HTC One SV Review

The HTC One SV picks up on the One name, following 2012’s X, S and V in what was designed to be HTC’s simple line-up of Android handsets.

Unlike the other One models, it doesn’t share the unibody design, and with the Desire line still rolling along, the SV is somewhat awkwardly placed. Is it a variant of the One S? The One V? Or is this handset more like the Desire S of modern times?

The raison d’être for the handset seems to be 4G and affordability, and that governs where this One SV lies. It’s set up against the Huawei Ascend P1 at the more affordable end of EE’s line-up of UK handsets and also sits on Cricket in the US.

But should you opt for this HTC model, or does it fall short?

The HTC One SV carries many of the typical design features we’ve come to expect from HTC. It has the micro-drilled speaker holes on the rear sitting above the Beats Audio branding. But the front of the phone makes a departure from HTC’s regular good form.

The ear speaker looks like someone forgot to insert a grille in front of it - almost like there’s a piece missing. Where other handsets in the portfolio have micro-drilled holes, the One SV just seems to have a trough, which will attract any sort of debris you might have languishing in the bottom of your pockets.

But apart from that and the perhaps odd sandwich of black front, silver waistband and white back of our review model, it’s well proportioned. The handset measures 128 x 66.9 x 9.2mm and weighs just 122g, noticeably lighter than the Nexus 4 we have in the other hand.

Lift the HTC One SV and the curved rear of the phone sits comfortably in an average-sized hand, with soft corners meaning there are no sharp edges around the back, but we found that the top edge on the front was a little uncomfortable against the ear.

The back of the phone is plastic and it’s rather slippery. It’s strokeably smooth, but we found with dry winter hands it was all too easy to lose grip on the handset. However because this isn’t a huge phone, that’s less of a problem than it would be on a larger device.

Although the backplate is plastic and rather thin, it doesn’t leave you with a creaking flexible phone. Like the Samsung Galaxy S III, once the back is in place, you probably won’t be concerned that it’s rather on the thin side.