HTC One S

Man... I really want a new phone. My HTC Legend is s pretty good phone, I kinda feel lucky I took a chance on it as my first smartphone because it has met my expectations very well. When I bought it I was looking for a phone that could play my videos, music and had a smaller form factor than my PSP.

But the HTC Legend is an old phone, even old when I bought it (used)... With low processing power and very little internal storage, running Android 2.1.... It can't do as much as I'd like it to-- as in gaming. I have a few games that I really like on it, Robo Defence free, Air Control, Trap, and Winds of Steel but between a few games and some apps like Swype, there isn't any space left. And I can't install or move apps to my micro SD card.

I've been in a quandary since my 2nd trip to China in November 2011. I can't decide between the Samsung Galaxy S2 - Rogers or Bell variants-- or the HTC Evo 3D, and now the HTC One S.

A good camera is one of my new requirements for a new phone, and the HTC One S has some great camera features. I consider it vital for a camera to have a fast startup time from when the phone is in sleep mode to taking a picture. I missed a bunch of photo opportunities on my last trips because my cameras were so slow to start up. You never know when a great picture scene will pop up.

What kills the HTC One S for me is that it only has 16 GB of internal storage with no micro SD card slot. About 9 GB of actual usable space, which isn't enough. I looked at my SD storage on my HTC Legend, I've got a 16GB micro SD card in there-- 14 GB of usable space and I've almost filled it. A sizable chunk of that is taken up with TV shows and photos. And of course my music. I love having my music on my phone it's so convenient. And considering the photo/video recording abilities of the HTC One S, owners would need a lot of space for those files because of the burst mode feature that takes a lot of pictures. Sure you don't have to save every one but in real-world situations you'll need a lot of space so you can decide what to discard at your convenience.

The 9 GB of storage is a fatal flaw in the HTC One S and One X (we in Canada are only getting the 16GB One X version, not the 32 GB international version) HTC is trying to make up for it by giving us Dropbox accounts that have a lot of storage online, but that is really a poor substitute that wouldn't work for me, I have no data plan, I'm on prepaid... But even if I did have data, it still wouldn't work for my needs, I don't think. I know that after formatting, the actual space of flash/hard drive storage is less than what is listed, but the HTC One S must use more space for OS and apps, making the actual user space of the so-called "16GB" of internal storage 5 GB less than on a 16GB micro SD card. There's a big difference between 14 GB and 9 GB.

It's such a shame that these One series are so fundamentally flawed. And don't even get me started on their micro-SIM slot... While not as bad as the removal of micro SD, why are phones going to micro-SIM standard anyway? Seems like such a pain. I might be able to live with it and cut down my SIM card if I had to, but the small 9GB storage space is a deal breaker.


later
don