HTC One Google Play Edition vs HTC One

Introduction:

Making some noise of its own in the space, the Sense 5 packing HTC One has proven to be one venerable competitor in the landscape for some time now, but very recently, it was announced that another variant running a stock Android experience would be made available shortly to complement HTC’s lineup. As if consumers weren’t bombarded already with a handful of stellar devices, they now have to seemingly choose between the original model and this new Google Play Edition one.

Design:

Well, these two are basically the same phone in terms of hardware, so they have exactly the same look and feel. With a classy aluminum body and solid construction, the HTC One (in both of its variants) remains one of the most appealing Android smartphones money can buy.


Meanwhile, the 4.7” screen adorning the front of both handsets is a beauty to behold thanks to its cutting-edge resolution of 1080x1920 pixels, as well as accurate and vibrant colors that make using the handset a real joy.

Interface and Functionality:

The single biggest difference between these so-called identical twins is found with their respective Android experience. As we know, the Google Play Edition features stock Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean – whereas, the original employs HTC’s Sense 5 UI running on top of Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean. So yeah, this is where the decision is going to be made by people. For those who center their life around social networking, we’d vouch for the original HTC One with Sense 5, mainly because HTC BlinkFeed adheres perfectly to their needs. Conversely, if you’re hardcore about Android, the Google Play Edition will astound people for its stock, untouched experience – plus, it’ll receive those prized major updates significantly faster too!



Naturally, as we take a peek around their respective core organizer apps, it’s clear that the biggest difference is mainly presentation and style – albeit, their functions are identical.
Even though the Sense 5 packing HTC One maximizes space by keeping its main keyboard layout filled with various punctuations and numbers, we don’t find it drastically better than the stock Android keyboard used by its sibling, since the two are extremely responsive and quick to the touch.


Processor and Memory:

Normally, it’s perceived that custom UIs tend to bog down the performance of a smartphone, but that’s not necessarily the case here, as the Sense 5 HTC One performs similarly to its stock Android brother. Powering the two is a quad-core 1.7GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 processor coupled with 2GB of RAM and an Adreno 320 GPU, which enables the two to power through basic tasks with minimal effort. However, we do notice a smidgen of improvement with the Google Play Edition, but it’s only seen when navigating across the homescreen – mainly because HTC BlinkFeed is a tad bit more intensive with its visuals.

Neither device offers expandable memory, so we’re quite mindful about what we stuffed into their 32GB of internal storage.

Internet and Connectivity:

Running Google Chrome, there’s nothing that we don’t like with the web browsing experience between the tandem, seeing we’re given everything we’d like to find with a phenomenal experience. Speedy page loads, check. Instant page rendering, check. Silky smooth navigational controls, checkmate! Everything gets a check with these two.

With the Google Play Edition, it has the ability to work with AT&T and T-Mobile’s network – though, it’s worth mentioning that it lacks the necessary radio to support TMo’s specific AWS band for HSPA+ connectivity. Besides that, everything else in the connectivity front is identical, seeing that they feature aGPS, Bluetooth 4.0, 5GHz 802.11 a/b/g/n Wi-Fi, NFC, and DLNA.

Camera:

Maybe there would’ve been some sort of improvement with the post processing performance of the Google Play Edition’s Ultrapixel camera, but that’s not the case after checking out some of the samples we shot. Honestly, their qualities look identical in all lighting conditions.




At the same time, their 1080p video recording qualities are identical to one another as well – so there’s no clear victor in this category. The videos might not be the prettiest things out there, but it has enough of a balanced look to make them pleasing nonetheless.

HTC One Google Play Edition Sample Video:



HTC One Sample Video:



Now, we’re going to hand the overall shooting experience to the Sense 5 HTC One, just because of the myriad of shooting modes and manual settings available to it. In comparison, the only unique aspect of the Google Play Edition is the availability of its Photosphere mode, which gives us that 360 degree rotatable image.

Multimedia:

Visuals are yet again what separate the music players on these two devices, since it’s the Sense music player on one, and the usual Google Play Music app on the other. Seriously though, we can’t say that one player is remarkably better than the other – even more when they boast nearly the same functions. Additionally, their front-firing speakers produce the same level of audio quality, which is astoundingly powerful, sharp, and commanding.



It’s the same display, so there shouldn’t be one that’s more optimal for the video watching experience, right? Not really, because the Sense 5 HTC One supports videos encoded in Xvid, in addition to MPEG-4 and H.264 out of the box. On top of that, there’s that nifty screenshot function available to it too that’s accessible by tapping the button on the right side of the screen. It also supports the built-in infrared remote controller.

Battery:

Again, one would tend to believe that a stock experience would be less draining with battery, but quite frankly, we don’t notice anything dramatic in this comparison. With our normal usage, the two are more than equipped to provide us with one whole day of battery life under 4G LTE connectivity.

Conclusion:

Same hardware, different experience – that’s essentially what boils down to here. In the end, it essentially comes to which experience is most preferable to you. As we’ve clearly pointed out, the HTC Sense 5 brings out all of the qualities that would snatch up individuals that live on social networking. In contrast, the stock Android would be most ideal to those who prefer timely Android updates more than anything else.

And we can’t forget pricing too, seeing that’s always a constant driving force in making any smartphone purchase decision. The Sense 5 packing HTC One is available by most carriers and retailers for $200 on-contract or less. Obviously, you’ll be saving a considerable amount of money in the short term, but you’ll be locked into a contract for 2 years. If that’s not your forte, then the Google Play Edition will be your cup of tea instead – albeit, you’ll have to fork over $600 to earn it outright.

HTC One Google Play Edition vs HTC One: