Next to Apple, HTC is my preferred smart device vendor. My previous experience with the smartphone market left me bored and wanting more. HTC’s unique smartphone designs and attention to detail have blown me away. Today, I’m reviewing the HTC Droid Incredible 4G. As some of you know, this smart device is much more compact than your regular Android. How does the HTC Droid Incredible 4G stack up against other smartphones in this competitive market? Keep reading to find out.
Introduction
HTC is widely recognized for providing feature-rich mid-range smartphones at an affordable cost. The Droid Incredible 4G is spot on when it comes to this core concept. Even though this is a much smaller device, you won’t lose any of the features you’d get on a more traditional Android smartphone. Something that stood out to me when using The Droid Incredible 4G was that when I switched between different applications and opened and closed screens, there was very little lag. Additionally, when it comes to call quality, this smartphone delivers. Calls were crystal clear for both parties on the line. The only downside of The Droid Incredible 4G was the battery life. Although it wasn’t terrible, it was not as impressive as other smartphones on the market.
Hardware
Size doesn’t matter when it comes to The Droid Incredible 4G. Compared to other chunky Androids on the market, this smartphone is incredibly small. It measures 122mm x 61mm (4.82in x 2.4in) making it incredibly easy to hold in one hand. When it comes to girth, this smartphone isn’t quite as thin as it measures 11.7 mm thick (0.46in). Many other smartphones on the market are slimmer.
The Droid Incredible 4G’s 4-inch display has a resolution of 540 x 960 pixels, which accounts for its small size. At this size, the resolution is pretty crisp but when you combine it with the display size, you might have to zoom in from time to time to read text. However, watching videos and playing games is still impressive in quality. HTC partnered with the popular Beats By Dre and this smartphone incorporates optimal sounding speakers which I know you’ll love as much as I do.
Under the hood, the Droid Incredible 4G sports a dual-core 1.2Ghz processor and 1GB of RAM. Additionally, HTC packs in 8GB of built-in storage for media and the option slot for a microSD card to upgrade the storage to 32GB. On the bright side, this device runs Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0.3, and the dual-core processor easily supports the HTC Sense 4.0 interface.
The Droid Incredible 4G comes with a 4G LTE 1700 mAh battery. The smartphone lasted approximately five hours while I heavily used Wi-Fi, watched movies and and browsed the Internet. It supports LTE 4G on Verizon’s LTE network. This is great if you live in an LTE enabled region as you’ll ble to take full advantage of impressive data speeds.
The Droid Incredible 4G comes with a suitable rear-facing 8 megapixel camera, especially for such an inexpensive smartphone. It offers a variety of features including HDR, panorama pictures and built-in Instagram inspired filters. The camera is very responsive and can take photos in low light as well as sunshine. You can even set the camera to auto capture photos when smiles are detected!
If you love capturing video while out and about in your neighborhood, you’ll love the HD 1920 x 1080 capabilities. The smartphone comes fully equipped with a Movie Editor program that is pretty amazing. There is the option to capture video in slow motion but it takes up a lot of space on your device. The front-facing camera offers very low resolution.
Software
As I mentioned above, The Droid Incredible comes with Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4.0) with HTC Sense 4. HTC Sense 4 is an overlay on top of the standard operating system which results in a very personalized feel. The overall experience is responsive, interactive and intuitive.
When you first boot up your new Droid Incredible, you’ll be greeted by a setup wizard that will instruct you to: set your default language, configure Verizon’s backup assistant plus service, setup email accounts and enable Google account. Next, you’ll configure your location based services and lastly, you’ll have the option to view tutorial videos.
The Droid Incredible 4G comes with the following applications: Let’s Golf 3 HD, Real Racing 2, Amazon Kindle, Amazon MP3, Slacker Radio and Slingbox. The games are merely shell apps that weigh in at less than 1 MB. If you wish to download the full versions, it will cost you 600 MB worth of data.
Body/Design
The design elements of The HTC Droid Incredible 4G are classic HTC. Flip the phone over and you’ll find angular shaped motifs and a large ribbon area that makes it easy to grip. The 8 megapixel camera is also on the back of the phone that shoots 1080 pixel video with a single LED flash. The front of the smartphone sports a front-facing camera and three touch capacitive buttons: Back, Home, and Application Switching.
PROS: Super LCD Display, plenty of power for daily tasks, solid built quality, fast interface and processor, impressive audio, removeable battery, responsive camera
CONS: Smaller screen, short battery life
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