There is new entrance in the Sensation line of HTC phones, guys and it has come with Beats Audio as well. The HTC Sensation XL differs from its other peers in the lineup with the huge 4.7 inch LCD display, and the lower hardware specs. HTC made it with a single-core chipset, no memory card slot, and lower screen resolution than the other models.

 

Hardware

Ignore Android for a moment, and you’re basically looking at the HTC Titan only in white rather than black: the XL and the Windows Phone share the same 4.7-inch WVGA touchscreen, the same 1.5GHz single core MSM8255 processor and 8 mega-pixel camera with 720p HD video recording support. There’s more RAM in the Sensation XL, 768MB versus 512MB but unfortunately the missing memory card slot and miserly 16GB of fixed storage (of which 12.64GB is available to the user). This is highly unimpressive especially when you consider HTC has included Beats Audio functionality and is pushing the handset as a multimedia smartphone.

Display

As for the display, it’s tough to get too excited over WVGA(480 x 800 pixels) resolution, even if the panel itself is large and bright. HTC’s point of view at the Sensation XL’s launch was that its display choice was partly down to supply availability and partly down to cost and then promptly wowed us with the HTC Rezound for the US market, complete with a 720p panel boasting a higher pixel density than the well-esteemed iPhone 4S. In comparison, while the Sensation XL’s Super LCD has vivid colors and solid viewing angles, we couldn’t help but feel short-changed when browsing and reading email and ebooks.

Software

Android 2.3.5 Gingerbread is the order of the day here, though with HTC’s usual UI revamp. HTC Sense 3.5 is carried across from the Rhyme, with its lockscreen shortcuts, colorful widgets that look good on the sizable display, and exclusive apps like HTC Watch along with social networking integration in FriendStream. By now it’s all very familiar, though HTC is careful to buff up the visual gloss every so often.

HTC has been showing off a version of Sense 3.5 with the curved buttons as the bottom traded for two small, unobtrusive round buttons for opening your full apps list or bringing up the phone, but this hasn’t made it into the Sensation XL rather it’s the old style here, which means it matches its Sensation brothers.

One minor but noticeable change on the HTC Sensation XL is that the default weather widget has been scaled back to something smaller than what HTC fans are used to. The old style is still there, though, hidden away in the Personalize menu.

 

Camera

The Sensation XL comes with an 8-megapixel camera with an f2.2 lens and backside-illuminated sensor for improved low-light performance. There’s a dual-LED flash but only 720p HD video recording, not 1080p like its Sensation and XE, thanks to the limits of the processor. A 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera does video call duty.

As for video, the Sensation XL seems particularly dependent on good lighting, with anything less than daylight leading to dim, murky scenes. The touch focus is useful, but exposure seems to adjust in steps rather than smoothly, as the sensor struggles to catch up. We’ve definitely seen better on other devices, including from HTC’s own stable.

Multimedia and Beats Audio

Media is firmly on HTC’s mind when it comes to the Sensation XL. In fact, with the bigger screen and Beats Audio, we’d say it’s pretty much the XL’s purpose in life.

The most important element is definitely the Beats Audio integration, with the special earphones included in the box.

We should point out that these aren’t the ones you’ll see on HTC’s Sensation XL product page, those are the Beats Solo HDs that come in a limited edition package. Most people will wind up with the deal we had, with the YourBeats in-ear headphones, the same as the Sensation XE, but in silver, red and white.

Internet and Connectivity

Web browsing on the HTC Sensation XL is superb. Thanks to the ultra big screen, text is legible and crisp from the page overview, and pinching to zoom is quick and smooth. Pages load up very fast and Flash video plays back smoothly. Text reflows to fit the display, which does stagger the process of zooming slightly. That said, it makes the reading experience more enjoyable.

As far as connectivity goes, you’ve got quad-band GSM and tri-band 3G along with Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth 3.0, DLNA functionality as well as an FM radio.

HSPDA is at an acceptable 14.4Mbps speed, with the upload speed bouncing in at 5.76 Mbps, both of which seem plausible in our tests plus the lovely option of setting up your own Wi-Fi hotspot if you fancy chewing the battery in heartbeat.

 

Other features and Apps

Sensation XL offers various other features and built-in apps:
DLNA, Flashlight, Friend Stream, HTC Hub, Mirror, Music, News, Peep, Polaris, Office, Soundhound, Stocks, Teeter, Watch and Weather etc.

 

Detailed Specification

 

  • 2G Network GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900
  • 3G Network HSDPA  850/900 / 2100
  • SIZE 132.5 x 70.7 x 9.9 mm
  • Weight 162.5 g
  • DISPLAY S-LCD capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors, 480 x 800 pixels, 4.7 inches
  • - Gorilla glass display
  • - Multi-touch input method
  • - Accelerometer sensor for UI auto-rotate
  • - Proximity sensor for auto turn-off
  • - Gyro sensor
  • - HTC Sense UI 3.5
  • Internal  Memory  16 GB Storage, 768 MB RAM
  • Card slot  No
  • GPRS  Class 12
  • EDGE Class 12
  • 3G HSDPA 14.4 Mbps, HSUPA 5.76 Mbps
  • WLAN Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, DLNA, Wi-Fi hotspot
  • Bluetooth Yes, v3.0 with A2DP
  • USB microUSB v2.0
  • CAMERA 8 MP, 3264×2448 pixels, autofocus, dual-LED flash, Geo-tagging, touch-focus, face detection, HDR, auto-upload
  • Video Yes, 720p, slo-mo video recording
  • Secondary Yes, 1.3 MP
  • OS Android OS, v2.3 (Gingerbread)
  • CPU 1.5 GHz Scorpion, Adreno 205 GPU, Qualcomm MSM 8255 Snapdragon
  • Messaging SMS(threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Email, IM
  • Browser WAP 2.0/xHTML, HTML, Adobe Flash
  • Radio Stereo FM radio with RDS
  • Colors White
  • GPS Yes, with A-GPS support
  • Java Yes, via Java MIDP emulator
  • Other Features
  • - TV-out (via MHL A/V link)
  • - Beats Audio
  • - Beats Headset
  • - Google Search, Maps, Gmail
  • - YouTube, Google Talk, Picasa integration
  • - MP3/eAAC+/WAV/WMA player
  • - MP4/H.263/H.264/WMV player
  • - Organizer
  • - Document viewer
  • - Voice memo/dial/commands
  • - Predictive text input
  • BATTERY Standard battery, Li-Ion 1600 mAh
  • Stand-by Up to 360 h (2G) / Up to 460 h (3G)
  • Talk time Up to 11 h 50 min (2G) / Up to 6h 50 min (3G)

 

By R¤m¥