HTC Vivid review: Welcome to 4G

The final member of AT&T’s impressive LTE smartphone 2011 lineup is at the start line, ready to impress. The HTC Vivid is joining the company of the Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket and LG Nitro HD in a bid to defend the reputation of the Taiwanese company.

 Hardware wise, the HTC Vivid is a familiar sight. The smartphone is essentially put together from the parts’ bin of the HTC Sensation 4G and HTC EVO 3D, save for its 4.5“ screen and beefed up built-in memory - it packs a well familiar dual-core CPU, clocked at 1.2GHz and a Snapdragon S3 chipset.

We do suspect that HTC has intentionally omitted features such as an HD screen and a beefed up CPU in order to maintain the flagship status of the Beats Audio sporting, HTC Rezound for Verizon Wireless. Thankfully, the Vivid is priced accordingly as well.

Key features

• Quad-band GSM and tri-band 3G support
• 21 Mbps HSDPA and 5.76 Mbps HSUPA
• LTE network compatibility
• 4.5" capacitive LCD touchscreen with qHD resolution (540 x 960 pixels); Gorilla glass
• Android OS v2.3.4 Gingerbread with HTC Sense 3.0
• 1.2 GHz dual Scorpion CPUs, Qualcomm Snapdragon S3 chipset
• 1GB RAM and 16 GB built-in storage; microSD slot up to 32GB
• 8 MP autofocus camera with LED flash; 1.3MP front-facing unit
• 1080p and 720p video recording
• Wi-Fi b/g/n and DLNA
• GPS with A-GPS
• Stereo FM radio with RDS
• Accelerometer, proximity sensor and an auto-brightness sensor
• Standard 3.5 mm audio jack (SRS enhancement)
• microUSB port (charging) and stereo Bluetooth v3.0
• MHL TV-out (requires MHL-to-HDMI adapter)
• Smart dialing, voice dialing
• DivX/XviD video support
• HTCSense.com integration
• HTC Portable Hotspot
• Office document editor

Main Disadvantages

• Screen performance is not on par with the best offerings
• At 177 grams, the device is downright heavy
• The glossy finish plastic is fingerprint and dust magnet; especially on the black version
• No dedicated camera button

As you can notice above, the spec sheet of the HTC Vivid is mostly a familiar sight. HTC have grown the screen to put it in line with the rest of the LTE offerings from AT&T.

We are not sure however, how the feeling of familiarity will bode for the smartphone – it simply does not feel like a brand new product. It is the end of 2011 now – a good eight months since HTC took the wraps off the similarly equipped Sensation 4G.