Introduction
Bright colors of mobile devices aren’t always a home run, which can’t be said for the HTC’s new device. Sapphire Blue U Ultra will leave everyone breathless. Right now, it is the best HTC phone, which not only has a unique color, but also has other news regarding HTC devices. It is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 chipset, which makes it a worthy competitor to other phones in the market. The thing that will draw attention to this phone is definitely its screen – a QHD 5.7” Super LCD5 display, with the assistance of another 2” display on top with the resolution of 160 x 1040. The main screen combined with a great chipset represents an ideal combination for another specialty of the HTC – virtual reality (VR). The camera is well-know from the previous HTC 10, and it’s a 12MP sensor capable of recording high resolution videos. Atop all that, the device comes with the Android 7.0 Nougat firmware. It also has stereo speakers with BoomSound and Usonic systems for improved audio quality. 3.5mm audio port is left out and missing from the U Ultra and the headphones delivered in the box use Type-C connector. The thing that is not included in the box is the Type-C to 3.5mm jack, which is not a very logical move by the HTC. The device comes in several color variants: Brilliant Black, Cosmetic Pink, Ice White, and Sapphire Blue which we have here. Let’s now see in more detail what the U Ultra brings.
Unboxing
Display
HTC U Ultra is one of the rare phones with 2 displays. The main display is QHD with a 5.7” diagonal. It is a Super LCD5 display that shows up to 16.7 million colors. Corning Gorilla Glass 5 is used for the screen protection, while the 128GB version has Sapphire Crystal Glass protection. QHD resolution on a 5.7” display translates to 513 PPI. Details about the display can be found in the picture 7. The thing that sticks out on this phone is the auxiliary screen above the main one, and to the right of the front facing camera. It is a 2” display with a resolution of 160×1040 pixels, which serves to show the weather, your favorite shortcuts, contacts and application notifications. The sharpness of the screen and visibility of the sunlight is great due to the resolution. The downsides of this screen are obvious color changes when viewing angles are changed, and the blacks are also much more poorly reproduced compared to, for example, SuperAMOLED screens. AlwaysOn display is present on this device, and it is shown on the secondary display.
Hardware and OS
Taking into account that this device came out in January 2017, Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 was the only and the best chipset option. The next HTC flagship, the U11, was announced to have Snapdragon 835 chipset, which really suits a flagship device. Now very well-known Snapdragon 821 has 4 CPU cores and Adreno 530 GPU. The chipset is divided into 2 clusters with 2 cores clocked at 2.15GHz, and other 2 clocked at 1.6GHz. The RAM is 4GB DDR4, while there are 2 storage options: 64 and 128GB. All application and games run smoothly, start very quickly and don’t really represent a challenge for the powerful hardware of the U Ultra. When it comes to benchmarks, the U Ultra scores just slightly better that flagships equipped with the Snapdragon 820 chipset. When it comes to the rest of the hardware, the fingerprint sensor is put into the HOME button, a microSD card up to 128GB is also supported, and the slot for it is basically the slot for the second SIM card. Quick charging is realized through Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 system. U Ultra comes with the Android 7.0 Nougat version, and the system works flawlessly with no stuttering at all. Everything is only a few taps away, and in general, the system doesn’t have any bloatware.
Camera
When it comes to the camera, we have a familiar setup from the HTC 10. It is a 12MP sensor, and the photos made by this sensor are among best made by mobile devices. Great color reproduction, detailed scenes and great contrast are only some of the advantages. DualLED flash is used for low light conditions. Alongside all standard functions such as Phase Detection Auto-focus (PDAF) and Face/Smile detection we have the PRO mode as well. In the Pro mode you can manually set all picture parameters in detail, and take photos in the RAW format. It also has Optical Image Stabilization (OIS). Video is taken in 4K resolution, but there is also FullHD video at 30fps and HD video at 120fps. Video is supplemented by Hi-Res audio recording. 4K video is, however, limited to only 6 minutes, which is definitely a minus for a device in this price range. Video quality is amazing with great details and a stable framerate. The front facing camera brings us impressive 16MP resolution. Resolution itself doesn’t mean much, but the U Ultra’s front facing camera brings really amazing results. The lack of auto-focus is a bad thing, but the focus distance is well adjusted and brings great results. It records FullHD video at 30fps. One of the disadvantages is that the camera protrudes from the back meaning that it could lead to scratching of the camera casing and the glass itself.
Connectivity
HTC U Ultra comes only as a DualSIM device. Those are 2 nanoSIM cards, and as previously mentioned, the device supports a microSD card which can be placed into the second SIM card slot. All modern connections are supported, and LTE speeds go up to 600Mbps in download, and 50Mbps in upload. Reversible Type-C is used for charging and data transfer. This time we don’t have a 3.5mm audio jack, and Type-C headphones are present in the box. When it comes to wireless connections, we have:
- WiFi (with HotSpot mode)
- NFC
- DLNA
- Bluetooth 4.2
- A-GPS
Battery
HTC U Ultra is equipped with a 3000 mAh battery. The battery could be bigger, however, because the phone is not really compact, and with a bigger battery it could make up for it. It is a non-removable Lithium-Ion battery. If used with the original equipment, the battery can reach 50% charge in 30 minutes. One full charge is enough for:
- around 300 hours in standby
- around 25 hours of talk time
Final words
If you like bright colors and big screens, and don’t really care for not being able to use your 3.5mm headphones or taking pictures under water, the HTC U Ultra is definitely your device of choice. Alongside all that, a great camera and the secondary display will make the experience even better for sure. Without the 3.5mm audio port, and with a price which seems a little unjustified, the lack of IP68 certificate is another big minus for this device. Our advice, however, is to wait for just a little more, and save your money for the real flagship which is coming very shortly – the HTC U11.
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HTC U Ultra Full Specificiations
