HTC revealed at CES 2012 its new smartphone, the successor to the HTC Titan Windows Phone, the Titan II, complete with a 16-megapixel camera, yes that’s right: a 16-megapixel camera.
The Display
The handset display is almost indistinguishable from the original Titan with the same 4.7-inch Super LCD capacitive touchscreen, 720p HD video recording and poorly 199ppi. The screen looks huge and gorgeous, and - though all Windows Phones are limited to 800 x 480 resolution , which is too low-res for a phone of any size let alone this gigantic screen. The handset has brightness output but doesn’t seem potent enough to with stand the harsh view of the sun.
The handset's viewing angles are fantastic the colors are accurate and vibrant, in short the handset has a great display.Futhermore we found Windows Phone 7.5 Mango looked perfectly crisp.
The Windows Phone live tiles are massive, and the header text within apps and menus takes up way too much screen real estate. This is almost a waste of a large display and the low-res experience prevents you from seeing and doing more on the screen at once.
Engine Room
The Titan II is powered with 1.5GHz Qualcomm MSM8255 Snapdragon processor with 512MB of RAM, which, as always, is ever plentiful in offering a responsive and smooth performance, even though it's not cutting edge anymore but the processor is still really solid.
And to sweeten the load, it’s blessed with 4G LTE connectivity to bring Microsoft’s shiny platform up to par with the others in terms of data connectivity. This Windows Phone and a meaty processor makes the comes to silky smooth performance.
Some of Android device is normal to encounter lagging sometime but this Windows handset is pretty quick thanks for Microsoft's tightly-controlled operating system. Everything seems to be fast, launching an app, taking pictures, and even the keyboard if I'm typing quickly.
The lack of multi-core support on the platform means that newer devices probably won't be getting any faster or smoother until Microsoft lifts its restrictions.
Camera
This is more interesting section as the handset has a 16-megapixel camera with a wide-angle lens, autofocus, dual LED flash, red eye reduction, image stabilization, a backside-illuminated sensor and a physical camera button, wide-angle F2.6 lens, backside illumination, and image stabilization.
HTC Titan II has a dedicated shutter button which lets you half-press to focus the shot, although you will have to press pretty hard to make the camera go the rest of the way and fire the shot, which leads to some camera shake that's hard to overcome. You can also tap anywhere in the frame to focus and fire a shot that works much better.
You would have though with this camera the image will be perfect, well with a good light the handset takes pictures with exellent detail and color reproduction, although the images seems slightly unfocused.
For all the talk, it seems very impressive on paper, but on the other hand its 720p video recording is rather dull – especially in the world of 1080p recording. Regardless of that, it’s filled to the brim with some photo-taking centric things that will appease a wide-range of people.
Futhermore the device has a on-the-go video chat over Wi-Fi with its 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera.
Apple, Google and RIM devices all now use dual core processors, meaning they can bring 1080p video recording abilities and advanced gaming to their respective platforms. And that’s all about to change with the release of the first Android-powered quad core devices.
Unlike the Titan II, Nokia’s PureView oversampling algorithm, combining the many soft pixels into fewer sharper ones so you get smaller but crisper photos.
The Design
The Titan II does not have a beautiful design as the Lumia 900 but is a well-made handset. The HTC Titan feels like, other HTC phones - specifically the Thunderbolt which it resembles as much or more than the Titan I.
The handset measures at 132 x 69 x 10.2mm 10.2mm, and weighes 173g (6.1 ounces) which is a massive change from Titan I's 160g (5.64 ounces). To be honest newer design design doesn't always equate to better. Titan I is sleeker, thinner, lighter and more elegant, while its sequel just feels more awkward and chunky in comparison
The Titan has an aluminium body of the original, Instead you get soft touch plastic and metallic finish with a single removable panel at the bottom where the SIM card is hidden. Remember if you remove the SIM the phone powers off automatically.
The Windows Phone buttons beneath the screen are capacitive and a part of the screen. Other fueatures include power, volume, and dedicated shutter buttons on the side of the phone. There is also a 3.5mm headphone jack and a Micro-USB charging socket but sadly, no docking station option
There is a Large HTC logo at the back of the phone and the camera lens and two LED flahses at the top. The phone is slightly curved upward at the bottom of the phone.
On top of the phone you will find a power button and headphone jack which is not too good as it is virtually impossible to reach especially when holding the phone with one hand. As big as it is the Titan II is still relatively easy to hold, especially if you have larger hands, obvious is not as nice in the palm as HTC One X.
Storage
You will not find a massive storage here as the handset comes with 512MB of RAM, 16GB of non-expandable storage , and there is no Microsd card slot just as majority of Windows devices.
You will have to pick what goes on your phone as you only have 13.5 GB of user-accessible storage. You may this 13.5 GB is enough but remember just camera alone has a massive resolution, one image is as large as 4MB to 5MP.
Connectivity
‘HTC’s history of innovation in 4G technology includes delivering the first 4G-powered devices to each major carrier in the U.S., so it is exciting today to continue that leadership with our first 4G LTE Windows Phone, the HTC TITAN II,’ said Peter Chou, CEO of HTC Corp.
He added: ‘this full-featured smartphone combines HTC’s design with AT&T’s high-speed 4G LTE network and Microsoft’s powerful Windows Phone software, giving people more of what they crave.’
The HTC TITAN II delivers a number of features that HTC has developed to help consumers capture photos in a variety of conditions, reads HTC’s press release, like panoramic shot mode for sweeping landscapes and burst shot mode for action photography.
Battery
The Titan I had a removable battery, this one does not, but as the battery bumps from 1600mAh to 1730mAh in Titan II. The battery isnt particularly large for the size of the handset but it does a good job.
With an LTE connection and the high-clocked processor, battery life is still surprisingly solid. Normal usage such as texting, emailing, taking pictures, and making a couple of phone calls, you will still get a day and a half of battery life. Talk time has been clocked at 4.3 hours, while stand by time has increased to 12.2 days.
Conclusion
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