HTC Amaze 4G vs Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket: Who Will Win 4G Smartphone Battle?

HTC Amaze 4G, which was released in October for T-Mobile, is expected to see or give stiff competition to Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket, which is a Long Term Evolution (LTE) version of the Galaxy S2 and debuted Nov 6 in AT&T network.

The HTC smartphone, which has a 4.3-inch screen, comes with 42 Mbps over T-Mobile's network. Amaze 4G, which is available in black and white colors, is priced at $299.99 with a 2-year T-Mobile contract.

Amaze 4G, which runs on Google's Android 2.3.4 Gingerbread OS, is adorned with dual-core 1.5 GHz Scorpion CPU, Adreno 220 GPU, 4.3-inch S-LCD capacitive display, 1 GB of RAM, and 16 GB of internal memory that could be expandable up to 32 GB microSD card.

HTC has already confirmed that Amaze 4G will be getting Google Inc.'s latest smartphone operating system Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich in 2012. The HTC smartphone has 8-megapixel dual-LED flash camera with 1080p video capture and 2-megapixel front-facing camera for video chat.

Amaze 4G touts a 4.3-inch S-LCD Gorilla glass touch screen with 960 x 540 pixels resolution at about 256 ppi pixel density. It comes with 130 x 65.6 x 11.8 mm dimension and weighs 172.9 grams.

On the other hand, the Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket runs on Google Inc.'s Android 2.3.5 Gingerbread OS. AT&T announced in the launch event that Skyrocket would receive an update to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich sometime in 2012.

The Skyrocket has a Scorpion dual-core processor, Adreno 220 GPU, Qualcomm APQ8060 Snapdragon chipset, 4.5-inch Super AMOLED (active-matrix organic LED) Plus display, 1GB of RAM, 16GB of internal memory, 4G LTE support, an 8 megapixel rear-facing LED flash camera with 1080p video capture and a 2 megapixel front-facing camera for video calls.

Let's look at the specifications of Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket vis-à-vis HTC Amaze 4G.

Display: Skyrocket touts a 4.5-inch Super AMOLED Plus Gorilla Glass display with a resolution of 800 x 480 pixels and about 207 ppi pixel density. On the other hand, Amaze 4G sports a 4.3-inch Super-LCD capacitive touchscreen with qHD resolution of 960 x 540 pixels with about 256 pixels per inch (ppi) density.

Size: Skyrocket comes with 129.8 x 68.8 x 9.5 mm dimension and weighs 130.5 grams while Amaze 4G has 130 x 65.6 x 11.8 mm dimension and weighs 172.9 grams.

Processor: Skyrocket features a 1.5 GHz Scorpion dual-core processor, Adreno 220 GPU, Qualcomm APQ8060 Snapdragon chipset with 1GB RAM. Amaze 4G packs a 1.5 GHz Scorpion dual-core processor, Adreno 220 GPU with 1GB RAM.

User Interface: Skyrocket comes with Samsung's TouchWiz 4.0 version user interface while Amaze 4G has HTC Sense 3.0 version.

Camera: Both smartphones sport rear-facing 8 megapixel cameras and additional 2-megapixel cameras for video chat. Skyrocket has 3264x2448 pixels, autofocus, LED flash in the rear camera with 1080p video capture capability while Amaze 4G has 3264x2448 pixels, autofocus, dual-LED flash with 1080p video capture.

Camera Features: Skyrocket has geo-tagging, touch focus, face and smile detection, and image stabilization. On the other hand, Amaze 4G has geo-tagging, touch-focus, face detection, SmartShot, BurstShot, SweepShot, and ClearShot.

3G/4G: Skyrocket has HSDPA 21 Mbps, HSUPA 5.76 Mbps and supports 4G LTE while Amaze 4G has HSDPA 42 Mbps and HSUPA.

Operating System: Both the smartphones have Android 2.3 Gingerbread operating system with both promised Google Inc.'s latest smartphone OS, Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. Android 4.0 is a combination of Gingerbread and Honeycomb in one unit.

Android's Head of Engineering Mike Claren has announced the new OS as Google's most ambitious release to date. The newest features include widgets in a new tab, a customizable launcher, Gmail with offline search with a two-line preview and new action bar at the bottom, better voice integration, improved copy and paste and a new tabbed Web browser that allows up to 16 tabs.

WLAN/Bluetooth/USB: Both the smartphones have Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, DLNA, NFC, and microUSB 2.0 version (MHL). Skyrocket additionally has Wi-Fi Direct, Wi-Fi hotspot, Bluetooth 3.0 version+HS and USB On-the-go, while Amaze 4G has Bluetooth 3.0 version with A2DP, EDR.

Storage: Both the smartphones have a fixed 16 GB of internal storage and expandable via microSD card of up to 32 GB.

Battery: Skyrocket comes with a standard Li-ion 1850 mAh battery that gives up to 7 hours talk time and up to 256 hours of standby. Amaze 4G, on the other hand, has a standard 1730 mAh battery that gives up to 6 hours of talk time and up to 265 hours of standby.

Pricing: Amaze 4G is priced at $299.99 with a two-year T-Mobile contract while it is available at $199.99 in Best Buy and Amazon.com. On the other hand, Skyrocket is priced at $149.99 with a two-year AT&T contract in selected areas.

Additional Features: Skyrocket has accelerometer, gyro, proximity, compass sensors, Assisted GPS, Adobe Flash, active noise cancellation with dedicated mic, SNS integration, MP4/DivX/XviD/WMV/H.264/H.263 player, MP3/WAV/eAAC+/AC3/FLAC player, Google Search, Maps, Gmail, YouTube, Calendar, Google Talk, and Picasa integration.

On the other hand, Amaze 4G has accelerometer, proximity, compass sensors, stereo FM radio with RDS, SRS sound enhancement, assisted GPS, Adobe Flash, active noise cancellation with dedicated mic, TV-out (via MHL A/V link), SNS integration, Google Search, Maps, Gmail, YouTube, Google Talk, Picasa integration, MP3/AAC+/WAV/WMA player, and MP4/H.263/H.264/WMV player.

Editors' Rating: Both the smartphones scored 4 out of 5 stars in CNET editors' rating. PCMag has a score of 4.5 out of 5 stars for Skyrocket, much better than 4 stars for Amaze 4G.

Editors' Review of Skyrocket: If you live in an area that gets AT&T's LTE network, we highly recommend the powerful and beautiful Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket, according to CNET.

The Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket offers blistering LTE data speeds, a massive screen, and very fast dual-core performance, according to PCMag.

Editors' Review of Amaze 4G: The HTC Amaze 4G is a beautifully designed and fast Android smartphone, with some advanced camera features, but don't go ditching your point-and-shoot camera just yet, according to CNET.

The HTC Amaze 4G has a big beautiful screen, a great camera, and fast HSPA+ 42 speeds, making it a top choice for Android smartphones on T-Mobile, according to PCMag.