HTC One Max review - Wired.co.uk

HTC One Max

Nate Lanxon

7/10

Wired rating

• Wired

  Sleek aluminium design, huge Full HD screen, Sense 5.5, good battery

• Tired

  Not as powerful as main rivals, fingerprint sensor isn't accurate enough

• Price

The HTC One has rightfully been one of the most popular and acclaimed phones of the year, and with a mini version of the mobile unveiled in July, it was surely only a matter of time until HTC supersized the device to make sure it had all bases covers. Enter the HTC One max, a "phablet"-sized phone that boasts top specs and a similar sleek design as its tinier siblings.

The One Max will be available in the UK from mid-October. No pricing details are yet available, but expect it to be expensive (£500+).

Design

Like the HTC One and the HTC One mini before it, the HTC One Max has to be one of the most beautiful Android devices ever produced. It's round back is crafted almost entirely from aluminium, although it has the same plastic rim that distinguishes the HTC One mini from the One. An extremely slim bezel rings the outer edges of the screen, which stretches nearly the full width of the phone, and along the top are two silver slivers with speaker grills.

HTC One Max

Nate Lanxon

All that metal means the device isn't super-light unsurprisingly, and the most obvious comparison to draw is with Samsung's recently announced Galaxy Note 3. The One Max with its 5.9-inch screen is bigger than the Note 3, which only has 5.7 inches of display, but it's also bulkier from angles and at 217g, weighs nearly 50g more than its Samsung rival.

Its full dimensions measure up to 165x83x10.3mm, so you'll need flexible fingers to keep hold of the One Max. Of course, unlike the Note 3, it also doesn't have a stylus, meaning that even if you're perfectly happy holding your phablet with one hand while using the other to navigate with a little plastic stick, you might struggle to type on the One Max.

One much longed-for addition to the HTC One by its fans is a microSD card slot, which has finally rocked up on this larger version of the phone, and can be found under the removable back panel. You can now expand the storage by up to 64GB, meaning there'll be plenty of room for you to stash your big media files.

Given the expanse of screen at your disposal -- ideal for movie-watching -- you'll be glad of this. The 5.9-inch 1080p display offers a pixel density of 349 ppi, which isn't the sharpest screen out there, but will still keep your photos and videos looking plenty crisp. Colours are more natural than on the Galaxy Note 3's Super Amoled screen, which has a tendency towards oversaturation.

Fingerprint scanner

One of the most notable features of the HTC One Max that sets it aside from other HTC phones -- and all Android phones for that matter -- is the inclusion of a fingerprint scanner, which can be used instead of a PIN number or password to unlock the phone. Up to three different fingers can be linked to the scanner and stored in the phone's memory. If the user chooses, these can each be linked to an app that can then be launched immediately from the lock screen.

The fingerprint scanner is built into the back of the phone and is activated by sliding your finger in a vertical downwards motion. In our testing, it achieved mixed results. One of the recorded fingerprints was consistently recognised more frequently than the others and even then the swipe motion had to be very carefully performed. It worked best when the phone was being held straight on in one hand.

As the sensor is located on the rear of the phone, directly below the camera lens, it was sometimes difficult to be sure you were swiping the correct element. The slight hesitation between swiping and the phone activating -- and frequently rejecting -- your fingerprint generally made the whole process of picking the device up to do something less seamless than it really should be.

Sadly for HTC, the scanner on the One Max doesn't even really compare in terms of accuracy and ease of use with the home button sensor on the iPhone 5s. It's perhaps ill-advised to take this tech on its first outing attached to the vast rear plate of such a big phone, where fingers are going to struggle to find it, never mind use it properly.

HTC One Max

Nate Lanxon

Features, Sense 5.5 and processor

Unlike Samsung, which replicated the design but not the specs of its Galaxy S4 in the form of the S4 Mini and Galaxy Mega, HTC has not chosen to exploit the brand of its flagship device by using its name and design but lowering the specs -- the HTC One Max is every bit as exciting on the inside as its namesake.

Under the hood you'll find an identical 1.7GHz quad-core Snapdragon 600 processor to the one inside the HTC One, which is accompanied by 2GB of RAM. It offers a decent amount of power and showed no signs of struggle in our tests, but it does pale in comparison to its rivals.

On the AnTuTu benchmark test, the One Max scored 26,314. A month or so ago and that score would have been very impressive, but we've recently reviewed a bunch of seriously powerful Android phones, led by the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 with 35,936, which have set a new precedent. With a 2.3GHz quad-core processor and 3GB of RAM, it's not surprising that the Note 3 has really raised the bar, but it's in good company, with the likes of the Xperia Z Ultra and Z1 producing similar results. As such, the One Max really is trailing in their wake.

Like the Note 3, the One Max will ship running the latest version of Android -- 4.3 Jelly Bean -- although this is likely to become imminently outdated. Unlike the Note, it doesn't offer a stylus, or any of the purpose-built stylus-optimised features, which if you're trying to decide between the two, might just sway your opinion in favour of Samsung.

However, the HTC One Max is in fact the first HTC device to run Sense 5.5, a refined version of the phone manufacturer's Android skin. Sense 5.5 sees no significant redesign, but HTC has removed some of the restrictions on its in-built features that transform them from frustrating to genuinely useful. Blinkfeed, for example, which was once an immovable element of Sense is now completely deletable if you'd rather not have it occupy one of your homescreens. If you choose to keep it though, you'll be rewarded with being able to pull in more content than ever, including Google+ and Instagram feeds.

The One Max comes in two different storage capacities -- 16GB and 32GB -- but with expandable memory and an additional 50GB of free Google Drive storage being offered with the phone, it's unlikely you'll ever struggle for room with this phone.

As you'd hope with a juice-sapping screen of this size, the One Max has a very powerful 3,3000mAh battery inside it. This is a step up from the Xperia Z Ultra and the Note 3, which only pack 3,050mAh and 3,200mAh batteries respectively. As with all smartphones these days, it's best to presume you'll have to charge the One Max everyday, but also be willing for it to take you by surprise. After well over a day of gaming, watching HD video, downloading bits and bobs and other usage, the One Max was still kicking along happily in our tests. If battery is important to you, this is about the best you can hope for from an Android phablet.

If that's still not enough, you'll get an extra few hours of power by investing in the HTC Power Flip case, which incorporates a 1,150mAh battery, as well as shielding your phones from accidental bruising.

HTC One Max test photo

Katie Collins

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Camera

There's nothing on the One Max we haven't seen before from HTC in the camera department. With 4 "Ultrapixels", instead of multiple megapixels, the camera has a large F2.0 aperture and wide-angle 28mm lens to let in lots of light. As a result, pictures are crisp and detailed, with very realistic, natural colours. The camera does struggle in low light however, barely exposing the collection of mugs in our test shot (see gallery).

There are plenty of fun modes to play with, including a panorama mode, HDR and Zoe Camera -- which records a three-second video clip and allows you to choose between the 20 frames to find the best photo. You can now upload pictures taken by Zoe as normal, rather than having to use HTC's software, as you did on previous HTC phones. Also new on the One Max is Dual Shot, which allows you to take a forward-facing photo and normal photo simultaneously, placing one within another. We've seen this feature before on the Galaxy S4 and are still struggling to see the appeal of it.

The camera also shoots video at 1080p and is accompanied by a forward-facing 2.1-megapixel snapper for selfies and video calls.

Conclusion

If you've been waiting for HTC to supersize its superb flagship device, you won't be disappointed with the One Max. It doesn't quite match its rivals in terms of raw processing power, but a decent camera, some pleasing software tweaks, great screen and a stunning physical design might just make up for it.