I'm just going to take this opportunity to lodge my obligatory complaint about the insanity of Qualcomm's part numbering "methodology" (if it could really be called such). We have here a "Snapdragon S4" MSM8225 that shares absolutely nothing whatsoever in common with the other "Snapdragon S4" parts, including the maddeningly similarly named MSM8227. Things have never been particularly decipherable in Qualcomm's numbering schema (see: APQ8060 and APQ8060A being completely different architectures, process nodes, etc.), but at least until now you could deduce the process node by the "S#" generation. Now even that modicum of sanity has been hurled out the window.
This will be a huge marketing ploy. I did not know that there were non-krait S4 chips as well. Unsuspecting customers will be tricked by "dual core" and "snapdragon s4" and will be stuck with sub-par performance. Really sad/
IMHO, people who know what a Snapdragon S4 is and what makes it good (the Krait architecture) will likely know to double-check when they check the price of this thing.
It puzzles me why HTC keeps forking phones that are so similar one another. I have the HTC sensation: a phone which has a slightly larger screen, slightly higher resolution and a dual-core Cortex A8 cpu, 768MG of ram ... Yes, Sensation was "high end" in May 2011, but this DesireX seems spec'd lower, and yet so close. Why not keep the Sensation in the product line and give better/faster support (like Jelly bean, Sense 4.0/4.1) instead of making a new phone so similar?
I don't like Apple's one-size-fits-all strategy, but 4~5 well designed products, ranging from small to large screens, should cover the vast majority of customers: no?
You know, there's a certain company that sells only 1 type of phone and is making boatloads of money with it. It's true that you make money with free SW updates, but you make even less money if your products are all "blah", look about the same, and if the phone you released 15 months ago is "better" than the one you are releasing today.
Not to mention cost of support: hoping that my sensation will be supported still a few years down the road, now HTC is "stuck" having to support two nearly identical phones, which happen to be quite similar to many other already around (Rezound, EVO, ...). They should one small size (like the Wildfire, only with enough memory to be usable), a mid range with 3.7" screen, a high end with 4.3" screen and the top of the line with whatever screen size can fit 720p. Update each line every 2 years with more memory, storage. power and maybe higher resolution, and guarantee at least a couple of Android revs.
My Sensation is more powerful than the Desire X, yet I don't know if I'll get Jelly Bean (I am currently on ICS but with Sense 3.6 ... because instead of supporting only Sense 4.0 with ICS, they decided it was better to make a half-ass release of their 4.0 and call it 3.6: more work for them, one more customer lost)
I would have to agree with all of you. As an owner of several htc phones, and knowing others with them as well, I find the overall lack of software support to be a deal breaker for future purchases. I've installed custom roms on all my htc phones (even when I had an htc windows mobile before my androids).
Personally I think 2-3 smartphone models, refreshed yearly, is probably enough for any smartphone company. Focus on quality, polish, and support. As others have said, apple releases 1 phone a year, and they're doing great. The market will certainly sustain more than a single model, but currently it seems to be.
iPhone size 3.5-3.7" no keyboard iPhone size with a slide out keyboard 4.3" size 4.8-5" size (possibly stylus) Blackberry style (half keyboard, half screen)
Isn't that just about the entire smartphone market? And then we have variations of all them with better screens, faster chips, LTE etc.
Seems to me that blackberry style and slide out keyboards seem to be losing popularity, 4.3 could be ditched and people would either buy slightly smaller or slightly larger, and you could just have a 3.7" and 4.8" offering updated yearly with excellent build quality and user interface.
I think these companies just release new devices to get new reviews and hype. The problem is, if they made excellent devices, they'd keep customers and be used as industry benchmarks. Instead they make good enough devices that quickly are forgotten when the next thing comes along. And they change the names so frequently you have no idea how one relates to another.
Eg the Galaxy, Galaxy S/S2/S3, Iphone 2/3/4/4s are pretty easy to figure out.
How about Desire, Desire HD, Desire Z, Desire S, Desire C, Desire X Do you have any idea how they relate to one another, which is better, newer, etc? It's a marketing fail in my books. Either advertise it so well that people know, or name it in a way that's obvious so you don't have to educate people.
I guess what I mean is, although you don't make money with free updates, HTC don't currently have the pulling power they once had that they could guarantee sales of their older hardware, if they could then updating the older phones better would make more sense.
Only Google and Apple seem to be able to get away with it, the rest have to scrabble in a pissing contest month after month to ensure they constantly attract new buyers.
There's no money to be made in free updates though unfortunately :P<< I bet there are quite a few people who are buying phones because of that though. And if the history of your company shows you are not updating your sold phones well, they will not buy a phone from you. And those people also likely influence the purchase decision in the family (since they tend to be better informed). There is a reason Nexus devices are doing pretty good even though they often have shortcomings. Being guaranteed the next few software updates is a selling point.
Why can't it record 720p videos....I have seen its benchmark like nenamark2 and they are on par with mid-range cortex A9 dual cores like galaxy ace 2 or xperia sola...
We’ve updated our terms. By continuing to use the site and/or by logging into your account, you agree to the Site’s updated Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
15 Comments
Back to Article
lowlymarine - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
I'm just going to take this opportunity to lodge my obligatory complaint about the insanity of Qualcomm's part numbering "methodology" (if it could really be called such). We have here a "Snapdragon S4" MSM8225 that shares absolutely nothing whatsoever in common with the other "Snapdragon S4" parts, including the maddeningly similarly named MSM8227. Things have never been particularly decipherable in Qualcomm's numbering schema (see: APQ8060 and APQ8060A being completely different architectures, process nodes, etc.), but at least until now you could deduce the process node by the "S#" generation. Now even that modicum of sanity has been hurled out the window.S_Constantinescu - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
I'm in 100% agreement with you.powerarmour - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
Thrice agreed!dishayu - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
This will be a huge marketing ploy. I did not know that there were non-krait S4 chips as well.Unsuspecting customers will be tricked by "dual core" and "snapdragon s4" and will be stuck with sub-par performance. Really sad/
aegisofrime - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
IMHO, people who know what a Snapdragon S4 is and what makes it good (the Krait architecture) will likely know to double-check when they check the price of this thing.yankeeDDL - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
It puzzles me why HTC keeps forking phones that are so similar one another.I have the HTC sensation: a phone which has a slightly larger screen, slightly higher resolution and a dual-core Cortex A8 cpu, 768MG of ram ...
Yes, Sensation was "high end" in May 2011, but this DesireX seems spec'd lower, and yet so close.
Why not keep the Sensation in the product line and give better/faster support (like Jelly bean, Sense 4.0/4.1) instead of making a new phone so similar?
I don't like Apple's one-size-fits-all strategy, but 4~5 well designed products, ranging from small to large screens, should cover the vast majority of customers: no?
powerarmour - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
There's no money to be made in free updates though unfortunately :PWhy update an old phone to a similar level of performance to a newer one, when you can sell somebody a new phone...
That's basically why I stick to the Google Nexus's (Nexi?)
yankeeDDL - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
You know, there's a certain company that sells only 1 type of phone and is making boatloads of money with it.It's true that you make money with free SW updates, but you make even less money if your products are all "blah", look about the same, and if the phone you released 15 months ago is "better" than the one you are releasing today.
Not to mention cost of support: hoping that my sensation will be supported still a few years down the road, now HTC is "stuck" having to support two nearly identical phones, which happen to be quite similar to many other already around (Rezound, EVO, ...).
They should one small size (like the Wildfire, only with enough memory to be usable), a mid range with 3.7" screen, a high end with 4.3" screen and the top of the line with whatever screen size can fit 720p.
Update each line every 2 years with more memory, storage. power and maybe higher resolution, and guarantee at least a couple of Android revs.
My Sensation is more powerful than the Desire X, yet I don't know if I'll get Jelly Bean (I am currently on ICS but with Sense 3.6 ... because instead of supporting only Sense 4.0 with ICS, they decided it was better to make a half-ass release of their 4.0 and call it 3.6: more work for them, one more customer lost)
andrewaggb - Friday, August 31, 2012 - link
I would have to agree with all of you. As an owner of several htc phones, and knowing others with them as well, I find the overall lack of software support to be a deal breaker for future purchases. I've installed custom roms on all my htc phones (even when I had an htc windows mobile before my androids).Personally I think 2-3 smartphone models, refreshed yearly, is probably enough for any smartphone company. Focus on quality, polish, and support. As others have said, apple releases 1 phone a year, and they're doing great. The market will certainly sustain more than a single model, but currently it seems to be.
iPhone size 3.5-3.7" no keyboard
iPhone size with a slide out keyboard
4.3" size
4.8-5" size (possibly stylus)
Blackberry style (half keyboard, half screen)
Isn't that just about the entire smartphone market? And then we have variations of all them with better screens, faster chips, LTE etc.
Seems to me that blackberry style and slide out keyboards seem to be losing popularity, 4.3 could be ditched and people would either buy slightly smaller or slightly larger, and you could just have a 3.7" and 4.8" offering updated yearly with excellent build quality and user interface.
I think these companies just release new devices to get new reviews and hype. The problem is, if they made excellent devices, they'd keep customers and be used as industry benchmarks. Instead they make good enough devices that quickly are forgotten when the next thing comes along. And they change the names so frequently you have no idea how one relates to another.
Eg the Galaxy, Galaxy S/S2/S3, Iphone 2/3/4/4s are pretty easy to figure out.
How about Desire, Desire HD, Desire Z, Desire S, Desire C, Desire X
Do you have any idea how they relate to one another, which is better, newer, etc? It's a marketing fail in my books. Either advertise it so well that people know, or name it in a way that's obvious so you don't have to educate people.
yankeeDDL - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
AAAHH!!"It's true that you make money with free SW updates"
should read
"It's true that you DON'T make money with free SW updates"
Where's the Edit button when you need it?!?
powerarmour - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
I guess what I mean is, although you don't make money with free updates, HTC don't currently have the pulling power they once had that they could guarantee sales of their older hardware, if they could then updating the older phones better would make more sense.Only Google and Apple seem to be able to get away with it, the rest have to scrabble in a pissing contest month after month to ensure they constantly attract new buyers.
Death666Angel - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
There's no money to be made in free updates though unfortunately :P<< I bet there are quite a few people who are buying phones because of that though. And if the history of your company shows you are not updating your sold phones well, they will not buy a phone from you. And those people also likely influence the purchase decision in the family (since they tend to be better informed). There is a reason Nexus devices are doing pretty good even though they often have shortcomings. Being guaranteed the next few software updates is a selling point.name99 - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
"That's basically why I stick to the Google Nexus's (Nexi?)"If you switched to iOS, you'd have an OS with a built-in dictionary that would tell you the plural of nexus is nexus or nexuses :-)
powerarmour - Thursday, August 30, 2012 - link
Ok clevercogs, you may win a cookie! :Dzaandaruwala - Monday, November 12, 2012 - link
Why can't it record 720p videos....I have seen its benchmark like nenamark2 and they are on par with mid-range cortex A9 dual cores like galaxy ace 2 or xperia sola...so why can't it record 720p videos