Samsung Galaxy S2 Vs. HTC Vivid: Which Has Better Leverage With Ice Cream Sandwich Update?

Samsung Galaxy S2, which is touted as the 'best Android phone', has become even more formidable after it got the Ice Cream Sandwich update earlier in the month.

Meanwhile, HTC Vivid had a messed-up beginning with Verizon and suffered a host of battery issues, but has since been re-launched on the AT&T. It also left behind the HSPA+ reliance and shifted to LTE wireless support.

This HTC smartphone also received the Ice Cream Sandwich update a few days back. While bringing the phone from Android 2.3.6 (Gingerbread) all the way up to Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) is a major leap, the HTC phone is the first of its class to mark the first official over-the-air ICS update.

Beyond the ICS upadte, the HTC phone also boasts of some newly introduced features like updated HTC's Sense UI, Beats Audio enhancements and a customizable launch bar at the bottom of the home screen.

Size: The Vivid comes with a dimension of 128.8 x 67.1 x 11.2 mm and weighs 176.9 grams. The HTC phone has a noticeable thickness and weight when compared to the Galaxy S2, which comes in 125.3x66.1x8.5 mm dimension and weighs only 116 grams. The battery size, numerous ports and LTE radio should be blamed for this excessive girth. Whatever the reason, experts find the thickness and weight of the HTC phone not only baffling but also sorely disappointing.

Display: Samsung Galaxy S2 sports a 4.3-inch 800x480 pixels Super AMOLED Plus capacitive touch-screen with 217 ppi pixel density. The Vivid, on the other hand, sports a bigger 4.5-inch 960 x 540 qHD TFT Super LCD display with 245 ppi pixel density.

Operating System and User Interface: With the latest OS update, both the smartphones run on Android's latest Ice Cream Sandwich. The HTC phone has also received an updated Sense UI, which results into a smooth, crispy and lag-free jaunt through HTC's homescreen carousel and sub-menus.

Galaxy S2 sports TouchWiz user interface version 4.0, which is known for being slick and adds real utility to daily use of the phone. With the new OS, the user can enjoy an endless carousel of homescreens and also browse through the new Google Chrome browser.

Processor and RAM: The HTC Vivid is powered by the dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon APQ8060 processor that clocks a respectable 1.2GHz and comes with 1 GB RAM. Galaxy S2 features a dual-core 1.2GHz Cortex-A9, Exynos processor with 1 GB RAM.

Memory: The HTC packed in 16GB of internal storage but that capacity can be expanded by an extra 32GB with microSD card. Galaxy S2 has internal memory configurations of 16/32GB and an external microSD card that allows it to expand to another 32GB.

Camera: The HTC smartphone sports an 8 megapixel primary camera that comes with 3264x2448 pixels unit autofocus, dual-LED flash and a rear-facing camera with 1080p video capture capabilities. A 1.3 megapixel front-facing camera is also there in the HTC phone for video calling.

The Galaxy S2 also comes with an 8 megapixel 3264x2448 pixels unit with 1080p video capture capabilities and a secondary 2 megapixel camera for video calling.

3G/4G: Galaxy S2 supports download speed of 21 Mbps and upload speed of 5.76 Mbps but does not support LET. HTC Vivid, on the other hand, supports LTE that hovers between 20Mbps to 25Mbps down and 10Mbps to 15Mbps up, with rates maxing out at 32Mbps down / 17Mbps up.

WLAN/Bluetooth/USB: The HTC smartphone has Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotspot, Bluetooth version 3, DLNA, and microUSB 2.0 versions. Samsung Galaxy S2 comes with Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, DLNA, Wi-Fi Direct, Wi-Fi hotspot, Bluetooth version 3 and HS, USB version 2.0 with microUSB (MHL), USB On-the-go features. Galaxy S2 also provides Near Field Communication technology as an optional feature.

Battery: Vivid comes with a Li-Ion 1620 mAh battery that can give up to 288 hours of stand-by time and talk time of up to 7 hours 40 minutes.

Galaxy S2, on the other hand, comes with a standard Li-Ion 1650 mAh battery that gives stand-by time of up to 710 hours for 2G and up to 610 hours for the 3G and talk time of up to 18 hours 20 min for 2G and up to 8 hours 40 min for 3G. HTC has offered quite meager battery life when compared to most of the smartphones available in the market. And, S2 is a clear winner in this department.

Other Features: The HTC Vivid sports accelerometer, proximity, compass, SMS (threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Email, WAP 2.0/xHTML, HTML, Adobe Flash, Stereo FM radio with RDS, SNS integration, Google Search, Maps, Gmail, YouTube, Google Talk, Picasa integration, MP3/AAC+/WAV/WMA player, MP4/H.263/H.264/WMV player, Organizer, Document viewer, Voice memo/dial/commands and Predictive text input. The Beats audio is also one major USP of the phone.

Galaxy S2 also sports the same features like active noise cancellation with dedicated mic, TV-out (via MHL A/V link), SNS integration, MP4/DivX/XviD/WMV/H.264/H.263 player, MP3/WAV/eAAC+/AC3/FLAC player, Organizer, Image/video editor, Document editor (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF), Voice memo/dial/commands and Predictive text input (Swype). Like any other Android phone, Galaxy S2 also integrates Google Search, Maps, Gmail, YouTube, Calendar, Google Talk, Picasa.