The Great The HTC Desire 610 has an affordable cost, its camera isn’t too good and its navy blue, plastic body is rather interesting.

The Awful it’s a quite low resolution screen that is overly dull either. Android variation and its central processing unit are just like the Motorola Moto G. that is significantly more affordable Its battery is not only inadequate.

The Important Thing The HTC Desire 610 may be affordable, with the iPhone 5C-design body that is plastic, but inferior screen resolution and its mediocre specs mean it is still not a great buy. For considerably less money it is possible to catch the 4G Motorola Moto G, which includes an increased resolution screen, Android KitKat applications and exactly the same central processing unit.

The HTC One M8 stormed its way into a glowing review from CNET editor Brian Bennett -luxury alloy layout, brilliant high definition display and oodles of power. It is a main telephone that is formidable, and includes a cost to fit. If your funding is a little smaller, but you need the HTC name cast your eyes.

Like the M8, it’s the double, front-facing Boom-audio loudspeakers, 4G LTE and the same appealing, Perception 6 applications that is user friendly. It has dramatically cut and has a plastic, rather than alloy, body -down specs so that you can keep down the cost.

The Desire 610 can be picked up now, SIM-free, straight from HTC’s website in great britain for GBP240 (which converts to $410 or AU$440). It is not yet been given an official launch date in Australia and the US, but it is anticipated to reach the US in another month.

Layout

Those of you trying to find a luxury feeling mobile with cutting edge fashion should keep on walking, towards the all-metal HTC One M8. The Desire 610 is built completely from plastic, making it feel and look like a considerably more budget-orientated apparatus. It is rather like the higher priced iPhone 5S and the difference between the iPhone 5C.

Actually, it is similar to the iPhone 5C. It’s rounded corners, with a mainly level back that curves around at the side, as opposed to the arched back of the One M8. The double Boom Audio loudspeakers above and below the display on the front tell you instantly that it is from the HTC family. They do not provide as big a sound as the main M8, but substantial chambers and their location enable them to give more clout to pictures and podcast than many telephones’ loudspeakers.

The rear of the telephone is a simple expanse of plastic – in this instance, a dark, navy blue colour – broken only by the camera lens and flash on top. It is hardly the most thrilling of layouts (I picture a hot pink or lime green variant would be more eyecatching) but I Have seen much worse. The screen, which does not help is surrounded by a thick, black bezel. It makes the display shatters any illusion there may happen to be that this is more costly than it’s and seem instead smashed in.

The bezel also means the body is a little bigger than it must be. It measures 71mm across, which I found only a bit too large to use with one hand. It is just 9.6mm thick though, which is readily slim enough to slip into a pocket. On the underparts of the the telephone is the micro-USB port, with the 3.5mm headphone jack sat on top.

The nano- microSD card slots and SIM card are concealed underneath a plastic flap on the side. I am happy to find expandable storage here as the 610 comes as standard, which you will quickly fill up with music, games and programs.

Screen

The 610′s 4.7-inch screen offers a 960×540-pixel resolution, resulting in a pixel density of 234 pixels per inch (ppi). That is really quite unsatisfactory, despite its cost that is affordable. The 4G Moto G’s 4.5-inch screen has a 720p display, with a pixel density of 326ppi – and that can be picked up for only GBP150.

The screen, unsurprisingly, is not quite clear. Text and icon borders do not have the same clarity you’d find on the Moto G, or really the complete-High Definition HTC One M8. The 610 actually is not economical for this low a resolution to be okay while it is less expensive than its main brother.

It is not a particularly glowing display either. Even under lighting conditions that were fairly bright I found myself staring back at the reflection of my own face. Under outside sun that is graphic, it is an even larger issue. It does have adequate, natural colours, but if you need to experience a Netflix film at its finest, locate a dark room to appreciate it in.
Applications that is android

The Desire 610 runs Android 4.4.2 KitKat, which is nearly the most recent variant of Google’s mobile operating system. HTC has used the exact same Sense 6 interface which you’ll discover over the top on the One M8, so it is visually different from your Android you may have seen on other, non-HTC handsets.

I am rather keen on Awareness 6, thanks to its minimalist look. It’s the same fundamental structure as any variation of Android, but the program tray uses nicely-spaced icons and can be readily customised, making locating your vital programs a breeze. The settings menu is much more easy to comprehend compared to Galaxy S5′s never ending lists of choices and the pull-down settings bar lets you easily alter settings that are crucial.

You will also find the BlinkFeed news aggregator sat to the side of the house displays of HTC. It pulls together news articles and your social networks from several select sources and presents it in a flow that is steady. It is essentially just like Flipboard. A recent change to Sense 6 lets you remove it if you are not fantastic, although it is in your home display as normal.

Camera

On the rear of the telephone is an 8-megapixel camera. Those are eight standard megapixels, as opposed to the physically bigger “Ultrapixels” you will see in the One M8′s camera. I had mixed, but usually adequate results and took it.

I was impressed on my first shot at the total exposure, looking towards the Shard building in London. The sky is glowing and under control, and there is still observable detail in the shadowy buildings on the right. The colours are a bit poor, nevertheless, giving an almost classic appearance to it, and there is image noise to be seen in the places that are dark. Likewise an excellent exposure was reached by the 610 complete and there is an adequate amount of clarity at full screen. This riverside scene is striking, with the glowing skies driving the camera to immerse the footpath. Although it does seem somewhat affected with HDR mode activated, the scene is considerably more balanced. Exactly the same holds true of the picture of a pub. In vehicle mode (top) the pub is somewhat shadowy and although the HDR style has helped increase the brightness, it is made the scene a little dreamlike.

Although the building has been made brighter hDR style has not helped keep the skies under control at all in this picture of a building. It is not a camera that is bad by any means, but, like the One M8, it is not outstanding in regions of high contrast. It is a lot more than sufficient for Facebook snapshots, nevertheless, and the simplistic interface allows you to play with settings and apply effects. Below are a couple more example shots.

Operation

A Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 chip powers the Desire 610. It is a quad core processor, chugging along at 1.2GHz, which I found absolutely acceptable for most jobs. It scored 1,317 on the Geekbench 2 standard evaluation, which is about what I’d expect for a midrange telephone. It is miles below the almost 4,000 the Galaxy Z2 reached, Xperia S5 and Sony but it is a similar score to the 4G Moto G, which I also found be enjoyably able.

Navigation around the Sense 6 interface was speedy and interim-free and it was not unable to play with the 3D racing game Need For Speed: Most Wanted pretty easily. Opening the camera was quickly also, and shot-to-shot time in auto mode was quick (although HDR rendering added several seconds delay).

Battery life

There is a 2,040mAh battery tucked in, which HTC reckons will supply up to 15.8 hours of talk-time over 3G. Based on my own evaluations, I reckon that is a little on the positive side. The telephone managed to keep my video-looping battery-drain test going for nearly 10 hours, which can be just typical. By comparison, the Galaxy S5 continued around 15 hours, while nearly 13 was reached by the LG G2 Mini.

You should have the ability to wedge a day from it however with requiring use. Keeping down the display brightness, turning off Wifi and GPS and preventing video or gaming streaming are all great means to eke out the last drops of battery life.

Decision

Although the Desire 610 is affordable, its uninspiring specs – particularly, its low resolution screen – means it is still expensive enough. It offers hardly any over the Motorola Moto G, which likewise has a quad and Android KitKat -core processor, but has a substantially more affordable cost and a greater resolution display.

The Moto G is the considerably more reasonable choice if you don’t urgently need the BoomSound loudspeakers or the marginally better camera.