The HTC 10 Review
by Joshua Ho on September 19, 2016 8:00 AM ESTSystem Performance
One of the major areas worth discussing when it comes to mobile devices is computing performance. As much as OEMs try to not talk about this, ultimately what distinguishes a smartphone from a featurephone or simple flip phone is dramatically improved compute. Running a web browser, running a full Linux OS with apps that require JIT or AOT compilation are all tasks that demand large amounts of system memory and compute. Similarly, any kind of 3D game is going to require quite a bit of compute power and memory in general. As mentioned in previous reviews a major focus for this year has been trying to make our benchmarks more focused on real-world performance, so we’ll be better able to show how the HTC 10 actually performs relative to other devices on the market.
In the basic browser benchmarks, we can see that the HTC 10 is pretty much on par with all other Snapdragon 820 devices. This shouldn't really come as a surprise given how much of an optimization target all of these benchmarks are for the OEMs and SoC vendors, but performance in general on Snapdragon 820 is not necessarily great for web browsing with Chrome.
PCMark is very sensitive to DVFS changes in most cases so it's interesting to see how closely it performed to the Galaxy S7 and G5. What is notable here is the poor showing in video playback, which persists even if you use HTC's CPU cheats which are still accessible from the developer settings. The average scores that PCMark records is significantly higher than what I can achieve with the HTC 10 unless I enable high CPU performance mode. Determining what this means has been left as an exercise to the reader.
Looking at the HTC 10 overall results it might be tempting to simply suggest that overall performance is comparable to the Galaxy S7 with S820 but when you look at the individual breakdown the main reason why the HTC 10 seems to be so slow is because the location provider in Maps is causing its launch time to be significantly higher than most phones I've seen before. In just about every other situation the Galaxy S7 is significantly behind the HTC 10. Overall, I think the HTC 10 performance is in line with what I'd expect for a Snapdragon 820 phone here.
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TheMysteryMan11 - Monday, September 19, 2016 - link
Hate to be that person, but HTC 10 is dead. People have forgotten about that phone and moved on. Sales have tanked and nobody really gives a damn about this phone at this point.TheMysteryMan11 - Monday, September 19, 2016 - link
And yes, I know I am generalising here.close - Monday, September 19, 2016 - link
So what you mean is you don't care about this review. Cool. I think everyone got it from this first comment.Now it makes me wonder why you feel the need to defend your opinion about your personal preferences with so many comments... I'm starting to think it's because you're very insecure saying this and need to convince yourself you're right. Just be honest for a second: you actually think HTC is alive an well, that people still think about it and care about it but you are fighting this feeling and you're hoping that by repeating your "skeptic comment" you'll convince yourself.
This is the only explanation for a guy trying to convince others that he know better what they want.
And yes, I know I am generalizing here.
theduckofdeath - Monday, September 19, 2016 - link
I think it's more a complaint against this site. This review would have been relevant six months ago. Still, more relevant than this site is turning into, though. :DI really liked coming here before. I don't see much point with it any more. I mean, what the eff? The next gen HTC flagship is right around the corner, few stores have this model left in the booths and NOW Anandtech posts a review of it?
ACM.1899 - Monday, September 19, 2016 - link
i think it's not that late (compared to Apple lifecycle of 3 years); some places(countries) may have just received the phone or waited for it to become cheaper or...(assuming 5 months is a long time) : he could've analyzed the sharp panel as well as the its polarization or other issues that appear after a while (some in Xda-Forums) ; or testing or introducing a custom rom that of course is manageable through Xda.
nevertheless it was a great and in depth review, as always.
ArmedandDangerous - Thursday, September 22, 2016 - link
Here in Malaysia, the HTC10 JUST became available, and looking forward to getting one!berantle - Saturday, September 24, 2016 - link
HTC 10 was available in Malaysia since end July 2016. My unit was delivered in the 1st week of August. It's the official local unit and not a grey-market import.Prod1702 - Tuesday, September 20, 2016 - link
I 100% agree. I am not sure if having the review out months ago would of made the HTC 10 sell more but having it come out this late in the game doesn't help at all.RadiclDreamer - Tuesday, September 20, 2016 - link
Yeah, Im going to agree with MysteryMan11 here, this phone is so old even my grandma wouldnt be caught dead using it.eclectech - Wednesday, September 21, 2016 - link
I read this review on my HTC 10. Today, it's still a great phone. A great phone is a great phone, even when new phones come out.