HTC Desire 516 Review After Using Some time My Opinion and Verdict.

Regardless of how many smartphones are launched in India, the inexpensive price range of Rs 5,000 to Rs 15,000 sees the highest volume. Perhaps this is why HTC, a struggling Taiwanese manufacturer, is focusing on this market after releasing excellent products in the super-premium (the One M8) and mid-range (the Desire 816) segments. Desire 516, the brand's most recent product, is smack dab in the midst of this segment.

However, being the most popular category, it also breeds fierce rivalry, with devices like the all-arounder Moto G (FAQs) and the recently introduced Xiaomi Mi 3 (first impressions) generating a lot of hype. The Desire 516 appears to be a good contender to the Moto G in terms of features, but how well does it operate as a daily driver? Let's find out in this in-depth examination.

HTC DESIRE 516 FULL SPECIFICATIONS

HTC Desire 516 Review: Staid looks, glossy body

When it comes to design, HTC smartphones stand out from the likes of Samsung's plasticky products and Sony's blocky offerings. The Desire 516 is no exception, however it isn't as well-designed as the One (M8) or even other devices like the One E8 (first impressions) and Desire 816, which have the same design concept but have polycarbonate bodies. In fact, the Desire 516 may appear attractive from afar, but once you feel it in your hands, you'll notice a significant difference.

For one thing, the plastic body doesn't inspire much confidence in the build quality, and it's quite heavy. The device is relatively heavy in comparison to its rivals, weighing in at 171g, especially at a time when manufacturers are emphasising the lightweight aspect of their products.

The smartphone is identical to any other standard ‘droid in terms of button and port arrangement. With the manufacturer's branding, the speaker grille and front camera above it, and the array of touch buttons at the bottom, the display is the focal point of the front. Back, home, and choices are the standard functions of the buttons, with recent apps being displayed when the home key is hit twice.

The power button is on the right side of the spine, while the volume buttons are on the left. The fact that the power button is metallic and the volume rocker is made of plastic made these buttons feel strange. The 3.5mm audio socket and micro-USB connector are located on the top, while the microphone is located on the bottom.

The HTC Desire 516's back panel is removable, revealing two SIM card slots, a microSD card slot, and the user-replaceable battery. The main camera unit and LED flash are located at the top of the back panel, while the speaker mesh is located at the bottom. The panel is incredibly glossy, gathering a slew of fingerprints and scratches, as well as slipping after a few minutes of use. Overall, we had hoped for something greater from the Taiwanese manufacturer in terms of design. When you add in the fact that the capacitive navigation keys aren't lighted, it gives it an entry-level feel.

HTC Desire 516 Review: The display isn't its best feature.

HTC already has the Desire 210 (first impressions) and 310 in the entry-level class, with 4-inch and 4.5-inch displays, respectively, while the Desire 816, with its 5.5-inch screen size, caters to the burgeoning phablet category. The Desire 516 has a 5-inch screen, which rounds out HTC's lineup and places it in the middle of the smartphones mentioned above. The display has a pixel density of 220 pixels per inch and a resolution of 960 x 540 pixels, which is on the low side. You won't notice any issues for the most part, but there is visible pixelation when the handset is held close enough.

Aside from that, the display is good, with sharp pictures and a wide range of colours. Because it's excessively reflective, it's not quite legible in direct sunshine, but you'll still be able to make that essential call or send that urgent text. The display, like the back, is a fingerprint magnet, therefore it's a good idea to protect it with a screen guard.

HTC has stripped the 516 of features that are now common even in low-cost smartphones, such as an ambient light sensor and a proximity sensor. This has a big impact on usability because you have to manually adjust the brightness and turn off the display when you're on the phone.

Although the screen supports up to five simultaneous touches, we found the touchscreen to be less sensitive than we would have liked, even for simple tasks like unlocking the screen or sliding the notification panel down.

HTC Desire 516 Review: At the back, there's a 5-meg shooter, but it's nothing special.

A 5-megapixel sensor is located on the back of the HTC Desire 516. The megapixel count of the smartphone camera didn't keep our hopes up at the time, when we were seeing smartphones with as high as 13-meg snappers in its range. However, we anticipated that it would suffice for casual use and social media sharing.

The camera does a good job with colour variation, but when it comes to detail, it falls short. When you zoom in just a little, you'll notice a lot of pixelation. Despite the fact that macro pictures turned out a little better than normal. In low-light situations, the gadget, like most smartphones, fails to catch the scenes well. Examine the photographs captured by the device and click on them to see them in their full resolution.

The camera interface is fairly simple, with the focus on a huge circular button for taking photos or recording videos, flanked by the option to pick between photos, movies, or panorama, and a menu that lists all of the settings. You can choose from a variety of image quality options, including colour effect, saturation or contrast levels, ISO mode, and white balance.

The smartphone has a 2MP camera on the front that can be used for video chatting or taking self-portraits.

HTC Desire 516 Review: Android prevailed with good Sense

The Desire 516, unlike other recent HTC devices, does not run the most recent Android version. Instead, it runs on Android 4.3 Jelly Bean with HTC's Sense user interface on top. The smartphone appears and functions similarly to its siblings thanks to the custom skin, however it is substantially different in most other ways.

The Sense interface's talking point is Blinkfeed, a dedicated homescreen that aggregates your news and social feeds in a visually appealing manner in one spot. Blinkfeed is completely configurable and provides Flipboard-like capabilities directly on your homescreen. The phone has a three-screen layout, with the exception of the Blinkfeed panel, which can be turned off if you don't want it. Video highlights, among other things, are included.

Preinstalled on the HTC Desire 516 are a variety of helpful apps, including Polaris Office for viewing and editing documents, WeChat, and a video player.

Apart from the aforementioned adjustments, there aren't any major changes, which is a good thing because it maintains the OS running smoothly and quickly. However, we had the impression that the OS was not sufficiently optimised because we experienced a few programme failures and detected a few spelling errors in the UI.

HTC Desire 516 Review: For the most part, it works fine, but the battery is a letdown.

HTC equipped the Desire 516 with a quad-core processor clocked at 1.2GHz to compete with the Moto G. The Snapdragon 200 chip, on the other hand, is slightly older than the Snapdragon 400 series that powers the Moto G. The Adreno 305 GPU is also included in the SoC for high-quality graphics rendering. A gigabit of RAM is included with the chipset. Scrolling the screens, browsing menus, and switching between programmes is all made easier thanks to this combo.

The tale continues in casual games such as Angry Birds and Subway Surfers, but not in 3D games such as Riptide GP2. When playing such games, there was an obvious stutter. We've encountered a heating issue with some MediaTek-powered devices, and the Desire 516 is no exception, as it heats up quickly while gaming.

The device's meagre 4GB of onboard storage is one of our major gripes, especially at its current pricing point. With this amount of storage, you won't have much room to install apps because the OS and other resources will take up the majority of it. You receive 1.7GB of storage out of the box, which can soon fill up with the installation of common programmes like Facebook and WhatsApp, leaving little place for games with large install sizes like Asphalt 8: Airborne. Heavy games may be overlooked, but the storage should be adequate for at the very least fundamental tasks such as storing camera photographs and text messages.

However, we regularly experienced low storage errors, indicating that this is not the case. You do get some relief in the form of microSD card support for up to 32GB of additional storage. The gadget also lacks OTG connectivity, which is becoming increasingly important in today's world, allowing plug-and-play support for USB drives and accessories such as external keyboards.

The Desire 516 comes with a 1,950mAh battery that isn't too small in terms of capacity. The juice, on the other hand, is a different storey, as it only lasts a day. With regular usage of roughly half an hour of calls, Wi-Fi on for checking Gmail and Flipboard, and a few minutes of gaming, the smartphone was completely charged at 7:00 a.m. and had dropped below the critical level of 15% within 12 hours. In our video loop test, the smartphone lasted five and a half hours with both brightness and volume set to 50%, which is below average compared to most other smartphones we've tested.

HTC Desire 516 Review: Verdict

Apart from the fact that it has a huge 5-inch display, the HTC Desire 516 fails to pique our curiosity as a smartphone. The specs are mediocre at best, and the lack of storage and battery life make the offer even worse. What works against the smartphone is that it can't keep up with the fast-changing competitive scene.

It can't compete with Indian handsets like the Micromax Canvas Turbo A250, Karbonn Titanium Octane Plus (first impressions), and others, which have full HD displays, greater hardware, and camera capabilities.

The Moto G, its direct competition, outperforms it with a better display, battery life, and, most importantly, a pure Android experience. New smartphones with flagship-worthy features, such as the ASUS Zenfone 5 (review) and Xiaomi Mi 3 (review | FAQs), make the Desire 516 appear insignificant.

The Desire 516 does not appear to be a good value for money at Rs 13,500. However, if the price drops to around Rs 10,000, HTC's brand power, the phablet-size display, and decent performance could work in its favour.