Look out Samsung Galaxy Note II, there's a new kid on the block, at least if you're a Verizon Wireless customer, and that's the HTC Droid DNA. Variously rumored as the HTC DLX and Butterfly J overseas, the HTC Droid DNA is one of our top smartphones for 2012. It has a slim and elegant design and it's relatively narrow, which makes holding this 5" Android smartphone easier than you might think. It trounces the Note II and every other smartphone on the market with its 1920 x 1080 Super LCD 3 display. That's 440ppi pixel density; significantly higher than the iPhone 5's Retina display and the lovely Nokia Lumia 920 332ppi display. Colors are more balanced and natural compared to Samsung's Super AMOLED HD display and letters and images look painted on the screen, much like the HTC One X and iPhone 5. Gorilla Glass protects the curved glass display.
Performance and Horsepower
But it doesn't stop there; this 5 ounce phone runs on a 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro CPU. The "Pro" is important, it indicates that this is the quad core variant of the S4 previously found on the speedy LG Optimus G and Nexus 4. The HTC DNA, running Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean with the HTC Sense UI absolutely flies. It feels noticeably faster than other high end Android phones, despite pushing all those extra pixels. It has 2 gigs of RAM and 16 gigs of storage. That's a sore point for us: we'd really like to see more than 16 gigs of storage since there's no microSD card slot. Of that 16 gigs, our phone had 11 gigs available after installing a few apps (none of which were particularly large).
The HTC DNA has no trouble playing 1080p MPEG4 high quality video or playing today's cutting edge 3D games. Since this isn't a Tegra CPU, you won't get the special effects like water reflections and splashes in TegraZone games, but we can live with that.
More Specs at a Glance
The phone has a 2020 mAh battery, dual band WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, a GPS and NFC that's not compatible with Google Wallet. As you'd expect from HTC, it has Beats audio that kicks in when you plug in headphones and there's a 2.5v audio preamp inside. The DNA has 3G EV-DO Rev. A and 4G LTE on Verizon and it's a world phone than can handle GSM/HSPA roaming abroad. The Droid DNA has a wide angle front 2.1MP camera and an excellent rear 8MP camera with BSI, fast f/2.0 lens and 28mm wide angle lens.
The Samsung Galaxy S III, HTC Droid DNA and Samsung Galaxy Note II.
Design and Ergonomics
The Droid DNA has a sealed unibody design with a soft touch charcoal black back. It’s a stunner and feels great in hand, though it doesn’t look quite as interesting as the polycarbonate unibody design of the One X. At 0.38” it’s extremely slim for a big phone and we love the metallic red stripes on the side along with the red rear camera lens ring and top power button. The DNA makes the shiny plastic Note II and Galaxy S III look a little cheap: HTC has always been good at premium materials. Where does the Note II pull ahead? For those of you who enjoy the Wacom digital pen, you won’t find that here. You also won’t get the Note II’s neato side-by-side app view or the ability to play video in a floating window on top of any app.
Unlike the HTC One X and One X+, the camera lens is flush so the phone doesn’t wobble when resting on its back on a desk or table. The perforated red metal side strips might look like incredibly thin speaker grilles, but the speaker is actually located on the back near the bottom where you’ll find it on most phones.
The red metal power button sits on the top edge, and while it looks very nice, it’s also hard to press because it’s nearly flush with the casing and has little travel. The same is true of the volume controls on the upper right side. The 3.5mm audio jack, micro SIM card slot (requires the included tool or a paperclip to open) and two mic holes live up top. The micro USB port and another mic hole live on the bottom edge.
