HTC Thunderbolt Review: The First Verizon 4G LTE Smartphone
by Brian Klug on April 27, 2011 12:12 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- HTC
- Verizon
- LTE
- 4G
- Android
- HTC Thunderbolt
- Mobile
- MDM9600
- MSM8655
Conclusion
The Thunderbolt reminds me of the EVO, and otherwise shares design language with all of HTC’s 4.3” form factor smartphones. The comparisons are so completely obvious that it’s almost pointless stating all of them. It’s a phone packed with latest and greatest cellular connectivity that actually does a very good job at disguising the number of design challenges doing so poses. LTE is easily an order of magnitude faster than EVDO, and if you're as obsessed with cellular network throughput as I am, the added thickness and reduced battery life are absolutely worth it.
I’ve talked a lot about thickness and weight, but at the end of the day the Thunderbolt is entirely pocketable and feels great in the hand. Despite not being metal and unibody like the Desire HD, the phone feels sturdy and build quality isn’t going to disappoint. It’s almost unfair to make size and weight comparisons against devices that are primarily built around one transceiver and a SoC.
That said, there’s no getting around issues such as battery life and the fact that though the Thunderbolt is the current latest and greatest, it still lacks dual core and a qHD screen. Those two features are going to be must-have in the next set of refreshes from HTC, and as a result makes the Thunderbolt almost feel a bit delayed. Battery life can be doubled by using the double capacity official battery, but again at the expense of adding more mass and thickness to an already beefy handset.
The HTC Thunderbolt in front of a Verizon 4G LTE eNodeB
The Thunderbolt’s cellular architecture is impressive, and its status as the first smartphone on Verizon (or CDMA2000 to the best of my knowledge) that can offer simultaneous voice and data in both 3G and 4G network conditions is a huge plus even if you aren’t in a 4G LTE market. It’s very surprising to me that Verizon has neglected to pick up on and aggressively market that selling point, considering AT&T's repeated jabbing. It’s a special extra that will likely continue to distinguish the Thunderbolt from a growing lineup of 4G LTE enabled smartphones set to arrive on Verizon this year. It's likewise surprising that the Thunderbolt isn't a "Droid" level phone, and considering the amount of unique things the Thunderbolt brings to the table, the other 4G LTE smartphones will have their work cut out for them stacking up. 4G LTE works perfectly on the handset, and is fast enough that I believe we’re back to page loading being SoC-bound rather than network-bound.
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deadsix - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
First of good review well done. I'm an Incredible 1 owner do you think I should wait for a the Droid Charge or the Bionic or snag a T-bolt now.Brian Klug - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
Hard to say honestly - dual core (Tegra 2) will come with the Droid Bionic, and the Droid Charge we will have a review of shortly is Hummingbird + MDM9600. We'll also have the Incredible 2 piece up later this week. Lots of choices coming up!-Brian
michael2k - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
How the heck do you live with that kind of battery life?sooper_anandtech12 - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
You don't. Nearly everyone I know has returned the device. They're either rocking the LTE OnOff app to manually switch back and forth. Or it's sitting on a VZW shelf ready as a refurb device. Most people can't live with this kind of battery life. The guy who works in my office went off and bought an extended battery. It's seriously JITT. Makes a heavier and fat phone even more heavy and fat.hans007 - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
i've had the tbolt for almost a month now.the battery life is really not that bad, i don't even turn off LTE and it makes it easily through a day.
you do have to charge it every day, but if you don't have like 700 widgets running it seems fine.
I had a G1 and a ton of other android phones. It really doesn't do much worse than the G2 I had, and it gets i'd say much better battery life than the G1 did. The only phone i've owned tha twas a lot better battery wise were a mytouch 3g slide and a optimus V which both happen to have basically the same arm11 600mhz "budget" 45nm cpu and much smaller screens.
HangFire - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
I have a Thunderbolt. If I start the day with a full charge, make and take several calls, check e-mail and read e-mail hourly, and do a little surfing after dinner, the battery indicator is still green when I plug it in for the night.I took a trip to a neighboring city, forgot my charger, used Google Navigate satnav for an hour driving, used Google maps repeatedly, made and received several calls, used satnav an hour on the way home, after 9 hours it was just getting into the yellow.
Battery life is not ideal or a selling point, but it is a usable phone.
guoxing - Friday, June 24, 2011 - link
it's really a good cell phone if you want to buy it i suggest you go http://www.2011bestphone.com/?p=95 to knowAnnonymousCoward - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
Why are so many smartphones advertised with that stupid huge flip clock...cmdrdredd - Thursday, April 28, 2011 - link
It's standard on HTC phones that's why. It's part of the UI they build into the base OS. If I am not mistaken it's a widget that you can turn off if you prefer.dagamer34 - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
So it's a first-gen phone with some nice hardware, but ultimately something you wouldn't want to stick around with too long after 2nd and 3rd gen chipsets arrive with integrated GSM / CDMA / LTE solutions.My personal opinion? LTE is nice, but I'd stick to USB modems and mobile hotspots and go from there. Transition over to an integrated LTE smartphone once a) the OS fully supports it and b) there isn't crazy power drain.