HTC One mini

HTC unveils the One mini - can it echo its big brother's success?

Given that Samsung has produced a 4.3-inch Mini adaptation of its flagship 5-inch Galaxy S4 smartphone, it's no abruptness to see HTC chase clothing with the HTC One mini, which the aggregation clearly appear on Thursday. Like Samsung, HTC is aiming to action the majority of its flagship-phone acquaintance in a scaled-down, added affordable package.

Not so continued ago, we were anecdotic 4.3-inch smartphones like Samsung's Galaxy S II and HTC's Desire HD as accepting a "large" screen. The aforementioned admeasurement awning now adorns these vendors' "mini" ranges.

In the case of the HTC One mini, it's a 720p HD affectation with a resolution of 720 by 1,280 pixels (342ppi). For those who acquisition 4.7-inch and 5-inch screens adamantine to use one-handed, the One mini's abate anatomy agency is acceptable to be a acceptable development. The new handset runs Android 4.2.2 (Jelly Bean). In best respects, the One Mini's architecture is affectionate to its big brother: it uses the aforementioned full-metal "zero-gap" architecture with front-mounted BoomSound speakers, an "ultrapixel" rear camera with HTC's accompanying multi-still/video Zoe functionality, and the BlinkFeed alive home screen.

The new handset measures 63.2mm advanced by 132mm aerial by 9.25mm abysmal and weighs 122g (by contrast, the Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini's basic statistics are 61.3mm x 124.6mm x 8.94mm and 107g). As for the innards, the One Mini is powered by a 1.4GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor with 1GB of DDR2 RAM and 16GB of centralized storage. It supports quad-band GSM/GPRS, tri-band HSPA at up to 42Mbps download and LTE in the 800/1800/2600MHz bands (in EMEA).

Dual-band Wi-Fi (802.11a/b/g/n) and Bluetooth (4.0) are present, forth with DLNA and HTC Connect alive media support. The front-facing camera is a 1.6-megapixel assemblage that supports 720p HD video, while the capital UltraPixel camera at the rear supports full-HD 1080p video recording.

The One mini introduces a abuse to the Zoe still and video abduction affection by acceleration the cardinal of music capacity accessible for the automated highlights video, and adds the adeptness to accept your own soundtrack.

What's missing from the One mini compared to its above affinity is the bittersweet alien ascendancy feature, Sense TV, and NFC abutment — basically for amplitude reasons. GPS is present (with GLONASS support), forth with a ambit and gyro, accelerometer, adjacency and ambient ablaze sensors.

The One mini has an 1,800mAh Li-polymer array for which HTC claims up to 20.72 hours GSM allocution time and 500 hours on standby. Comparable claimed abstracts for the One with its 2,300mAh array are 27 hours allocution and 479 hours standby.

The rollout of the HTC One mini, which will be accessible in argent or black, starts in August, with Germany and the UK in the aboriginal beachcomber of countries to get the device. HTC wouldn't allocution prices at the columnist examination above adage that, compared to abettor tariffs for the HTC One, the One mini would be "two amount credibility below".

To acquisition out whether it delivers as acceptable an acquaintance as its big brother, delay for our abounding review. Aboriginal impressions, however, are good.