Would you rather have a larger phone with a bigger battery that lasts forever? Or a thin, sleek and sexy phone? This was HTC’s question and apparently they decided to shelf the bigger battery plans to compete with the DROID RAZR MAXX and opted for a mild upgrade to the battery. This will enabled them to produce the thin and awesome phones like what we are seeing today in the HTC One X and One S.
According to our friends and sister site SlashGear, today at a conference in Seattle HTC’s VP of portfolio strategy Bjorn Kilburn cited research they’ve conducted throughout 2011 which helped them decide that customers wanted thinner and sleeker phones, so they cut back on future plans and took larger battery ideas out of their roadmap. Now the HTC One X has a large 1800 mAh battery, and lasts plenty long, but it’s no comparison to the DROID RAZR MAXX and its 3300 mAh battery.
What this essentially means and what we are hearing is HTC had plans for large 3000 mAh batteries, and super sleek phones for the future, not the current ONE series, but opted to settle in the middle – which is ok. By making them non-removable this will help them achieve the best of both worlds. That being decent and standard battery life and thinner phones. The HTC One S is the thinnest HTC device to date, and still manages to get excellent battery life thanks to the efficient Qualcomm S4 dual-core processor under the hood. So what they’ll produce next will probably be even better.
So it appears that HTC is retiring the plans for smartphones with bigger batteries in order to save space and keep things sleek. We here at Android Community love the new One series, available on T-Mobile next week and on AT&T with 4G LTE in early May. Would you still buy a ONE device if they were slightly fatter, say 2mm but came with 2500 mAh batteries?
Personally, I could care less about ultra-slim phones. In fact I’m perfectly happy with the feel of a Droid 1. But I’d love to have the battery life of a RAZR MAXX.
How much is the battery life? Because win terms of tablets and smartphones, that actually is a factor in whether or not I will buy the product.
The bigger battery isn’t exactly insignificant.
I definitely want a big battery in my next phone, my current HTC isn’t very good on battery life, even with mild use. So it looks like my money wont be going to HTC at the end of this year.
No, HTC. You are wrong.
People don’t want to be tethered to a charger all day, and can handle a few mm of thickness.
Stop being wrong, HTC. Just stop it.
Yeah, would certainly rather my One X had a larger battery. Especially since I can’t replace it with an aftermarket larger capacity one!
It really shows you how dumb the HTC people have been lately. The EVO was a really innovative device at it’s time. The Razr has been a dud and they’re just copying duds instead of trailblazing their own path. Now it’s Samsung that’s building the innovative devices.
They’ve really lost their way.
Now they’re launching an unimpressive dual core device in the US when the GS III will be quad core and better. They’re about to get their clock cleaned.
@openid-41024:disqus and what unimpressive dual-core phone is that??? The One X
The Qualcomm S4 in the ATT X and the T-Mo One S is very impressive. Just because it’s dual-core doesn’t mean it should be overlooked.
http://androidcommunity.com/htc-one-x-vs-one-s-benchmarks-battle-for-the-top-spot-20120405/
I’ve owned HTC phones for years and even imported them from Europe. From the Nexus One, to the HTC Universal to the PDA2k to the Treo variants. I only had a HTC phone for over a decade.
The Samsung Galaxy line is the leader. HTC needs to produce phones competitive with it instead of competitive with Motorola. Samsung’s building devices that resonate with customers in terms of size, shape, variety and specs.
Does HTC have an answer to the Galaxy Note? Not really. Is the HTC One X going to be better than the GS3. Probably not. Do they make a decent Tablet? Nope. MP3 player? Nope.
By the time the HTC One X is out, there will probably be 2 or 3 Samsung devices that I would prefer. Which is why I think they will continue to bleed and the One X will not do anything to stem their bleeding. Samsung is destroying their business.
Wow! How can a company that makes some pretty great phones just continue to miss it on the small details? I own the original HTC Evo 4G and my two biggest complaints are #1 poor battery life and #2 small amount of internal storage space. I would much rather carry a heavier phone with better battery life! I am never far from a charger out of necessity & I hate it!
It is easy … when a person walks in a store and picks up a phone, they can’t see the battery capacity in their hands. They can see the”thinness” and that is what matters when the sale is made. “
Isn’t that why you do a little bit of research before you go and buy a new phone?
I really love the HTC design…I’m still using their Desire HD, but hate the lousy battery life.
How much thickness did the 3300 mAh battery add to the razr maxx? I can live with that!
I would rather have a slightly thicker & heavier phone that last more than 1 day on heavy usage.
I wonder who & where they did their survey….really stupid decision.
HTC wakeup!!!
You make a good point but the MAXX and RAZR are really wide, almost too wide IMO.
I think a phone slightly thicker than the One X (like the Sensation) with a 3,000 mAh battery that lasts two days would be ideal
I don’t know if its ok to curse in comments, but I don’t give a flying fuck about having the most ultra super uber slim phone ever. What’s the point of having a superphone with all these capabilities but a battery not capable of handling the actual use of said features? I’d love a mobile phone that can stay MOBILE, my Thunderbolt goes from wall charger, to car charger, to wall charger. Who the hell did they poll? I have a Galaxy Note as well, and it seems to have the best battery life ever…at times. But why do I feel that way? Because I have a Thunderbolt, made by HTC, that has the worst battery life ever. And that’s with LTE turned off on the TBolt and on on the Note
lifetime for battery is for me better
I would also love to know who they surveyed. I had an original Sprint EVO and late last year switched to a T-Mobile Amaze. Both phones were battery monsters. I daily have my phone sitting on a charger at work and that is doing nothing more then listening to MP3s from the SD card (No streaming, no BT just wired earb buds). By lunch time I’m normally down to 50% or so. If I don’t charge the phone then it is dead before I leave for home. I’d much rather have a thicker phone and longer life then some super thin phone that I feel might crack in half if I forget to take it out of my pocket before I sit down.
I’m definitely leaning to someone other then HTC for my next phone with what I’m seeing from HTC lately.
I have to admit though guys, Samsung’s choice to offer the Galaxy Nexus with a 1750 mAh battery and offer a 2100 mAh extended battery was a great idea.
The extended 2100 is what I use and it still fits all my standard cases, barely any fatter. They should have just met in middle and sold it with 2000 mAh stock if you ask me though
Hell ya I would. That little bit would make a big difference for me deciding what phone to purchase. I don’t really care how thin, as long as it will last
HTC,
at least let us replace the battery when the battery die. Why your phone always being created with some intention flaws? Is it your selling strategy? so people will keep buying your next phone? your strategy may work if there was no samsung or Apple as your competitors.
Thicker phone with better battery life for sure! What’s another .5 MM?
Ok, I can see how a device with 3k mAh battery and 14mm thickness isn’t very sexy in 2012/13, but that doesn’t mean that we couldn’t cram a 2250 or 2500 mAh battery into a 10mm device, right?
In fact, I find a non-user replacable battery much worse than a device that comes with a comparatively weak one.
And this is why I’m still running an old android phone. Hardware manufacturers have forgotten the things that brought me to android in the first place in their attempts to out-Apple Apple.
I have a Razr Maxx. I have never had the phone die in 1 day….ever. No matter how I use it, it gets through the day on 1 charge. I wonder why it is the best selling phone Verizon has???? It’s because people DO not want to worry about the battery.