HTC BoomBass Bluetooth speaker
Price: £60
Not simply a Bluetooth speaker, but a subwoofer for your HTC One (or One Max, or One Mini) that doubles as a stand. This 64cm cube is compact and nicely designed, with a bass port on one side and a driver on top, though the pronounced corners may catch on things when you're carrying it. The rubberised bottom grips nicely when you set it on a table top and the red bottom bit slides out to reveal the stand -- the lip could have been a little bigger though, the phone can slip over it quite easily.
Use NFC to pair phone with speaker and Bluetooth transfers the sound. The One has a pretty decent sound from its twin speakers already which is just as well since the BoomBass simply augments this with more bottom end. It doesn't really make the sound any louder, but it does make it sound fuller. That said, many will still prefer a speaker that boosts all frequencies in the music, not just the low end, to get a room-filling sound from your phone.
Size: 64x64x64mm
Connectivity: Micro USB charging port, Bluetooth®
3.0+ EDR with apt-X and A2DP, NFC for Bluetooth setup
Hardware: Power/pairing button, status LED indication
Battery: 1200mAh
Wired: Augments sound like a subwoofer, good-looking design Tired: Not cheap, doesn't amplify full range
7/10
HTC Fetch
Price: £35
We've all been there. You reach for your phone, and it's not there. So you search around and eventually call your number from another phone (or get a friend to do the same) et voila, there it is under the sofa. That's essentially what the HTC Fetch does. It's a key fob basically, with a watch battery inside. Once you've paired it via Bluetooth with your HTC One phone you simply press a button to set off a piercing alarm that should lead you directly to your missing handset. So long as you're not more than about 15m away from it that is. More usefully, it will set off an alarm if you go more than that distance from your phone, so you're unlikely to leave it behind. And if you lose both, there's the option to go online and see where they were last both together.
As an extra, you can also use it to take remote photographs.
When your phone's camera's on, you simply press the button on the Fetch to take a pic. Whether or not this feature lands HTC in court at some future date remains to be seen.
At £35 the Fetch demands quite an investment for something with very limited usefulness, but if you've ever left your phone on a pub table, you might find it an investment worth making.
Size: 29x29x9mm
Range: 15m
Technology: Bluetooth 4.0
Battery: Replaceable CR2032 (est 6 months)
Wired: Unobtrusive and lightweight Tired: Not cheap, only really useful as a reminder
6/10
HTC Mini+
Price: £90
Slim and lightweight, this palm-sized device connects to your HTC One via Bluetooth and allows you to control certain apps -- camera, media player and presentation files. Or you can use it to control your TV -- up to a point. You can also use the LED screen to see your call history, view and reply to text messages and check your calendar. It comes with a built-in laser pointer and the buttons are backlit, so it'll work nicely in a darkened room.
Now that smartphones are getting so big there is perhaps room for a controller to operate them. However, you'll need to have the apps open first which limits its usefulness as a remote device and the connection seems a little slow -- we often found ourselves reaching for the phone to check what was the matter before the command kicked in.
There are some interesting possibilities here, but to be really intuitive, the controller really needs to be as smart as the phone, and this solution feels a bit too much like a compromise. And for £90, that's not really good enough.
Size: 119x40x7mm
Display: 1.5in greyscale OLED, 128x128 resolution
Features: Stay connected with calls, SMS, control TV, presentation with laser pointer
Applications: CIR/Sense TV, PowerPoint controls
Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR, NFC
Battery: 320 mAh
Wired: Slim and neat, range of control options Tired: Not cheap, apps need to be opened on phone first
6/10
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
