HTC ONE Mini Phone Review.

[MI5]

I'd also like to thank the O2 Community Team for allowing me the chance to test drive a new device.... and firstly I will dispel any fears anyone may have about refurbished phones from O2.

This phone arrived in plain packaging with just a charger so clearly was a refurb, however, it was in pristine condition and fully functional without anything to distinguish it from brand spanking new.

Right, so on the the phone. There's no point in this case to cite specs as they are all covered here.

What we see immediately is a phone that, on paper, is not all that highly spec'd, however, this is never apparent during use. Not once did I witness any significant lag, battery life was amazing (typically 2.5 days between charges) a bright crisp screen and powerful booming sound from the built in speaker.

The phone itself is quite light and fits nicely in your hand. It is taller and thinner than my normal phone (Xperia SP) but one handed operation is made easier due to the shape. One annoyance is the power button on top - the side is much more of a convenient location and whilst we are talking buttons, there was a distinct lack of tactile feedback from any of the phones buttons. They always worked fine but I was always waiting for a "click" that never came.

The phone was running Android 4.2 with HTC's own "Sense 5" overlay. This is very nice and does not require my normal use of Nova launcher to get around the limitations found in many standard launchers (Samsung's TW for example), however, "Blink Feed" lasted around 30 mins before been removed from my homescreen - Some may like it but I just don't see the point personally.

The camera is only a 4mp offering but does a good enough job for a phone. The really nice integrated feature is "Zoe" who will turn all your photos into mini movies automatically. These do unfortunately though take up quite large amounts of storage space (limited to a fixed 16Gb on phone) so I had instant upload to Dropbox enabled and deleted the "Zoe's" off the phone every couple of days.

Finally I'll touch on build quality. The phone is not heavy at all, and therefore can feel "cheap", although it does have solid build feel. You don't get the aluminium chassis of its big brother but you do get an aluminium back cover and Gorilla Glass 3 which is, incidentally, extremely resilient to finger marks, so top marks for that.

Would I own one of these phones - Most certainly YES

Would I buy one of these phones - Definitely NO.

The price is just too high (new) to justify the hardware you get and with the limited storage, low specs and cheaper build quality I'd be more happy with this sitting at £250 rather than £400.

All said and done though, it's a highly capable phone, that is good looking, nice to hold, easy to use, has a long lasting battery and does everything you ask it to do without fuss or bother.....

Overall 3.5 out of 5.

Some pictures taken at night in low light without flash (I've reduced the size for the forum):