Hands-On with the HDMI Port
Sprint’s new HTC EVO 4G specs smartphone has several features never before seen on a phone and it’s a monster. The underside of the phone has a Mini-HDMI interface port.
You will need to purchase the Micro HDMI cord from Sprint, HTC, or an online retailer. The Micro section fits securely in the bottom of your handset and the other snaps into your HD television or other HDMI compatible device.
To test out the feature set I encoded a couple of different videos in various sizes and settings. Videos encoded at the EVO 4G’s 720P resolution performed the best of all the tests. The file format of choice landed consistantly on the MP4 encoding format. Videos above 720P resolutions stuttered and skipped frames more than was acceptable.
Videos stored on the phone or streamed off of the video site Youtube were all that is available currently to use with the HDMI Port. So any movies or television shows that you want to watch on the go need to fit on your Micro-SD card beforehand. Overall there was no settings within the menus or application control of how the HDMI performed.
Suprisingly applications that you would expect to work such as private streaming apps, Slingbox Mobile, and even your stored photos cannot be viewed through the connection. However, there is a slight workaround for photos if they are placed within a slideshow.
As to be expected the best looking videos we played using the phone were cell animated television shows and movies. They upscale really well because of the lack of extreme detail. Animated content as small as 500 by 280 upscaled to near perfect 720P.
Which is great since this 4G phone only outputs at it’s native 720P resolution no matter what content you throw at it. The volume of the content is controlled by the normal volume slider on the phone’s side. Also it takes several moments to switch from phone mode to outputting in HDMI mode. This causes you to miss several opening seconds of your content.
Video recorded and played back with the 8 Megapixel inbuilt camera looked exceptional on the phone’s 4.3 inch display, but a little ugly when output to a television. There was constant stuttering and several dropped frames which is unsettling.
Overall, the HTC Evo’s HDMI offering is acceptable at best. Sure it is an exciting new feature but it just has very few practicle uses considering the limitations. Possibly in the future when the phone receives a needed upgrade it will get some much needed use. Depending on your output display and the encoding settings of your video files you may greatly enjoy this feature. Right now there are to many what if’s and maybe’s to reliably suggest.
