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Review of HTC Advantage (X7500) cameraReview of UMTS-communicator HTC Advantage (X7500) – part one>>> Review of UMTS-communicator HTC Advantage (X7500) – part two>>> Sales package:
First up, a dedicated camera review has come to life due to several reasons. It is the first HTC-branded communicator with a 3.2 Mpix camera onboard, then the maker has implemented autofocus for the first time as well. The fact of the matter is that for devices running Windows Mobile camera has long since been considered a makeweight, being the department they have paid least attention to. Such state of affairs has led to the today’s situation when camera in WM communicators is there just for the sake of it. The talks on WM-powered offerings house poor cameras are not relevant these days since this fact is something everyone who has had hands-on with such devices is already aware of. Last year Asus give it a go and made an attempt to turn the situation around with its Asus P525 communicator armed with a 2 Mpix autofocus-enabled camera. However in that device the camera still was far from perfect and more in line with standard cameras lacking autofocus (you will have a chance to make sure of that when we have Asus P525 review over at Mobile-Review.com). All attempts to implement a camera that would be on a par with other platform, were made by other vendors. For example in the middle of 2006 Voxtel released a communicator known as the W740 with a 4 Mpix camera and autofocus capability onboard. It didn’t go any further than great-looking spec sheet, though, as that offering has a very mediocre imaging department. 
HardwareHTC X7500 – 3.2 Mpix matrix, maximum resolution - 2048x1536, LED flash Canon PowerShot A510 – 3.2 Mpix matrix, maximum resolution - 2048x1536, Xenon flash Sony Ericsson K800 – 3.2 Mpix matrix, maximum resolution - 2048x1536, Xenon flash Nokia N73 – 3.2 Mpix matrix, maximum resolution - 2048x1536, LED flash 
SoftwareThe camera interface is a copycat of that used in all the previous devices – home screen with icons placed along the display’s edge. All settings are altered in the semi-transparent menu popping up in the viewfinder mode. 
On the screen sit the most frequently required icons indicating active shooting modes. The top bar (from left to right) holds the following items: current shooting mode (camera, video, MMS video, sport mode, panorama, portrait, multi-shot), then goes currently engaged camera (main or forward-facing), selected image resolution and storage place. On the right is the counter of shots you can take with the picked resolution and memory type. 
Looking at the bottom of the viewfinder reveals Menu and Gallery buttons in the left corner. More to the right are contrast correction, exposure measurement type, flash status and white balance settings shortcuts. Lining the left side of the viewfinder mode is quite original shoot zooming menu – to zoom in/out you should press corresponding arrow (up or down) or just select the zooming icon. Top zooming level (8x) becomes enabled only when shooting in 160x120 resolution. With 640x480 pixels the maximum goes down to 4x, and from 1 Mpix resolution onwards, zoom function is disabled. Video capture is not much different – at low video resolutions (128x96 and 176x144) you gain access only to 2x zoom. While recording a clip you are unable to zoom in/out or change any other settings. Now on to the abovementioned camera settings (menu titles are given for the local edition of the communicator). For still images there are the following resolutions available:
Picture quality (affects mainly size of an image):
White balance:
Overlays:
Exposure measurement:
Snap quality can be adjusted with the help of a number of extra parameters, such as contrast settings, saturation, hue and sharpness adjusted on a 5-scale bar. Additionally you can play with shutter sound, grid in viewfinder mode, self-timer and time stamp. 
Video is captured in MP4 (MPEG-4 codec) at 15 frames per second, with sound recorded in AMR at 128 kbps bitrate and 8000 Hz. There are four resolutions at your disposal - CIF (352x288), High (320x240), Medium (176x144) and Small (128x96). Settings for video clips match those for stills, though there are some points that should be highlighted: sound recording on/off, adjustable duration or size caps. Quality-wise the video clips captured with the X7500 are very good, being comparable with those provided by Nokia N73. Apart from still image and video modes, there are a few more: MMS video, image for contact, sport mode, framed snap and panorama. In fact, that sport mode is 5 shots taken in rapid succession. The panorama option automatically stitches images, giving you quite natural photo in the end, whose junction points can be spotted only when viewing it on PC screen. 
The full cycle of taking a shot with the X7500 (starting up the camera, making a shot, displaying it on the screen) averages 11 seconds, at that 2-4 seconds are spent of focusing and 3-5 seconds separate the moments of triggering the shutter and seeing the resulting image.
ComparisonRight before getting down to the comparison itself, we are ought to make some notes. We did set out to portray HTC X7500’s camera in the most favorable light, make you realize its unrivaled quality or things like that. The truth is, it packs a 3 Mpix camera and autofocus ability, however imaging is not the centerpiece in a communicator. At the end of the day, even implementation of such camera (which is HTC’s first go actually) is just another point on the lengthy list of the device’s specifications. This comparison was made by one man, who has its own world view. And everyone sees this world as he likes. All impressions of the pictures quality and colors are based on subjective judgment of the author. You can make up your own mind with the left of the sample shots given in this review. Reading this comparison you might catch yourself at thinking “why the roster looks this way?”. We simply picked the market’s 3 Mpix leading solutions, which is quite consistent, even though these cameras are implemented each in its own manner. We tested the cameras at several sittings, though the process was extremely simply – we just took pictures of the same object with different devices. Then we moved to another place, did the whole thing all over again, and that’s how it went for a couple of days. HTC X7500 · Canon PowerShot A510 The proving ground was one of the dormitory areas of Moscow. Shooting conditions – cloudy day, snow. Settings – auto on both devices
The most notable letdown of the X7500’s camera in this case – gamma, falling into green tones. At that this goes not only for snow, where unnaturalness is more striking, but other objects as well. Sharpness is quite acceptable, but the graphics chip tries too hard at post-processing the shots. As a result all objects are clearly outlined. Zooming in one of the snaps you will need no other proof of how noisy the communicator’s shots are, compared to a digital camera. The bottom line here as follows: overall the X7500’s quality is considerably inferior to the digital camera, though if you are ready to overlook greenish gamma and contours, then snaps are quite acceptable.
HTC X7500 · Canon PowerShot A510 · Sony Ericsson K800 The next round takes place in the same conditions, yet in another place – one of the Moscow’s parks. Shooting conditions – cloudy day, snow. Settings – auto on all devices
Looking at the photos, it is not a challenge to see how differently theeX7500 and SE K800 process the snaps. Let’s take Canon A510 as the benchmark, since it has the lowest level of distortion. The X7500 sways towards green one more time, and outlined objects haven’t gone anywhere either – black contrasty trunks of the trees, emphasized graininess of the asphalt. Sony Ericsson K800 is a complete opposite to the X7500 in this respect – all images are artificially blurred by the device, which makes for softer shadows and contours, more halftones.
Now we are enlarging the area with the tree’s bark and its reflection found in one of the photos. Specifically, this shows how cameras process shots. HTC X7500 comes up with textured bark, finest ripples on the water and even some artifacts due to software increased sharpness. The SE K800 has something different to offer – barely visible roughness of the bark and smooth water surface. Another example of this kind
HTC X7500 · Sony Ericsson K800 · Nokia N73 The next session was held in perfect conditions on a sunny day. Shooting conditions – sunny day Settings – auto on all devices
Here HTC’s greenish gamma is not that striking anymore, and if the photo features green grass, then this shortcoming gets almost annihilated. But even in that case inaccuracy of color rendering is noticeable. Generally speaking, quality of shots taken with SE K800 and Nokia N73 is more or less the same, taking account of completely different approach to image processing algorithm. HTC X7500 is lagging behind, which comes as no surprise. Amplified sharpness allows the communicator to benefit when shooting against the sun – objects will still have crisp outlines regardless.
The photo featuring a lamp pole and a scrap of road exposes another drawback of HTC X7500. No matter how strange it sounds, but the focusing algorithm doesn’t detect the centre, and thus focuses on the entire visible area. But it is not the main problem – its real letdown is that the X7500 outputs 2D pictures, since the fore- and background are indistinguishable. At the same time with SE K800 this boarder is more obvious, whereas with Nokia N73 it is present, albeit barely visible, yet present. Here you can also see that it is not only HTC X7500 that “confuses” the colors. Nokia N73’s vision of the lamp pole’s top is greenish, much like the X7500.
Now here is an array of the most similar-looking shots, of course with the X7500’s greenish gamma in mind.
HTC X7500 · Canon PowerShot A510 · Sony Ericsson K800 · Nokia N73 Now onto flash in each of the devices. The main point here is to find out whether the X7500’s can make some difference when shooting by not bluntly highlighting an object, but softly picking it out of shadow. Also, this is where we can see how these devices make use of their flashes. Shooting conditions – indoors Settings – auto on all devices, flash always on
If we are to describe flash usage for each of the rivals here, the picture will be as follows: HTC X7500 – “flash” term is definitely not for this device. It is just a flashlight that illuminates the biggest area possible. Canon PowerShot A510 – the benchmark among the cameras tested. The flash gently picks out objects placed on dark background, making for visually richer snaps. The flash itself is quite powerful, yet it is not dazzling. Sony Ericsson K800 – the most “faceless” flash of all. Shots loses in sharpness, at that it is unclear what the flash actually does here. With the flash activated, the K800 puts up the greatest number of noises and artifacts. Nokia N73 – a smartphone with active flash for some reason shifted all images into blue color. Turning a blind eye to this quirk, the N73 is closer to the digital camera than everything else on our list here. Let us dwell upon photo of the apple.
Looking at this example one can easily learn about all the abovementioned traits – in the photo taken with the X7500, the apple and the table are over saturated, and the apple itself lost its shape due to superfluous illumination. Cannon’s shot plainly displays what a quality flash should be. The SE K800 features finely illuminated apple, allowing you to “feel” its volume, at that the rest of the shot is speckled with artifacts. The N73 proves a moderately lit up apple, though the color-related distortions are apparent. Master Yoda, our special guest from the Start Wars, holding a lightsaber in hands, will be our next test shot.
The X7500’s again reveals distorted gamma – in poor light conditions it falls into red tones. The SE K800’s flash made the picture unsophisticated, as all details were taken away due to spotlighting a few color spots. The N73’s snap is too brightened up. The above characterizing features can be observed on the following shots as well.
HTC X7500 · Canon PowerShot A510 · Sony Ericsson K800 The next stage is indoors shooting without flash being permanently turned on Shooting conditions – indoors. Settings – auto on all devices
Everything we said about the flash-always-on goes for this case as well. Sharpness of shots is next to equal for all cameras, at that the X7500 again sways towards red, and the K800 softens color blends and make the picture a tad blurry. In both cases images are equally spoiled with artifacts. HTC X7500 · Canon PowerShot A510 · Sony Ericsson K800 · Nokia N73 Here we will be looking at macro-mode quality, but take note that HTC X7500 simply lacks special mode for macro – neither hardware, nor even software. Therefore in this test there will be all devices, expect the highlight of this review. Shooting conditions – objects up to 10 cm away Settings – auto on all devices, macro mode
The conditions we put all participants in were too much for them – in the end only the digital camera coped with the task. Sharpness and quality of snaps taken by the X7500 turned out to be the lowest of all, just like we’d expected.
Though we should do justice to the X7500 – even for want of macro-mode, it is not too far behind the K800 and the N73, what’s is more, the snaps of the ruler and game title don’t give us an undisputable winner among these, all differences come down to color rendering. HTC X7500 · Canon PowerShot A510 · Sony Ericsson K800 · Nokia N73 The last leg of this race should answer one of the most intriguing questions – whether the camera is capable or not of taking an adequate snap of a book’s page or a document, so that it could be then recognized. Each contender had to shots – overview and close-up Shooting conditions – document shooting Settings – auto on all devices, macro mode
The digital camera, as expected, gave us the clearest shot, the K800 and the N73 share the position of the runner-up, and the X7500 with its blurred picture finished third. All snaps were then processed with Abbyy FineReader so as to recognize the text – the outcome of this experiment can be checked out below, where you can judge the rate of dropped symbols visually. Unrecognized parts of the text are marked in cyan.
On the face of it, SE K800 wins this contest with the best recognition quality, and then goes Canon and Nokia N73. The X7500 was doomed due to the blur you saw a few lines above, so the text we had barely qualified as “recognized” And here are some close-up shots, where you can look at the cameras’ macro performances; this time around the X7500 did more or less well.
EffectsThis is where you can see how some settings and effects impact on the resulting snap. We modified brightness and applied various overlays.
Here goes the part with special effects:
The X7500 sports no extra settings for camera mode. PanoramaThis mode is quite remarkable here, as the HTC-branded communicators belong to the few devices that can automatically stitch a batch of photos together. We can’t pass by the fact that it stitches shots together very well, so if you don’t make any mistakes, you will get almost a perfect panorama.
Wrapping it all up, we offer you a couple of photos taken with HTC X7500 on a sunny day.
Taking into account the previous HTC camera-armed devices, the X7500 puts up great quality of pictures. The omission with the greenish gamma can be rectified in any graphics editor. Also, we do hope that the manufacturer will solve this issue in one of the impending firmware versions or with the OS shift to Windows Mobile 6 (the company is planning to release an update pack with the new operating system for the X7500). VideoThe quality of video captured with the X7500 proved to be pretty high, being in line with Nokia N73, as it put up equally crisp picture. The only thing we have to add is that HTC X7500 with its 8 Gb hard drive does extremely well as a tool for recording videos. Video sample 1 (mp4, 6.1 Kb)>>> Video sample 2 (mp4, 384 Kb)>>> SummaryThe quality of the HTC X7500’s built-in camera is on a high level, even despite the fact that the device eventually ends up loosing to such grandees in this area as Nokia N73 or Sony Ericsson K790/K800. Though the gap between them is marginal, and in some cases everything comes down to inaccurate color rendering. All this gives us the ground to say that so far HTC X7500’s camera is the finest unit among all Windows Mobile-based smartphones and communicators. In one of the letters I received after publishing the first two installments of the HTC X7500 review, the reader lamented over lack of information for car owners in either of the parts. Now we are fixing the things up. This device barely fits in any situation indeed: it would be out of place for a man-in-suit, since the keyboard is tricky to use, and for Techi as well, due to its extremely hefty price-tag. However people who spend much time in their cars, especially in traffic jams, might find this communicator of some use. First, because there aren’t too many GPS-navigators with 5-inch display and ability to playback non-converted video available these days. HTC X7500 has it all on its spec sheet. Second, its VGA-Out enables the users to have another display or even a monitor in car. The only barriers, preventing it from becoming a “must-have” for car owners are the price and absence of a car holder from the sales package. Review of UMTS-communicator HTC Advantage (X7500) – part one>>> Review of UMTS-communicator HTC Advantage (X7500) – part two>>> Specifications:
Artem Lutfullin ([email protected]) Published — 05 April 2007 Have something to add?! Write us... [email protected]
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