HTC Surround Review: A Pocket Boombox
by Brian Klug on November 13, 2010 2:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Windows Phone 7
- HTC Surround
- Mobile
Performance
Of course, performance on the Surround should be in line with the other WP7 devices, which we covered in the launch piece. With the Surround, you get a 1 GHz Qualcomm QSD8250 SoC with 488 MB of LPDDR1, and 512 MB of NAND onboard in JBOD with the 16 GB internal microSD card. Like the rest of the WP7 lineup, we’re dealing with basically the same kind of SoC performance.
I was surprised previously when there was an performance disparity between the HTC Surround and the two other WP7 devices we had - the Optimus 7 and Focus. Interestingly enough, I re-ran those two tests and performance fell in place right where it should be:
Sunspider as well:
We’ve talked in the launch piece about IE browser responsiveness on the platform in general. While panning around inside WP7 after the page is loaded is very speedy thanks to GPU acceleration, loading is measurably slower than the competition. You can really get a sense of that from the Browsermark numbers above, and the video below.
The rest of the story about the HTC Surround is that it’s indeed in line with the rest of the WP7 devices we’ve tested thus far.
Battery Life
If you read the launch piece, you already know the state of battery life for WP7, which I’ll repeat below. The HTC Surround and rest of the WP7 lineup uses Qualcomm’s 65nm SoC which doesn’t exactly help things, but overall Microsoft has done a good job keeping things reasonable. These tests are again our standard smartphone battery life tests - for call time, we place a call and make noise at both ends until the connection drops, for WiFi and 3G we keep the screen on at 50% brightness and cycle through pages roughly every 20 seconds.
Again, battery life isn’t iPhone 4 level, but middle of the pack with Android devices.
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KayDat - Saturday, November 13, 2010 - link
Would have been interesting if HTC could implement a keyboard/speaker combo. Slide one way for speaker, other way for keyboard. That way, you wouldn't add thickness just for speakers.bpt8056 - Saturday, November 13, 2010 - link
I like your idea about the speaker/keyboard combo. In addition to that, better landscape support would make this phone a much more competing product.vol7ron - Sunday, November 14, 2010 - link
I love the fact that speakers/sound quality are now being considered by manufacturers. I wish the kickstand was on it, so the screen was higher.I'm curious how big the speakers are - I also would not be too sure that the part would be durable enough to withstand a slide out keyboard/speaker combo.
Randomblame - Saturday, November 13, 2010 - link
if only it ran windows mobile 6.5 and that slide out was a keyboard. That would be the updated rhodium aka touch pro 3 I would buy.Snotling - Saturday, November 13, 2010 - link
come on now... win mobile? What else Windows XP forever? Do you Miss Pentium CPUs? Still playing Starcraft 1?aebiv - Monday, November 15, 2010 - link
No, some of us aren't wow'd by the fact with WP7 you LOSE functionality vs WM6.5.Quit being a tool.
Nataku - Monday, November 15, 2010 - link
well... legacy is a blessing and a curse, thats all that can be said for winmo6.5...im actually glad win phone 7 gets a fresh start, at least nothing to drag it's feet
a12e - Saturday, November 13, 2010 - link
only has 8 GB of integrated NAND, I believe, not 16.softdrinkviking - Saturday, November 13, 2010 - link
i can't find that mistake. on pg 2, it says 512MB of integrated NAND, and a 16GB microSD card.a12e - Saturday, November 13, 2010 - link
In the spec comparison table at the bottom of the first page for the Samsung Focus.I wish it had 16GB... then I'd have an extra 8GB right now. :)