TechTheDay

To kick off the New Year, HTC has announced two new all-glass smartphones powered by a new chipset when it comes to Artificial Intelligence that is set to be released in February. The first pair of the U series represents the new image of the company after the well received HTC 10, and its basic design in place of quirky features.

On top of all the new updates on the U series the company wants to make sure that users do not get distracted with the notifications, when watching and be passed on to the second display, instead of just popping up over what you are doing with your phone.

The U series notification priority will now be handled by HTC’s new AI. The AI will adapt to which apps and contacts the user interacts with and gathers information that will make up what is important to the phone’s owner. It can also eliminate information on your phone that the user seldom uses or never uses at all and can even shorten your contact lists by getting an initial list of friends from social networks the user often uses.

However, it does not end there. The phone also aims to provide recommendations based on previous choices which will build up your preferences overtime, weather alerts that appear after changes in status quo and recommend changes in your route, and may also help in extending your battery life by monitoring your movements, your commute, and the apps that you often use and their usage pattern. All these will be controlled by the new HTC Sense Companion that will soon work with the updated version of the other apps.

Aside from the AI that will change the way people use their phones, here are some more quirky features of this New Year kick starter:

• Biometric lock
  This is the first ever attempt in biometric voice unlocking, aside from the usual voice control from Google Now. The phones have a set of four microphones that stay on with a range of two meters. As the company claims the devices will be able to learn the owner’s vocal patterns which will enable them to lock and unlock sensitive data and information without using a pin or a finger print. The owner’s voice will be able to get to the locked data without manually unlocking the device. The multiple microphones will also allow the device to save 3D audio recording.


Image credit: YouTube

• Design and Display
  One phone will come in 5.7 inches display with 2560 x 1440 (534 pixels-per-inch) with Gorilla Glass5. The other is slightly smaller with a 5.2 inch full HD display with 1920 x 1080 super LCD with Gorilla Glass. Both come in color choices of blue, black, and pink which the glass provides a richer finish under the light. The usual power button and volume rocker are found on the side, with the SIM and MicroSD card slots at the top with the sleek seamless look. It has a USB-C port in USB 3.1 Gen 1 and a single speaker and no headphone jack.
• Processor
  To top it all off, the bigger phone is equipped with the latest quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor 821 that can run up to 2.1gHz, and the other is not far off with the octa-core MediaTek Helio P10. Both phones have the Android 7.0 Nougat with HTC Sense. The bigger phone has a bigger battery with 3000mAh, and the other has 2500mAh, powerful enough for its size.