We’re sitting patiently at HTC’s NYC Media Event at this very moment, itching in anticipating for what we expect to be the official debut of HTC’s latest Android flagship. Originally leaked as the M7, the alleged HTC One is set to be one of the most important phones HTC has ever brought to market.
2012 was a very dreary year for the Taiwanese phone maker, as handsets like the Galaxy Note II, Galaxy S III and iPhone 5 stole away attention and valuable market share. But the HTC One aims to reverse all that, with a brand new iteration of HTC’s Sense overlay, as well as a revamped design language which deters greatly from HTC’s usual style.
We’re about to get started in just a few minutes. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the show!
HTC Corp, (TAIEX: 2498) produces smartphones running the Android and Windows Phone 7 operating systems for themselves and as an OEM to other manufacturers. Since launching its own brand in late 2006, the company has introduced dozens of HTC-branded products around the world. The company recently introduced the HTC diamond to compete with Apple’s iPhone. Founded in 1997 by Cher Wang, Chairwoman, and H T Cho - former CEO who is a chairman now, HTC made its name as...
Thanks for tuning in guys. We’ll hit you with initial impressions in a few minutes.
opening up curtains for hands-ons and food!
Looks like we’re done.
available in march.
launching to 80 carriers. t-mobile, best buy, sprint, and ATT.
“The HTC One is the best phone ever made.”
Mike Woodward, HTC’s America’s President on stage.
Has a matte aluminum finish.
HTC One edges taper to less than 4mm.
video package over.
video package.
By the way, here’s the full skinny on the newly-revealed HTC One: http://techcrunch.com/2013/02/19/htc-one-official/
broke down the barrier of having to have non-metallic pieces for antenna connectivity.
“no extraneous details. pure lines and surfaces.”
Followed three guiding principles: simple, crafted, and human.
Ok, now the design lead is talking about design.
Zoe gives you the most flexibility later. Combine a series of shots into a single image. Remove unwanted people and objects.
You can send highlight videos through FB, Youtube or email.
To shuffle content, just hit remix.
Highlight movies automatically set pictures to music, and add transitions and cross fades. you can choose themes.”
You can also add filters.
HTC One automatically pulls Zoes, photos and videos and creates highlight reel movies on its own. You do nothing.
“looking at a living gallery instead of static photos.”
Introducing Zoe. “Brings your photos to life: automatically captures hi-res photos and video at the same time.”
Talking about the history of photography.
THe HTC One delivers better images in lower light. Shows competition’s images.
the UltraPixel Camera is a real thing. ultrapixels gather 300 percent more light than traditional sensors.
“The megapixel race became a sales quality.”
Video package on camera.
Entirely new approach to camera technology. Pulls up a David Pogue quote about how important the pixel size is, opposed to amount of pixels.
The ability to switch between front and back cameras by swiping on the screen. Seems arbitrary.
Moving on to camera.
Sense TV is here on HTC One, integrated with the cloud. Revamped interface to help you navigate to the shows you like.
He’s talking about noise cancellation on phone calls. “When you’re making a call, phone monitors ambient noise and adjusts frequency response.”
“HTC One uses two mics to produce clear, undistorted high-quality audio.”
Moving on to sound capture, for recording videos.
They designed a new cloud-centric music player. When you’re listening to the song you can look at lyrics in real time along with the music. Seems a lot like Shazam’s player.
“Increases volume and gives you clearer sound than ever before.”
I love when they do smartphone audio demoes pulled through the venue sound system.
HTC One has something called “boom” sound. powerful beats amplifier and dual-speakers that deliver true stereo.
Now he’s talking audio. “smartphone speakers are always awful.”
“Blink Feed is just the start.”
He’s talking about Blink Feed: add or remove topics or areas of interest from the menu, meaning you can filter sports or social.
More on Blink Feed. “Turns your home screen into an integrated home feed.”
HTC Design director, Jonah Becker is on stage to talk design.
Mackenzie back on stage.
We hear that Zoe will be a lot like a Vine, but under HTC’s brand name. Just what we need, right?
He’s excited about ESPN, also outed a new application called Zoe.
“Technology is an advancer. We see tech as our friend. we love that sports fans use tech to make their experience better.”
He’s essentially saying that HTC and ESPN strategies are in line.
ESPN wants to serve consumers wherever they are, no matter how they’re consuming.
ESPN’s president of global customer sales and marketing, ed erhardt, is on stage.
One of those is ESPN. Big plug for the sports news network.
1400 content partners for Blink Feed.
Here’s that new feature I was talking about: BlinkFeed, which is an updating stream of social updates, news, interests.
“phone shouldn’t be built on a desktop model, but on a feed model.”
“No matter your age, we rely on our smartphones and off a constant supply of content.”
Sense has been given a redesign. Shocker.
“proud not only to introduce you to htc one, but the new htc sense.”
HTC one improves every part of smartphone experience: new design, sound quality, and a revolutionary camera.
Mackenzie is posing with the phone.
It looks a lot like the BlackBerry Z10 actually.
First thing to note, home screen has some sort of live tile or live feed type feature, as opposed to the usual icon-filled home screen.”
He introduced the HTC One. now watching video package.
“htc saw a massive opportunity, to bring your entire smartphone world to another level.”
“people are snacking on a steady stream of information, looking for creative and new ways to live and share personal stories.”
“htc has always been bold. htc has always valued innovation. htc launched multiple hero phones last year, and as you know people are using their smartphones today more than ever.”
Jason MacKenzie, President of HTC, is on stage.
That was Jordan, by the way. I’m Chris and I’ll be snapping some photos for you today.
And here we go!
To be clear, I’m officially obsessed with the British lady that keeps making announcements. Except for the fact that she keeps saying we’re starting, only to play more 2-minute loop music.
And the music is finally over — now we’re just waiting to “sync” with the London event.
“the music won’t possibly be playing for more than two minutes,” HTC’s event planner says. “a two-minute music sample is fine.”
— Chris Ziegler (@zpower) February 19, 2013
Connectivity issues with our liveblog have been officially squashed. Smooth sailing from here. All I need to worry about now is getting this looping theme music out of my head.
As a brief reminder, here’s a leaked image of what HTC will reportedly unveil today. Shouldn’t be too long until we see how close it is.
http://techcrunch.com/2013/02/19/htc-one-final-press-images-leak-ahead-of-todays-launch-event/
Hello World! A English accent just told us over the loud speaker that “we’re just waiting on a few more people to arrive.”
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