The Samsung Galaxy S4 has indeed turned out to be a trendsetter. The trend we are referring to is that of high-end devices coming out in stock Android special editions. After prolonged rumours of a stock Android version of HTC One, the company has officially
announced that the 'Nexus user experience' will indeed be coming to the device.
So what do you have to trade to get the stock experience? Apparently, a few major features of the HTC One. As we had
speculated earlier, with stock you'd need to bid goodbye to the Beats Audio software and the HTC camera app. Android Police
confirmed that these features will indeed be gone. The 'UltraPixel' camera and the camera app were together a great combination for taking pictures in low-light conditions on the original HTC One. With the stock on and the camera gone, whether the camera performance will be compromised is a major concern. The report also confirmed that the Infrared blaster that is applauded for its remote control functionality will be disabled out of the box. With Beats Audio incorporated in the One, the music device on the performance is one worthy experience. Though the hardware will remain, the software with which you could choose the Beats functionality and switch it on and off will now be gone. Hence, Beats Audio will be on by default.
In contrast to the three capacitive buttons on stock Android, HTC One has two buttons (back and home) with the HTC logo in the middle. HTC has confirmed that this will continue to be the case in the Google Edition of the device.
Like the stock version of Samsung Galaxy S4, even the HTC One with Nexus User Experience would be initially available only in the United States. The device priced at $599, will be available on the Google Play Store starting June 26. The Nexus experience on the One would cost $50 dollars less than the Galaxy S4 Google edition (which will be on sale for $650).
We now have two flagship smartphones getting the Nexus experience. If the trend continues, consumers will have a wider range of choices when they go out to buy a smartphone. Earlier you only had an OS and device to choose. Now, we are moving to a scenario where after choosing the device you can choose multiple experiences with the same OS.