A New Phone Purchase Conundrum

I have been using my HTC Desire S for more than two years, in the real world, that's not a very long time, but it is in the world of tech, especially when life span of gadgets are very short. My Desire S (Ass if you wanna name that) has been under a lot of problems lately, which signals the end is nigh. So, I've decided this year is the year I change my phone.

This time (around March) is the perfect time to change phone every year. Why you ask? It is because this period is usually when phone companies introduce new phone technology and upgrades, and year end is usually slight tweak in software updates and rehashes. Buy around year end means you are going to get disappointed fast because it is close to brand new tech.

Now, I'm doing research for quite some time now, I've ended up with a choice of two phones. This is where the problem starts, I equally like these two phones, the HTC One and Sony Xperia Z. I didn't make my decision on Samsung Galaxy S IV because no. 1, I don't really like the phone as it looks like Galaxy S III S and no. 2, my sister won't let me get near any Samsung products (you should ask her), so I would love to forget about the S IV. And don't get me started about the iPhone.

So, let compare the two phones in question, shall we? For starters, they are both a full HD smartphone capable of displaying 1080p visuals, both are quad-core processors, LTE ready, Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean and upgradable to 4.2.

Now let's put up the differences. Sony Xperia Z has a 13MP camera, 1.5Hz S4 Quad processor, TFT screen, whereas the HTC One has 4MP 'Ultrapixel' camera, 1.7GHz S600 Quad processor, SLCD screen. Sony uses glass for the phone's front and back where HTC uses full aluminum unibody contruction, both looks very solid. And Sony UI looks more like Android skin and HTC One is customized by HTC itself called the Sense 5.

For me, specs are irrelevant to me right now, flagships are so advanced these days that some of the performances differences are not significant to each other. Right now I am thinking of which exterior looks will get my attention most. On the Xperia Z, we have a very high quality all glass construction which is magnificent to look at, it looks absolutely classy in every way. On the other hand, we have the HTC One, which has a unibody aluminum construction that set the bar for smartphone's build quality, it is also looks very pretty in silver.

The question for me now is: Should I go for the glossy glass construction of Xperia Z? Or go for the industrial design aluminum unibody HTC One? It's a touch choice. I managed to test out the Xperia Z last time I went out for a walk and find it quite comfortable, despite my small hands and the phone's large dimension. Now, I am waiting for HTC One to test it out. One of these two will be my communication companion for the next two years at least. It will be the toughest purchase decision I will ever make.