Most beautiful, highest-quality hardware on the market. You can tell HTC takes a lot of pride in this phone. It's stylized down to the 'Sense' user interface, surely the most impressive UI on any device.
Aside from obvious aesthetic appeal, 'Amaze' is a significant upgrade from the Sensation. HTC addressed most of my gripes w/ Sensation by giving Amaze a hardware camera button, more onboard memory, more RAM & more ghz. Multi-tasking is effortless. Amaze can run a number of memory-intensive programs without as much as hiccup, and does so with style. To put it bluntly, Amaze throws down the gauntlet.
The device also runs on T-Mobile's 42mbps 4G network, provided you live in one of T-Mobile's 4G regions. I do, and the service is no where near as consistent as their 3G service. The highest download speeds I've reached on SpeedTest is 4mbps download. Theoretically, it can reach much faster speeds & some tests on YouTube have reflected as much as 12. I'm less impressed w/T-Mobile's 4G, but that's no fault of HTC's.
As with any device, and impressive as the Amaze is, it comes w/a few disappointments. The ability to shoot in 1080p is a big deal and, as w/the Sensation, the audio recording quality is unacceptable. You can hear a sample by searching YouTube for (HTC Amaze 4G 1080p Camera Test| Booredatwork) or (HTC Amaze 4G 1080p HD Video Sample). HD looks, LD sound. The end result of the video is more important than style & process. So, if you're looking to take advantage of one of this phone's major selling points recording in HD this might not be the best device.
Secondly, although the screen in quarter HD, it's not quite as vivid, bright or impressive as some of it's competition.
iPHONE 4S (Requisite comparison)
The iPhone isn't really in the same league. It's an incredible device, but it's just an app tray squares on a screen. As a result, iPhones are generally far more consistent. They are also less glitch/bug prone than Androids. If you're new to Android, this will take getting used to. The Apple is a bit smoother because it doesn't have to do much more than launch apps. We don't expect a multi-functional SUV to be as smooth as a basic car. iPhones have no widgets, no multiple homescreens, (still) no full flash browser, no customization, no memory card, no removable battery, no keyboard options, no homescreen replacements, smaller screen... You get the idea. iPhones don't do much more than host/open apps. iPhones are well-designed, user-friendly & have wonderful cameras, but they're tract phones. Pretty basic & that has broad appeal. If you think you need Siri, Android already has Vlingo & Iris. If you're a busy career and/or family person, or not too good w/ technology, however, the iPhone is definitely better for you because it takes less time to configure, learn & operate. Not a matter of better/worse. There's something for everyone.
As HTC comes out with a new flagship seemingly every month, however, this phone will not hold its value as well as an iPhone, which is released only once a year. Like Samsung, HTC is known for creating buyers' remorse by coming out with something better only weeks after a flagship release. Be prepared for that.
ANDROID & de Führer Google
There is *a lot* to configure & customize on a high-end Android. Busy, older folks will either be overwhelmed, or proceed w/o a clue as to what this device can actually do, in spite of having paid for it. Secondly, Androids are *very* Googley. When you sync your Google account, be prepared for folks you've emailed once, 8 years ago, to show up on your phone. If you have a Picasa album, all of your photos will be automatically downloaded to your phone. If you erase them, all of the images will be deleted from Picasa online as well. Even storing phone numbers poses you with questions of storing to phone, SIM card... or Google. The same with calendar entries. Google is very invasive. Android has a lot of options, choices, customization, questions, combinations, permutations... It's like asking for water & the waiter spends 5 minutes asking sparkling or flat?... chilled or room temp?.... w/ or w/o ice?... large or small?... green glass or blue?... with straw or w/o?... It's overkill & obtrusive. Android won't win any prizes for being user-friendly, but it will for being thoroughly customizable.
GALAXY S II
Amaze's only real competition on T-Mobile, at the moment, is Samsung's Galaxy S II. The GS2 has a larger screen which, depending on your tastes & size, may or may not be a plus. The GS2 can be used on AT&T's network, should you hold onto the device long enough to weather the possible merger. The GS2 has the most beautiful screen colors & saturation, but Amaze has slightly higher pixel density. They're both very competitive.
In the end, this is a dual core, HD device. If you provide HD imaging, you should provide the corresponding audio for it. Amaze fails to deliver on the basics decent audio recording for videos. If you're not big on shooting videos w/ the HD shooter, then one is as good as the other. However, as 1080p is one of the primary selling points for this device (& you pay for it), the Amaze takes a significant back seat in audio quality to Galaxy S II. The audio it produces from recorded videos is an embarrassment, frankly. (You can compare video-audio quality for the competition on YouTube as well.) For this reason, I give it 4 stars. This is the only area where Amaze fails to live up to its name. It is, otherwise, an impressive device inside & out.
My original review was for the white version of the Amaze, but I realized that won't help much when most searches on Amazon hit the black version.
HTC Amaze 4G Android Phone, White (T-Mobile)
Let me preface this review with my past phones. I've been thru 7 BlackBerrys in the last 6 years with Verizon. I recently switched from Verizon to T-Mobile as both my wife and I were constantly dropping calls in our home. I won't ever look back.
This phone is smoking fast. The UI is snappy and I've experienced 0 lag switching between programs even while streaming a movie over the 4G connection. I've downloaded and installed 10+ apps in the past few days including Netflix, a yahoo fantasy football app, a few games, a few social networking and chat apps as well as 3 different game emulators. I had 0 issues with installing any of the apps on this phone. When the 4G connection is active, webpages actually load faster than on my laptop over a local WiFi-n connection.
I've read reviews of HTC phones having issues with the quality of the speaker. I was able to use this phone in the middle of a very noisy state fair, surrounded by screaming kids, rides and other distractions without having to plug my other ear to hear the caller's voice. My friend later told me that he had no issues hearing me either. I find that the speakerphone works well, but the sound quality is better when I flip the phone over. My wife says I sound like I'm on a land line when I use the speakerphone, and the sound coming thru the speaker was not tin-cannish.
The screen is amazing. There's a handy app built into the phone that tells you what is draining the battery the most. After quickly draining the phone (4 hours) a few times, I discovered this app and saw that the screen was eating up 95% of the battery life. Changing the brightness of the screen to the lowest setting greatly increased the battery life, but it still looks great when dimmed.
The camera is snappy. I can take pictures as quickly as I can hit the button and they look amazing. The auto-focus can sometimes be finicky in low-light situations, but overall I have to say this could easily replace my $250 Sony point-and-shoot camera, and I haven't even begun to touch all of the camera modes on the Amaze. The video is fantastic as well. When viewing the 1080p playback on my tv, my family was blown away with the quality of the picture. The sound capture on the video could be a little better, but that is a minor deterrent.
If there is one major drawback to the Amaze, it would have to be POP3 email issues. I found the POP3 email delivery system / syncing adequate at best when using Hotmail and a school email account. Gmail syncs well, so if that is your only email address, you should be fine with this phone. POP3 emails seem to disappear and reappear whenever they want, deleted emails sometimes don't stay deleted and I occasionally receive notifications for emails I've already read. I'm a systems analyst and even when working with T-Mobile support and trying to tweak every syncing setting there is, we could not get this to perform as well as a BlackBerry with regards to email delivery. That being said, the official Hotmail app from Microsoft works without a hitch on this phone. I installed that and it has been smooth sailing ever since.
Battery life is not awesome on this phone if you use it for anything besides email / calls / texting. However, I didn't expect it to be with the qHD Super LCD display and when running everything else that I do (Facebook, games, streaming video, messaging apps, taking pictures/video). I'm getting between 5-6 hours of battery life before I hit the 15% mark. Installing JuiceDefender from the Android Market helped the life, as well as disabling Bluetooth and the GPS connection.
Few other quick points:
The FM radio and MP3s sound wonderful over headphones / earbuds. No distortion.
The GPS navigation works better than my 2 year old Garmin, and syncing Google map directions with calendar entries is easy and helpful.
This phone is slightly weightier than the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy S2, but for me this is a bonus. I prefer using a phone that doesn't feel like it could snap in half if I sit on it by accident.
If you are up in the air between the HTC Amaze and the Samsung Galaxy S2, you really can't go wrong either way. Go into a T-Mobile store and play with each as I did to see what your personal preference is. Enjoy!
Note: As another reviewer has stated, the sound quality of recorded video is not the great. Since I've had more time to play with mine I've noticed that in some instances it is very hard to hear people speaking unless they are looking directly at the phone.
I've also seen a remarkable jump in battery life since updating the Amaze with software version 1.36.531.6. I can now use the phone for 12+ hours before hitting 15% most days (in good coverage areas).
Buy HTC Amaze 4G Android Phone, Black (T-Mobile) Now
Extremely stylish and well built, probably one of the best looking phone I've ever had. Let me first stary by saying that it DOES have 16GB of memory. The user who complained about 16GB with 1 star himself has admitted it and I hope people do not get misguided by that inaccurate review. The phone has 9.75GB for pictures, movies, music and 2.2GB for apps and app data. 9.75 + 2.2 = ~12GB. The remaining goes for OS (1 GB), installed apps and space to execute apps (2 GB) and general cache (remaining), -->
PROs:
* Amazing build quality and most beautiful phone ever, great finish and feels really good in hands.
* Most advanced camera ever with features that would put a point-and-shoot digital camera to shame. The video quality is amazing and pretty smooth.
* Extremely fast, there's virtually no lag at all in running heavist of applications/games.
* Very vibrant, bright and highly responsive.
* Net speed is awesome with new HSPA+42 4G on T-Mobile.
* Pretty generous battery with 1760 mA
CONs:
* The phone is ever so slightly heavier than other phones but to me, the premium material used maks up for it.
* The phone heats up slighly (no where near as bad as Motorola Atrix) with heavy use.
* Battery drainage is significant (although that's same with pretty much every single android smartphone out there).
* Camera is great but seems to take a little bit washed out pics in low light conditions which is not bad for a phone but with all the HYPE around it, I felt I'll throw my point-and-shoot away.
Overall, with $199 with 2 yr contract and no tax or s/h (from amazon or from wirefly); this is not a bad deal at all. I would say this phone definitely beats out Samsung Galaxy SII with it's style and features (and I found this much more pocket-friendly than Samsung Galaxy SII).
Bottom Line: Amaze is amazing. I'd say go for it, you will not regret!!
Read Best Reviews of HTC Amaze 4G Android Phone, Black (T-Mobile) Here
You can read in-depth reviews all over (Gizmodo, Engadget, TheVerge, et al) with details, and probably some whining. But trust me, this is a superb Android-based smartphone. The HTC Sense overlay isn't terrible, has some nice additions to Android 2.3.4 (Gingerbread), and in 4 weeks of use and testing I've found it hardly wanting. Battery life can be short, but getting additional chargers and cords will help, as will using Juice Defender or Llama to program in some power savings. HTC offers many widgets including a cute but simplistic Battery widget for your home screen which displays charge and status. If you've never used HTC Sense or the HTC widgets, they are both beautiful and feature some functionality that third party apps (for $) on the Android Market offer. I recommend Battery Monitor Widget and SystemPanel Pro if you really want to see where your power is going.
One thing I want to point out is that the "What's in the box" description on Amazon is wrong, this phone does NOT come with a wired, stereo earbud set. T-mobile store personnel confirmed for me that their package includes no headset. No loss, the HTC charging cable is crap, has a problematic micro-usb plug, I suggest stashing it for travel in favor of an AmazonBasics USB Cable 2.0 A Male to Micro B (6 Feet / 1.8 Meters) which I'll review shortly. I wouldn't expect the HTC headset to be any good. I recommend you instead shop for something like a JLab J3M In-Ear Earphones or JBuds J5M In-Ear Earphones (both have microphone and control button). Bose in-ear headphones are great, I own a pair, but they're overpriced. Etymotic, Shure, and even Monster make some respectable earbuds that have fans.
Also missing from the box: micro-SDHC memory card for the expansion slot, which the camera app and music apps really need. But this allows you to buy, according to your budget, a 4GB, 8GB, 16GB, or even a 32GB card. I recommend a Kingston 32GB microSDHC Class 4 card or similar. I had a Kingston 4 GB microSDHC Class 4 Card I was using in my PlayStation that tests at some phenomenal speeds, at the sacrifice of storage space for music and HD video. Shop around on Amazon, usually a Kingston or Sandisk package with a USB reader, or SD and mini-SD adapters, can be found for not much more than a dollar per gigabyte. (Lexars, with higher speed ratings, will cost more.) I like Kingston memory, never had a problem with cards, laptop SIMMs, etc; Sandisk cards, though ubiquitous, have been getting a flurry of online discussion about their Class 4 cards (guaranteed 4MB/s sequential write speed) far surpassing those ratings. PNY and other brands, meh I avoid them unless they're disposable. I ended up getting a SanDisk 16GB Mobile ULTRA (SDSDQY-016G-A11A) with a rebate at Costco, not as fast as the Kingston 4GB card, but a good performer.
Pros:
+ Great, high resolution 4.3" screen for crisper text and graphics, at this time only the Verizon Rezound variant of this phone has a better resolution (even better than iPhone 4S, I'm told)
+ 1.5Ghz dual-core Snapdragon processor
+ Solid construction and build quality that is immediately evident out of the box
+ Expandable memory to suit your usage and needs, in addition to the ~9GB of internal storage available to the user.
+ Dedicated buttons for camera and videocam
+ T-Mobile now offers WiFi calling (December update)
+ HTC Sense, great launcher, some cool widgets, and not much cruft-ware bloating the phone
+ Can I mention again how NICE this phone looks and feels in your hand?
Minuses:
Battery life, you'll need to charge nightly unless you conserve aggressively (there are multiple methods to do this, some involving 3rd party apps)
Colleagues noticed the phone is heavier than comparable phones, due partly to that great build quality; I don't mind this personally
Pricey, at the time of my purchase (second week of December) more than a Samsung Galaxy S II 4G Android Phone (T-Mobile) or other comparable models (the SGS2 was $130 on T-Mobile, the Amaze was anywhere from $180 to $230 depending upon rebates and purchasing method, i.e. online, store, reseller)
It is missing some things you'll end up buying -plan to spend another fifty dollars on a car charger, a microSDHC memory card which some apps need, maybe another charging cable, wired earbuds or Bluetooth headset ... so plan on total cost of ownership (initial) to be a bit higher
No dedicated hardware button for menu/apps, or for making/ending call; these can be provided by QuickDesk Pro and Headset Button Config apps in the Android Market (e.g. Nokias and other non-smartphone handsets have keypad buttons for calling functions, and launching applications; these phones generally don't have capacitive or touch-screen controls)
Other phones to consider: The Samsung Galaxy S II (11/2011), HTC Vivid 4G, HTC Rezound LTE (12/2011), Samsung Galaxy Nexus 4G (12/2011)
[Edited: added more information about memory cards.]
UPDATE(S):
Since buying this phone, I've been through two handsets encountering an annoying cyclical buzzing noise during stereo video recording. The problem develops some times after a reset, after installing some widely used apps. HTC has not confirmed this problem, but I've received anecdotal reports from 2-3 other people also encountering this issue.
A common complaint about this phone is a light-bleed from the capacitive soft keys (home, menu, return, search) below the screen. In darkened rooms, the backlights glow from behind the screen, washing it out. Quite annoying when using backgrounds or watching movies. The backlights can be turned off with an app like ScreenFilter, but you shouldn't have to do this for such an expensive phone.
I've identified the unusual charge/sync port as HTC's proprietary "ExtMicro USB" port. It has 12-pins over Micro-USB's usual 5. Special HTC adapters use the extra leads for video-out, and perhaps other purposes (reference: XDA-developers forums). Though the port is backwards compatible with Micro-USB plugs (for syncing, and for charging), those plugs may wiggle a bit in the phone. Some Amaze owners aren't happy about this. Even less happy about the fact that the T500 cable with this special connector is a) hard to find, and b) not cheap. A call to HTC Customer Service may net you a free one for the asking. If you want to shop for your extra cables, look for an AC-T500 (HTC's part number is 73H00389-11M). The car charger equivalent is called the C500. And the 12-pin MHL-HDMI adapter (look for my review there) is the M500.
Want HTC Amaze 4G Android Phone, Black (T-Mobile) Discount?
Call Quality
Call quality of this phone is very good, very solid. My friend could hear me very clearly and I could hear her as well. Phone feels more comfortable next to my ear than my previous phone (Google Nexus One). Speakerphone is very good, my friend told me I almost sounded like I was just using the regular handset (I sounded just slightly different on the other end). I was holding the phone in my hand, speaker is on the back of the phone. The speaker might be harder to hear, depending on if you have the back of the phone turned up or down.
Alarm Clock
I use my cell phone as my alarm clock so this is important for me. I only need 1 alarm, but it looks like you can make more than a half dozen if you so desired. You get a pretty good selection of standard chimes for the alarm sound. Once the alarm does go off you get a choice of "Dismiss" or "Snooze" for which you must drag the "Dismiss" or "Snooze" into the circle at the bottom to register your response. It would have been nice to simply allow us to select "Dismiss" or "Snooze" directly (like my Nexus One) rather than dragging it into the slider.
Battery Life*
When left to it's own devices (the screen is off), the battery life is actually quite good. It's only when you turn on the screen and start using it does the battery really take a hit. Watching movies and videos is a big battery sucker. Web browsing is also a battery hog.
I have turned down the dim switch so the battery doesn't get eaten so quickly now and the screen still looks good. The battery widget does not seem accurate. From 100% to about 40% or 50% the battery will last a while. However, once you get below 40% the battery seems to run out of juice in a hurry.
If you buy this phone be ready to work with it. I have had those days where you put the phone in the car, go to work, come back 7 hours later, and there's a voicemail and email messages and only 20% left on the battery. I guess HTC phones are notorious for this. One solution? Turn the phone on Airplane Mode if you're at work and not using it. For some reason those notifications can really suck battery life. It's not always like this, but it used to happen occasionally with my N1 as well.
The HTC Amaze uses a proprietary USB charging cord. This charging cord uses an extra two prongs so that it can recharge the phone quicker. I have a different take on this. I think HTC made the cord like this so it wouldn't take all night to recharge. I tried recharging my phone using a USB extension (so that the extra two prongs would not come into play). All the while, I was playing games and web surfing on my phone at the same time. The battery level stayed exactly the same for that 30 minutes, it never got charged.
Even with the proprietary cord the way it is, it takes much longer to recharge my Amaze than it did to recharge my Nexus One. Within 2 hours my Nexus One will pretty much be mostly charged up close to 90% or more. If you are starting from near zero, the Amaze might be around 75% or less after 2 hours.
In terms of real world use, I can easily make it through a full day with some internet usage, some phone calls, and some app use. I'm generally not a heavy user. I usually turn off: Wi-fi, Bluetooth, GPS, etc. when I'm not using the phone.
The Screen
Initially the screen looks of a very high quality. It feels very smooth when dragging a fingertip over the surface. It is remarkable because it does not retain fingerprints the way my previous phone did, amazing. The glass remains clear if I keep my fingers relatively clean. The size of the screen, 4.3", is not too large. The larger size actually makes reading web pages a little easier on the eyes which is a plus. The phone does not have any trouble fitting in my pocket. Any larger and it might be too much.
Colors look bright and accurate. Text looks very sharp and detailed as do pictures. Contrast is not the greatest, there is backlight bleeding coming from the bottom of the screen which is a well known problem with this phone. It is visible in a darker environment, but not really obvious unless you are looking for it. My previous phone had an Amoled screen which had tremendous black and white contrast, however, the HTC Amaze's ppi (points per inch) is so good, and pictures are so sharp, it is easy to forgive it for the lack of contrast.
The capacitive touch is very responsive and keys are easy to predict and press on the keyboard. The default keyboard has a grey background which is not the easiest to see. It has a bevy of options including a Swype-like ability to input via dragging as well as predictive text input and on the fly spell checking. I like the keyboard very much. I find it easier to type on than the stock Android keyboard.
Notifications
When I receive a notification, the phone will emit either a green or an orange light on the left side of the top speaker. This can be anything from a voicemail, an email, a text message, or an app that needs updating. You get to choose what gets updated and what doesn't. A chime will also sound when you get a notification.
The Camera
Pictures really are amazing for this smart phone when there is adequate light (and are pretty good even if there isn't much light). Pressing the shutter button and holding it for approximately 1 second brings up the camera app. I wish the delay were just a bit longer than 1 second as I have accidentally turned on the camera on more than 1 occasion. The shutter button really does function as a shutter button, allowing you to press the shutter half way before actually taking the shot. The limited manual controls include: White Balance (incandescent, fluorescent, daylight, or cloudy) and ISO (adjustment from 100,200,400 and 800).
One of my favorite abilities of the camera, is the manual focus. Example: a picture of a patch of grass in the foreground, clouds and mountains in the background. Simply touch the screen on the area you wish to be in clear view, and the camera will automatically adjust the focus to make that part of the image clear (and the rest of the image fuzzy). Of course there's auto-focus too which lets the camera decide what is in focus and what is out of focus.
Low light photos showed obvious noise, but not as heinous as most smart phones will produce. Details were still well rendered and sharpness was obvious. The lack of dynamic range of the lens really shows. There is no optical zoom feature (there is digital zoom) but you do have a bevy of features like: self timer (2 secs or 10 secs), special effects like vignetting, sepia, negative, posterize, etc. widescreen size, ability to geo-tag (tag photo by location), smile recognition, blink detection, and other. Quite impressive for a smart phone.
Cons
While I'm typing quickly it will seem like the keyboard will lag a little bit. It will seem like the keystroke didn't register, but then a second later it will show up. This is annoying. The built-in web browser, when you press on a link, sometimes does not show or indicate that you've selected a link. Then a few seconds later, the new page will appear, again, annoying.
The wifi on this phone doesn't work as well as my Nexus One. It takes just a wee bit longer to acquire the signal and it doesn't seem as sensitive as my Nexus One or my Samsung 7" Galaxy Tab. There is an app which allows me to setup mail on both my Hotmail and Gmail accounts which works surprisingly well and was easy to set up.
The 4G speeds work well when I am close to a cell tower in South King County where I live (south of Seattle). In fact they are the fastest speeds I've ever experienced. Great for downloading files, but in terms of web use you won't see a big improvement.
One very frustrating thing about this phone is the way the internet connection turns off when the display does which is a function of Juice Defender (which turns off data when the phone is not in use). I have had many downloads interrupted because of this. Just a heads up in case you use Juice Defender. I had to change the display timeout to a longer interval to prevent download interruption.
****Update****
I've been using over a month now. Battery life has gotten better as I've learned to turn off the Clock Sync feature and dim the display. It's not necessary for the phone to always check to see if it has the most accurate time, just a waste of battery and bandwidth. The clock is very accurate by itself. I can get a full day easily if I'm not out looking for houses with my Agent.
The 4G internet works really well where I live. I can get 4G in my bathroom which is surrounded by walls and yet more walls. In my particular case, I get much better performance using 4G than my Wifi.
I have a car charger for my Amaze and it works well. Plugs into the cigarette lighter via USB. I have a cord for home and car. The phone will charge fairly quickly despite using a generic cord (picked up from Ebay). The battery indicator is not accurate. When fully charged it will say 100% for a long time, close to 5 mins of internet use. Normally after 5 mins the battery will drain down a tick or two.
Have a thin case now. The camera buttons are still too easy to press. Many times I turn on the camera on accident because it's too easy to press (and hold) one of the two buttons that will activate it. You have to hold the buttons for at least a good second if not longer, but I still do it because it's right where my fingers grab.
The GPS works well on this phone as does the compass. Initially I was skeptical as the phone had difficulty figuring out which direction I was facing and it still does on occasion. However, this does not affect the text-to-voice navigation. I have now used the phone on cloudy days as well as sunny and I'm fairly confident it will get me from point A to point B. The problem is, battery life gets sucked up like it's nobody's business with GPS and satellite location turned on.
*Update 9/8/12 My Amaze's battery has taken a turn for the worse. It's only been 6 months since this review was written. I think the battery should last longer than that. It's so bad, I've decided to buy Samsung Galaxy S2. The S2's battery life is much more representative of what I desire in a smart phone, but it falls short in every comparison to the Amaze, screen quality, camera, and most annoyingly in the sensitivity of the touch screen.
The battery life was already not very good to begin with. I realize I could just buy a new battery and be done with it. But even then, I'd have to live with battery life that wasn't atrocious, just bad. The S2 feels mediocre compared to the Amaze. However, the best smart phone in the world is the one that has power.
Yesterday I was playing with the Amaze and the S2. Within 2 hours of playing with both, my Amaze went from nearly 100% to 32% whereas the S2 went from around 95% to 80%. Big difference. If I have to make pictures or video, I'll use the Amaze because it's camera is much better than the S2. However, for daily use the S2 is much better.
