The HTC Flyer- Puts you on Cloud 9

This device is HTC's first endeavor in the field of tablet computers. Well, being a fresher in this particular market dominated by major companies such as Apple Inc. and Samsung, we would like to see how well the Flyer fared against its rivals, namely the iPad 2 and the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1.


 In this review, I'll be critically analyzing the HTC Flyer on the grounds of design, build quality, functionality and pricing after which I'll give the final verdict.

Design- Honestly, the HTC Flyer is a beauty to look at, sporting a shimmering, steely appearance which is actually more captivating compared to the iPad 2 or Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. The tablet boasts a 7 inch LCD capacitive touchscreen and three navigational capacitive buttons namely Home, Menu and Back. There is also a noticeable button which opens the Scribe application(usable only with the stylus which is sold separately). There is a volume rocker on the top and a dedicated power button on the left side. There is 1.3 MP front facing camera and a 5 MP camera at the back. 

Build Quality- The material primarily used in the construction of the Flyer is aluminium. Hard plastic is also used and it is a unibody, hence locking us out from the battery and other internal components. However, the portion of plastic housing the camera can be removed(after a lot of difficulty, lost a nail in prying it open) to reveal the micro SD card slot.

Functionality- The HTC Flyer is powered by a 1.5 GHz Scorpion Qualcomm Snapdragon processor which is probably the fastest we have ever seen in a tablet PC. Hence, normal navigation through home screens is very smooth. It runs on Android 2.3 Gingerbread, that's right, not Honeycomb. Though most tablets these days come with Honeycomb, it's nothing much to worry about, because HTC has done an incredible job optimizing the OS for its tablet. Frankly speaking, we didn't miss Honeycomb. You have the signature HTC Sense User Interface, with a lot of customizable properties and widgets which occupy an entire page. The web browser is good; it supports HTML5 and Flash. Web pages load up quickly and scrolling through them is great. There is also a stylus(sold separately) which can be used to open up the Scribe application. It's not of much use; you can take screen shots, jot down hand-written notes and just play around with various colours. You can use the front facing camera for taking portraits and making video calls. The camera at the back takes some really nice pictures and is clearly more than just passable.

Pricing- However advanced a device is, it should come at an affordable price. The HTC Flyer does the same. Well, it's not exactly rock-bottom, but you will we be very happy once you have purchased it. It comes at a price of $390(USD), $470(USD) and $550(USD) for the 16, 32 and 64 Gigabyte versions respectively. The memory can also be expanded up to 32 GB via the micro SD card slot. The stylus costs $80(USD) extra, which we think is not worth specially buying.

The Verdict- Overall, the HTC Flyer is a successful experiment by HTC and will have some very delighted customers through its elegant looks, premium choice of materials and amazing functionality. Though the Gingerbread OS is great, you can still shell out a little more dough to upgrade it to Android 3.2 Honeycomb. We are expecting more devices such as the Flyer from HTC's tablet arsenal in order to strengthen its foundation in consumer electronics.

Hope this review was resourceful and helps you buy your HTC Flyer. If you would like to purchase the HTC Flyer right away, you can buy it through our 100% safe Amazon portal. You can also purchase the Stylus.

  

Posted in: Reviews, Tablets