When choosing a smartphone, there are a growing number of options on the market, some better than others. Thanks to Telecom, we got to take a look at the new HTC sensation, one of the latest dual core smartphones running the Android platform.

One of the things that impressed us about the HTC Sensation is the high level of customisation available to users. The phone offers several pre-set themes to choose from, ranging from a social media layout with built in Facebook news stream, to options for business users with built in time zone clocks. Or you could choose to customise the layout yourself using all of the different components available. The phone is responsive and smooth, the touch screen works very well and menus load quickly thanks to the phone’s dual core processor. The only minor gripe we encountered with the user interface was occasionally touching the wrong letters, though that tends to happen on most touch screen phones.

Size-wise, the Sensation is 10 grams heavier than its Apple rival, but its well balanced slim design makes it feel about the same or even a bit lighter.

In terms of the phone functions, we had no problems with either calls or text messaging, and the HTC Sensation performed adequately in all the environments we tested. Nothing to complain about, but nothing particularly outstanding either.

HTC has made a good effort to create some nice features that stand out and make use of the phone’s great quality display, even if they aren’t always of practical use. Take the weather screen for instance – available as a screen saver/lock screen, it shows you animated rain clouds with drops falling on the screen, or the sunbeams peaking through the moving clouds. Unfortunately, as pretty as the idea is, after repeated viewing it appeared to have only one graphic for each forecast, with the weather display never changing over the course of the day, even when the real weather outside did.

Pros

Nice large screen area

High level of personalisation

Nice slim design and large display screen

Cons

Screen keyboard letters are sometimes a little hard to touch accurately

Some features, like the interactive screen savers, look pretty but are of little practical use

Conclusion

Overall the HTC Sensation is an excellent Android phone, offering a fantastic level of user customisation.