HTC One A9 review: Rejuvenation

Performance

HTC One A9 is the first smartphone to utilize the Snapdragon 617 SoC, which upgrades the mid-range Snapdragon 615 with the ability to use all 8 Cortex-A53 CPU cores at once and bumps the RAM frequency. The connectivity suite got faster Wi-Fi, support for LTE Cat.7, Bluetooth 4.1 and Quick Charge 3.0.

HTC One A9 is not a flagship device, so we didn't expect flagship results. By choosing a mid-tier chipset HTC made a clear statement the A9 won't be fighting the top of the shelf devices, but rather the upper midranges.

GeekBench 3 puts to the test the multi-core performance of the octa-core processor of the One A9. It's a quad-core 1.5 GHz Cortex-A53 & quad-core 1.2 GHz Cortex-A53 actually, but unlike the Snapdragon 615 chips, the S617 can use all of those cores simultaneously. The final result is a noticeable performance increase over the S615 devices (Oppo R1x and R7, vivo X5Pro), while the A9 is also very close to the hexa-core CPU of the Snapdragon 808 (LG G4, Xiaomi Mi 4c) and the Helio X10 chip performance (Xperia M5).

GeekBench 3

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S6
  5215
• Meizu MX5
  5110
• OnePlus 2
  4429
• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  3796
• HTC One M9
  3761
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  3554
• LG G4
  3509
• Huawei P8
  3380
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  3321
• HTC One A9
  3209
• Apple iPhone 6
  2924
• Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
  2856
• Oppo R7
  2683
• Oppo R1x
  2507
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  2298
• vivo X5Pro
  2241
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  1460

AnTuTu 5 gauges CPU, GPU and memory performance and the HTC One A9 outs mid-range scores, as expected. It does the same as the Snapdragon 801-packing Xperia Z3 Compact and the Helio X10-powered Xperia M5. The S808 and S810 chips are obviously better.

AnTuTu 5

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S6
  69396
• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  61481
• HTC One M9
  51427
• Huawei P8
  50876
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  50875
• LG G4
  49295
• Meizu MX5
  48915
• OnePlus 2
  47207
• Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
  46566
• HTC One A9
  40631
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  38786
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  35582
• vivo X5Pro
  34649
• Oppo R1x
  30187
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  29452
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  21581

Another well-known compound test is the BaseMark OS II 2.0 app, which takes into consideration the CPU, GPU and RAM, but also the web and OS performances. The HTC One A9 once again came in the middle of the chart, outing similar results as the Helio X10 fellas.

Basemark OS 2.0

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S6
  1674
• OnePlus 2
  1622
• LG G4
  1584
• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  1440
• HTC One M9
  1365
• Meizu MX5
  1252
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  1233
• Huawei P8
  1112
• HTC One A9
  944
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  860
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  757
• Oppo R1x
  753
• vivo X5Pro
  738
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  569
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  282

Its single-core performance is quite mediocre, but so are all Cortex-A53 cores out there.

Basemark OS 2.0 (single-core)

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S6
  6306
• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  6234
• LG G4
  5871
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  5739
• OnePlus 2
  5301
• HTC One M9
  4688
• Huawei P8
  3684
• Meizu MX5
  3262
• vivo X5Pro
  2767
• HTC One A9
  2753
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  2676
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  2452
• Oppo R1x
  2177
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  2065
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  1861

Fortunately, the true-octa core power shines at the multi-core test.

Basemark OS 2.0 (multi-core)

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S6
  26799
• Huawei P8
  23676
• Meizu MX5
  22976
• HTC One A9
  19160
• HTC One M9
  18047
• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  17770
• LG G4
  17739
• OnePlus 2
  16798
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  14276
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  9979
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  9755
• vivo X5Pro
  8733
• Oppo R1x
  8683
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  7891
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  7492

Now, about the graphic capabilities. The Adreno 405 GPU has never been known of its superb performance - it was designed to serve the mid-class after all. The one in the HTC One A9 does not support Quad HD resolutions, so video playback and capturing are out of the question. And while the Adreno 405 will do awesome on 720p screens, the one in the HTC One A9 is a 1080p one, which should somewhat lower the performance.

So, both the offscreen and onscreen tests reveal the One A9 is a mediocre achiever at best, putting it next to its S615 siblings (Oppo R7, R1x, vivo X5 Pro, Nubia Z9 mini). This isn't bad, but it means you should not expect smooth performance of heavy 3D games.

GFX 3.0 Manhattan (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  25
• Samsung Galaxy S6
  24
• HTC One M9
  23
• OnePlus 2
  22
• Apple iPhone 6
  17.7
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  15
• LG G4
  14.9
• Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
  11.8
• Meizu MX5
  10
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  8.4
• HTC One A9
  6.4
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  5.9
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  5.9
• vivo X5Pro
  5.8
• Huawei P8
  5.4
• Oppo R1x
  4.9
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  1.8

GFX 3.0 Manhattan (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  39
• Apple iPhone 6
  29.2
• Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
  25.4
• HTC One M9
  24
• OnePlus 2
  22
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  15
• Samsung Galaxy S6
  14
• Oppo R1x
  9.6
• Meizu MX5
  9.5
• LG G4
  9.4
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  8.7
• HTC One A9
  6.7
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  5.9
• vivo X5Pro
  5.8
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  5.8
• Huawei P8
  5.7
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  3.9

The latest GFX 3.1 tests and the BaseMark ES3.1 bench based on the OpenGL ES 3.1 reveal the same findings.

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  18
• OnePlus 2
  16
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  10
• Meizu MX5
  4.8
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  4.5
• HTC One A9
  3.8
• Huawei P8
  3.4

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  38
• OnePlus 2
  16
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  9.7
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  4.9
• Meizu MX5
  4.7
• Huawei P8
  4.3
• HTC One A9
  4

Basemark ES 3.1 / Metal

Higher is better

• HTC One M9
  409
• Samsung Galaxy S6
  311
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  248
• HTC One A9
  132

Finally, the BaseMark X GPU test also puts the HTC One A9 behind the Xperia M5 and Meizu MX5, which are running on MediaTek's Helio X10 (with PowerVR G6200 GPU).

Basemark X

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S6
  27169
• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  23703
• OnePlus 2
  21937
• HTC One M9
  19848
• Apple iPhone 6
  17054
• LG G4
  15090
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  12096
• Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
  12080
• Meizu MX5
  10403
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  7780
• HTC One A9
  6617
• Huawei P8
  6307
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  5382
• vivo X5Pro
  5091
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  5003
• Oppo R1x
  4018
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  1897

A mid-ranger usually does average on the web benchmarks and so is the HTC One A9. The Chrome's JavaScript performance (the Kraken test) and the overall web performance (the Browsermark 2.1) are about the average.

Kraken 1.1

Lower is better

• LG G4
  4085
• Samsung Galaxy S6
  4154
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  4506
• Apple iPhone 6
  4710
• HTC One M9
  5500
• Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
  6480
• OnePlus 2
  6808
• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  7868
• HTC One A9
  11069
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  11257
• Meizu MX5
  11414
• Huawei P8
  11867
• vivo X5Pro
  12525
• Oppo R1x
  12826
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  13083
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  18583
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  25088

BrowserMark 2.1

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone 6
  3153
• Samsung Galaxy S6
  2718
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  2113
• Sony Xperia Z5 Compact
  2099
• OnePlus 2
  2055
• LG G4
  1990
• HTC One M9
  1681
• HTC One A9
  1562
• vivo X5Pro
  1509
• Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
  1500
• Meizu MX5
  1471
• Oppo R7 (retail)
  1433
• Sony Xperia M5 Dual
  1203
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  1171
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  767
• Huawei P8
  764
• Oppo R1x
  627

Regardless of whether you opt for the HTC One A9 with 2 or 3 GB of RAM, you'll get a mid-range smartphone to the bone. Its processing power is indeed very impressive, but its GPU is an average performer and may struggle in future top-tier 3D games.