HTC One X vs Samsung Galaxy Note

Introduction:

The Samsung Galaxy Note bully is not just the record holder in screen size among high-end phones, it also comes with a baseball bat to crush the competition, in the form of a stylus. This actually puts it in a category of its own, but for the sake of the comparison with another giant - the HTC One X - we’ll pretend that size doesn’t matter.

Once you go big, you might never look back - valid as much for banks as for smartphones now. If you’d told us just two years ago that we will be comparing a phone with a 4.7” display to one with a 5.3-incher as if it’s no big deal, we’d be recommending a full mental checkup.

Yet here we are, comparing HTC’s high-end for the year - the One X - with the phone Samsung took a big risk with and won - the 5.3” Galaxy Note. We say won, since it has sold millions to date, backed by a lofty marketing campaign, whereas the HTC One X has only been around for a few weeks, but the Taiwanese already pledged that its One series trio will receive the best marketing attention the company’s ever done too.

So which one of these gigantic and expensive phones should tickle your fancy? Read on to find out...

Design:

The Samsung Galaxy Note is actually pretty well done in terms of size and weight, considering the display diagonal. It’s bearable if you have larger palms, but we won’t pretend that one-handed operation is viable on it with anything, including typing. The 5.3” size of the screen has other virtues, but the phone being comfortable to hold in not one of them. Thankfully the handset is less than 1mm thicker than the One X, so you can slip it in a back or even a baggy front pocket, but it’s way more suited for a purse or a handbag, which might explain why Samsung threw so much money to position it amongst women, and offering the Note in pink.

The HTC One X is no small potatoes with its 4.7” screen either, but the so-called “Infiniti Display” is made to seem as if falling off the sides, despite the normal amount of bezel around it, and the phone is made of unibody polycarbonate, making it compact, light and durable. This brought along a sealed battery compartment, lack of microSD card slot and a micro SIM card, though, and those are easily accessible on the Note by just prying off the thin back cover over the 2500mAh battery, which is a huge plus.

The S Pen stylus is what drew many to the Note, and it’s not only from nostalgia. Stashed in the lower left corner of the back, it is unfortunately not very easy to draw out quickly, but you get used to it with time. There is no arguing that it is more natural to scribble down an address, reminder or a shopping list quickly on the huge screen of the Note than to type it on even the most comfortable on-screen keyboard, but in reality if that’s the only use you find for the Note’s stylus, you’d better look elsewhere. Samsung touts drawing design sketches, directions, floorplans and whatnot with it, so if that’s your thing, the Note is certainly for you.

The One X actually has a pretty cool Notes app, which allows you to doodle with your finger on the screen, and if you master it enough, it could serve as a partial substitute to the stylus frenzy around the Note.

Displays:

You have to be really picky to tell the PenTile pixel matrix arrangement on the Note with its 1280x800 pixels of resolution. You've got to stuff the phone in your face and examine solid colors like the green in the battery icon, or the red in Contacts up close and personal to notice an alternative pixel arrangement.

Yet the 4.7” Super LCD2 HD display on the HTC One X is one of the best, if not the best LCD screen on a smartphone we’ve seen to date. It just doesn’t have a weak spot. Granted, at first look the saturated colors of the HD Super AMOLED display on the Note are more appealing to the eye, but the colors on the One X are vibrant enough, too. Its contrast is very good as well, even though the blacks still look greyish compared to the infinite contrast of the AMOLED screen, which in its turn has the typical cold colors those Samsung screens exhibit.

Amazingly enough, the viewing angles are almost on par on both phones, but the One X has a huge advantage in terms of display brightness, which is pretty important if you want to use the phone comfortably outdoors. The Galaxy Note is brighter than the Galaxy S II, for instance, but no match for the luminous screen on the One X.