HTC One X9
AN IPHONE 6S PLUS FOR AROUND HALF THE PRICE?
TAIWANESE PHONE MAKER HTC was once the darling of the Android world, but with the smartphone market becoming increasingly competitive and saturated, it’s had a troubled few years of late. e company’s latest strategy to try to turn that around seems to be something along the lines of ‘copy Apple, but cheaper’. As a point in case, last year’s One A9 handset was a pretty good mimic of the iPhone 6S — at least in terms of looks — and with this new X9, HTC is squarely aiming at the bigger iPhone 6S Plus. e X9 ups the screen from 5 inches to 5.5 inches but otherwise keeps the fairly iPhone-esque shape, with smooth curves combined with a metal unibody back and glass front. To its credit, HTC has at least added a few more ornamental design ourishes to the X9 — notably around the rear camera and front-facing speakers — so it’s not quite as plain as the iPhone, but the overall intent is still quite clear.
ankfully, there’s actually a lot to like about the X9 elsewhere. Despite the $599 price, its actually fairly well equipped, specs wise, with a 1080p screen, 32GB of onboard storage, 3GB of RAM and Android 6.0 (AKA Marshmallow). e 3,000mAh built-in battery supports fast-charging (though you’ll need to fork out for an extra adaptor), the cameras (13MP rear and 5MP front) produce generally pleasing results, and there’s even a microSD slot to expand your storage, with support for cards up to 256GB. is phone also sees the return of HTC’s front-facing Boomsound speakers and they’re still some of the best built-ins you’ll nd in a phone, making it better (though still not great) for watching videos on sans headphones.
It’s also one tough-feeling phone, although it is a little big and unwieldy in the hand — Samsung’s bigger phones are a little trimmer and nicer to hold, and the X9 doesn’t carry o its big size quite as smoothly.
You also get HTC’s Sense UI, which is one of the slicker custom Android interfaces on o er. e good news here is that HTC has taken the same approach with the X9 as with its agship HTC 10; it’s avoided bundling in its own apps just for the sake of branding and, where Google’s stock apps are good enough to stand on their own, HTC has used those rather than doubling up by including its own (o en uninstallable) duplicates.
Under the hood, HTC has opted to go with a MediaTek Helio processor, rather than the Qualcomm Snapdragon seen in the One A9, but that’s not an entirely bad thing. e Helio is quite a clippy little chip, with the X9 turning in benchmark results quite a bit faster than its smaller sibling, and the battery life is good too, reaching a respectable 8:40hr in PCMark for Android at 50% screen brightness. e X9 is a bit behind when it comes to gaming speed, however — it’s passable, but falls behind in more demanding titles, where current agships can be up to ve times faster.
While not perfect then, there’s a goodenough mix of specs, performance and pleasing design in the X9 to make it a worthwhile o ering at this $599 price — provided you actually like the iPhone stylings, of course.
DAN GARDINER
AS A POINT IN CASE, LAST YEAR’S ONE A9 HANDSET WAS A PRETTY GOOD MIMIC OF THE IPHONE 6S — AT LEAST IN TERMS OF LOOKS — AND WITH THIS NEW X9, HTC IS SQUARELY AIMING AT THE BIGGER IPHONE 6S PLUS.