As anticipated, HTC announced the launch of a selfie focused smartphone called Desire Eye to in bet on the selfie smartphone industry. Besides this smartphone, HTC also announced several other devices and sevices at the Wednesday’s Double Exposure event. If you are interested in this camera centric smartphone, here is a quick review on the same.
Camera and Internal Storage
The highlight of the Desire Eye smartphone is its photography capabilities as there are dual 13 MP rear and front cameras that are accompanied with dual LED flash. Also, this handset carries the credits for being the first smartphone with such a massive front facer, but there are swivel camera smartphones such as Oppo N1 and Gionee Elife E7 that come with similar front facers. Also, the rear camera has f/2.0 aperture and 28 mm wide angle lens, whereas the front facer has f/2.2 aperture and 22 mm wide angle lens respectively.
The camera experience is further enhanced with the new HTC Eye Experience that combines many software features. The Face Tracking makes sure that up to four users are focused during video calling, Spice Capture feature allows users to combine the images captured by the rear and front cameras and Crop Me feature lets users to merge the self portrait shots with scenes from the primary camera.
Also, users can simply say ‘smile’ to capture a selfie, whereas saying ‘action’ will debut video conferencing. The HTC Eye Experience will be rolled out to the other existing Desire lineup of smartphones via an OTA update.
The internal storage is 16 GB and it can be further expanded to 128 GB using a micro SD card. This storage capacity is definitely on par with that of the other high end models in the market leaving us with no issues in this regard.
Processor and Battery
The processor used in the camera centric HTC smartphone is a 2.3 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 SoC that is aided by 2 GB of RAM for enhanced multi-tasking capabilities. The chipset is used by several other premium smartphones and it is known for its power packed performance.
Battery capacity is 2,400 mAh and it is rated to render up to 20 hours of talk time and 538 hours of standby time respectively that sounds pretty decent for a top tier model.
Display and Features
There is a 5.2 inch Super LCD 3 display on the Desire Eye with FHD 1080p resolution that translates to a pixel density of 423 pixels per inch. This screen is protected with the scratch resistant Corning Gorilla Glass protection as well.
Fueled by Android 4.4.4 KitKat operating system, the Desire Eye smartphone also comes with front facing BoomSound speakers as in the other HTC smartphones. Also, the device features the IPX7 rating that makes it water resistant.
Comparison
The HTC Desire Eye smartphone will be a competitor to the camera centric smartphones and high-end offerings such as Oppo N1, Gionee Elife E7, Sony Xperia Z3 and others in the market.
Key Specs
| Model | HTC Desire Eye |
| Display | 5.2 inch, FHD |
| Processor | 2.3 GHz Quad Core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 |
| RAM | 2 GB |
| Internal Storage | 16 GB, Expandable up to 128 GB |
| OS | Android 4.4.4 KitKat |
| Camera | 13 MP/ 13 MP |
| Battery | 2,400 mAh |
| Price | Yet to be announced |
What we Like
- Impressive camera aspects
- Capable hardware combination
Price and Conclusion
The HTC Desire Eye with camera centric features is a pretty impressive top tier smartphone that has been launched to cash in on the selfie trend that is booming rapidly. As of now, we do not have any such device with dual LED flash for the front facer that provides a weird look to the device’s front. Otherwise, HTC has done a good job by adding decent hardware to the smartphone making it on par with its competitors in all the segments. Now, the pricing of the device is the one that has to be known and that will definitely have a major impact on the device’s success in the market.
