U.S. This ruling reports HTC’s violation of a pair of patents by Apple regarding the formatting of data in otherwise unstructured documents allowing users to interact with them (like phone numbers in emails). The ban is scheduled to be enacted on April 19th, 2012, to give HTC and Google time to address the court’s concerns. HTC could just simply remove the features from its phones to avoid the ban, but that would take away an important ability in their phone.

The ITC did not find HTC violating the other two patents in question, which was related to realtime signal processing. Of course, this battle is far from over and we expect these two (along with almost all the other mobile manufacturers) to continue battling in the courts, instead of the “free-market”.

HTC has responded that they will indeed remove the feature off their phones to avoid banning.

  • BGR

    • HTC Android devices get 5GB Dropbox space for free

    By Robin Eyckmans on October 25, 2011

    HTC Sensation With DropboxHTC delivers their (new) Android phones with a 5GB Dropbox account, according to HTC’s Twitter account. That’s 3GB more than the standard free account. It’s unclear if this update also becomes available for older devices. Dropbox received this year 250 million USD from investors. With this money, Dropbox wants to take over other companies and enter into partnerships with companies like HTC. It’s quite noteworthy that HTC has signed for a partnership with Dropbox, because HTC bought an American company called Dashwire earlier this month. Dashwire also provides cloud services for music, videos and other files, which can be accessed from different devices.

    HTC Explorer is yet another budget friendly Android smartphone

    By Stephen Huot on September 29, 2011

    HTC ExplorerHTC Explorer is HTC’s try at creating a low-end Android phone. Compared to some of the new Android smartphones on the market today, the specs of the HTC Explorer are pretty low, for instance with a 3.2-inch 480 x 320 capacitive touchscreen, 600MHz CPU, 3 megapixel camera and 512MB of storage (extendable through microSD). Currently planned for Europe, Africa, Asia and the Middle East for early October, there’s still no word of a North American release. As for pricing, the HTC Explorer will like cost around €100 EUR.

    T-Mobile’s HTC Amaze 4G pictures leaked, this phone is why we love Android!

    By Mike Bednarsky on September 5, 2011

    HTC Amaze 4GT-Mobile has a hulk-like phone on the way.  Called the HTC Amaze 4G and codenamed “Ruby”, this device puts the smart in smartphone.  A few pictures of the amazing Amaze are leaked for your enjoyment (after the break) and the juicy specs of the device are listed below, courtesy of leaked picture #4.

    • 1.5 GHz dual-core CPU
    • 4.3-inch qHD display
    • 1GB RAM
    • 8MP rear-facing camera
    • 2MP front-facing camera
    • WiFi

    The phone will probably become official very soon.  Until then, enjoy some classic leaks after the break.

    Continue reading >>

    FCC receives a HTC Windows Phone, Mango coming soon?

    By Jason Yip on September 1, 2011

    As we know, phones have to go through FCC before making it through the market. Today, HTC pushed a phone through FCC and wanted to be specific by saying the OS (not usually done): Windows Phone. The document revealed that the handset was tested for GSM 850/1900, which are standard 2G bands at AT&T and T-Mobile, but no WCDMA frequencies. The document also mentioned about a “WiFi hotspot”, which is most likely the confirmed feature on Mango. HTC has not announced any of their mobiles running on Windows mango yet, but this phone may be the first one to come out with it. Since it doesn’t appear to include WCDMA, we won’t be seeing an US launch.

    HTC Jetstream LTE tablet launched on AT&T, costs a whopping $849

    By Stephen Huot on August 31, 2011

    HTC JetstreamPreviously known as the HTC Puccini, AT&T has now officially launched HTC’s latest tablet, now called the HTC Jetstream. The Jetstream has a 10.1-inch WXGA capacitive touchscreen, 1.5GHz Snapdragon dual-core CPU, Android 3.1 and HTC’s Sense UI modification for tablets. Although it’s the first LTE / HSPA+ tablet for AT&T, the price is steep at $699.99 USD on a 2 year contract, or $849 without a contract. If it’s any consolation, you’ll get a $35/month 3GB data plan with the contract, as well as the HTC Scribe digital pen accessory for free.

    AT&T-Bounded HTC Holiday spotted

    By Jason Yip on August 28, 2011

    It seems like AT&T just got another powerful smartphone this coming fall for more business. The HTC Holiday is confirmed real, and will soon launch under AT&T’s LTE market, which definitely helps customers with speed. This gigantic Android 2.3.4 smartphone comes with a 4.5-inch qHD touchpanel, 1.2GHz dual-core processor, 1GB of memory, an 8 megapixel rear camera with flash, 1.3 megapixel front camera, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 3.0 connectivity and four capacitive touch buttons below the huge screen. Coming with it is also HTC Sense 3.0. Engadget predicts that the phone will be launched with the name “Waikiki” if Holiday doesn’t describe the phone well enough.

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