HTC Desire 700 dual sim review: Smarts for size

Synthetic benchmarks

The HTC Desire 700 dual sim packs a quad-core CPU and 1GB of RAM. The chipset is made by a company we are not so familiar with - Spreadtrum. Their Shark chipset uses Cortex-A7 cores as opposed to the Cortex-A5s on the Desire 600's Snapdragon 200, so we expected its performance to be around the same mark as the one of the Snapdragon 400.

The four cores run at 1.2GHz each. The Spreadtrum Shark also includes the now ageing Mali-400 GPU alongside 1GB of RAM.

The Cortex-A7 cores aren't the best performers out there so we don't expect much from the Spreadtrum Shark in the following series of benchmark tests. Still, these cores should be able to outperform the Cortex-A5 cores in the Snapdragon 200 easily.

Single-threaded performance was quite disappointing - the Desire 700 dual sim even came behind the Desire 600 dual sim.

Benchmark Pi

Lower is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 mini
  166
• Sony Xperia Z
  264
• HTC Butterfly
  266
• Oppo Find 5
  267
• HTC One X+
  280
• LG Optimus G
  285
• HTC One mini
  293
• Samsung Galaxy Express
  346
• Sony Xperia C
  374
• Motorola Moto G
  392
• Sony Xperia M
  400
• Samsung Galaxy S II Plus
  409
• Sony Xperia L
  435
• Samsung Galaxy S III mini
  499
• Samsung Galaxy Ace 3
  519
• Sony Xperia go
  543
• HTC Desire 600 dual sim
  554
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  578
• Samsung Galaxy Core
  578
• HTC Desire X
  639
• Sony Xperia E dual
  800
• Samsung Galaxy Young
  831

GeekBench is a compound benchmark, which tests memory speed in addition to CPU performance. Here, the Desire 700 dual sim got the last place. The least we can say is it didn't fare well against its Snapdragon 400 competitors.

Geekbench 3

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy Note 3
  2937
• Sony Xperia Z Ultra
  2670
• Sony Xperia Z1
  2638
• Apple iPhone 5s
  2561
• LG Nexus 5
  2453
• LG G2
  2243
• HTC One
  1972
• HTC One Max
  1899
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  1869
• LG Optimus G
  1623
• Meizu MX3
  1579
• Huawei Ascend P6
  1315
• LG Nexus 4
  1288
• HTC Butterfly
  1257
• Motorola Moto G
  1120
• Sony Xperia C
  1079
• Oppo R819
  1047
• HTC One mini
  887
• Samsung Galaxy Ace 3
  564
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  310

AnTuTu put the HTC Desire 700 dual sim slightly below the One mini and above the Desire 600 dual sim and the Galaxy Ace 3.

AnTuTu

Higher is better

• HTC One
  22678
• Sony Xperia Z
  20794
• Motorola Moto G
  17214
• Oppo Find 5
  15167
• Samsung Galaxy S4 mini
  14518
• Sony Xperia C
  13948
• HTC Butterfly
  12631
• HTC One mini
  11434
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  11370
• HTC Desire 600 dual sim
  11203
• Samsung Galaxy Ace 3
  10448
• Sony Xperia M
  9902
• Sony Xperia L
  9746
• Nokia Lumia 620
  9140
• Samsung Galaxy Core
  7408
• Samsung Galaxy Xcover 2
  6650

Quadrant gave the Desire 700 dual sim the boot, placing it with the smartphone ending light-years behind smartphones that are much cheaper than it like the Motorola Moto G.

Quadrant

Higher is better

• Motorola Moto G
  8508
• Samsung Galaxy S4 mini
  7153
• HTC One mini
  6048
• Sony Xperia V
  5816
• HTC Desire 600 dual sim
  5053
• Samsung Galaxy Express
  4998
• Sony Xperia C
  4941
• Sony Xperia L
  4279
• Sony Xperia M
  4147
• Samsung Galaxy Core
  3240
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  3219
• Samsung Galaxy Core
  3152

The new Basemark X tests a little bit of everything but since we have only used it on flagship devices so far, the Desire 700 dual sim never stood a chance of getting anything but the last spot in our results table.

Basemark X

Higher is better

• LG Nexus 5
  985
• Samsung Galaxy Note 3
  961
• Sony Xperia Z1 Compact
  931
• LG G2
  879
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  172

Because of the now-low-end Mali-400 that's running the graphics department in the Spreadtrum Shark, we had to reside back to the NenaMark 2 benchmark. Unlike mid- and high-end devices, the Desire 700 dual sim GPU didn't max out this test, but it still led the Adreno 203 by 18 frames.

NenaMark 2

Higher is better

• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  56.0
• HTC Desire 600 dual sim
  38.8
• Sony Xperia E dual
  27.7
• Samsung Galaxy Fame
  26.9
• HTC Sensation XE
  23.0
• Sony Xperia J
  19.6
• LG Optimus L7
  19.3
• Sony Xperia miro
  15.9
• Samsung Galaxy mini 2
  15.4
• HTC Explorer
  15.1
• Samsung Galaxy Y Duos
  13.2
• Samsung Galaxy Pocket
  12.9
• Samsung Galaxy Ace
  12.0

To put the graphic prowess of the Mali-400 in perspective we performed the T-Rex 1080p offscreen test - the Desire 700 dual sim managed to pump out mere 3.2 frames per second, although chances are it will never have to face 1080p screens in real life.

GFXBenchmark 2.7 T-Rex (1080p off-screen)

Higher is better

• Sony Xperia Z1
  23
• Sony Xperia Z Ultra
  23
• LG G2
  22
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  17.1
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  17.1
• Apple iPad 4
  16.8
• HTC Butterfly S
  16
• Samsung Galaxy S4 Active
  16
• Google Nexus 10
  13.9
• LG Optimus G
  13.9
• Sony Xperia Z
  13.5
• Sony Xperia Tablet Z
  13
• Sony Xperia ZL
  12.8
• Samsung Galaxy S4 mini
  6.4
• Samsung Galaxy Mega 6.3
  6.3
• HTC One mini
  5.6
• Motorola Moto G
  5.6
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  4.9
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  3.2
• Sony Xperia C
  2.8

Epic Citadel delivered a very solid score for the Desire 700 dual sim, but you have got to bear in mind it runs at the native resolution - in this case 540 x 960 px so don't go rushing in comparing it to flagship phones, which have 1080p screens. It's still a good score from the Mali 400, showing why it's so successful years after its initial release in 2010.

Epic Citadel

Higher is better

• Sony Xperia Z1
  54.9
• Sony Xperia Z Ultra
  54.9
• LG G2
  51
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  49.5
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  37.2
• Sony Xperia C
  36.3
• HTC One
  35.6
• Motorola Moto G
  34
• HTC Butterfly
  29.6

Now it's time to move onto web performance testing. We start with the JavaScript benchmark SunSpider. Here, the HTC Desire 700 dual sim browser produced a mediocre showing, although it's about in line with what its specs sheet suggests. BrowserMark 2 and Vellamo told similar stories.

SunSpider

Lower is better

• Apple iPhone 5s
  403
• Samsung Galaxy Note 3
  587
• Apple iPhone 5
  694
• Apple iPhone 5c
  704
• Sony Xperia Z Ultra
  750
• LG Nexus 5
  827
• Sony Xperia Z1
  845
• Sony Xperia Z1 Compact
  855
• LG G2
  908
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  1046
• HTC One
  1174
• HTC One mini
  1375
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  1853

BrowserMark 2

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone 5s
  3549
• Samsung Galaxy Note 3
  3041
• Apple iPhone 5
  2825
• Apple iPhone 5c
  2799
• Oppo N1
  2769
• LG Nexus 5
  2745
• LG G2
  2718
• Sony Xperia Z1 Compact
  2600
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  2438
• Sony Xperia Z Ultra
  2419
• Sony Xperia Z1
  2398
• Samsung Galaxy S4 mini
  2314
• HTC One
  2262
• HTC One mini
  2164
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  1354

Vellamo

Higher is better

• Sony Xperia Z1 Compact
  2996
• Sony Xperia Z Ultra
  2944
• LG G2
  2908
• Sony Xperia Z1
  2904
• Samsung Galaxy Note 3
  2853
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  2418
• HTC One
  2382
• HTC One mini
  2252
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  2060
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  2056
• Samsung Galaxy S4 mini
  2019
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  1264

The HTC Desire 700 dual sim obviously has problems with the benchmark performance at this stage. Barely beating Snapdragon 200 chipsets and their Cortex-A5 CPUs suggests that there's a lot of tuning still required. Good news is things aren't quite so dramatic in real life and the Desire 700 dual sim isn't terribly slow - in fact it's quite acceptable.