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
Performance
The Thunderbolt doesn’t surprise too much in the performance category. It’s the same single core Snapdragon 45 nm SoC we’ve talked about before and become very familiar with performance-wise. Inside you get one 1 GHz Scorpion core, and Adreno 205 graphics. I’m decently impressed with the improvement from Adreno 200 to 205, but again there’s an upcoming big boost in Qualcomm’s roadmap with Adreno 220 that will debut in its first dual-core SoCs.
There’s nothing super surprising here in the performance category, but we still ran the Thunderbolt through our test suite. Subjectively the Thunderbolt feels the same as the Inspire 4G and other MSM8x55 devices I've spent time with. It's definitely current generation, but there's still a surprising amount of smoothness that dual core brings that the Thunderbolt can't quite match.
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kmmatney - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
One important battery test is how long the phone lasts just sitting around doing nothing, or walking around in a pocket. I can get 3 days out of iPhone 3GS, if I just use it as a phone and not much else.hans007 - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
this or the charge are both pretty similar.the bionic is delayred until at least Q3 . i'm figuring there is probably a reason there are no dual core LTE phones out and they keep getting delayed.
i think either of them is a good choice, if you want to mod your phone, the tbolt is already rooted with several custom roms, and CM7 is already in alpha/beta stage.
HangFire - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
Brian,It's not the BB app but the background services behind it that are persistent, particularly PVWmdrmService. You can kill it but it will come back on next reboot.
The first hit on a Google of Thunderbolt Disable Blockbuster recommends starting and updating the app, and then turning off updates from within the app. While this seems to be good advice as far as data usage goes, it does nothing for preventing the background services from starting and taking up RAM.
Looking forward to what you find on the 8GB issue.
bplewis24 - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
Brian, excellent job with the review. One of my favorite aspects of the review is how you appropriately compared it to different devices in different contexts (design, function, performance, display, etc), instead of always comparing it to the iPhone4 or always comparing it to the Evo, etc.Very objective, informative and practical review, which I realize is a delicate balance.
Kudos,
Brandon
HangFire - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
Just a note, I work in a non-LTE area of MD, and 3G (HRPD I suppose) has been working great all day.pedant - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
"That’s almost exactly double the size"...vision33r - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
Soon, all these Android phones will be 4.5"+ and pushing towards 4.7" and 5.0"synaesthetic - Thursday, April 28, 2011 - link
The 4" screen size with the near-8:5 aspect ratio is absolutely my sweet spot. Software problems aside, I love love LOVED my Galaxy S's screen size. The slightly smaller one on my Glacier just feels a bit cramped.carte247 - Wednesday, April 27, 2011 - link
Good job Brian on the extremely thorough and interesting review. There's always a level of thought and analysis in Anandtech reviews that other sites lack. Or maybe I should be angry, as you're seriously making me consider moving away from my G2 (which up until now I was perfectly happy with...).mlangsottile - Thursday, April 28, 2011 - link
Absolutely fantastic review. Anand Tech is my favorite source for detailed technical analysis of consumer electronics like this. Keep up the good work.