Top smartphones of 2013

New Delhi: 2013 was a great year in terms of technology and design in the smartphone world. Most of the handsets launched this year featured full HD displays, high-end processors like Snapdragon 800, Tegra 3, along with supersensitive cameras, and marvelous design. Overall, the mobile market worldwide saw an explosive growth in 2013 with smartphone shipments expected to surpass the 1 billion unit mark in 2013, representing a 39.3 per cent growth over 2012, according to a report by International Data Corporation (IDC).Here is India TV Tech's brief guide that tells you about the best in every category: Best build quality and finish - iPhone 5SThere's hardly any doubt about the class and build quality offered by Apple's iPhone 5S. The iPhone 5S has been designed for everyday use and to just work, not something that needs to be maintained. The phone has an aluminium case and glass screen, retaining the premium look and feel for the latest model. It is comfortable to hold, measuring 124x59x7.6mm and weighing only 112g. In terms of button allocation, the new iPhone features a power button, with a SIM card slot on the right, a ringer on/off button and volume controls on the left. There's a headphone jack, microphone, Lightning charging port and speaker on the bottom of the device. The difference between the iPhone 5S and its predecessor is the use of sapphire crystal in its home button. The change means that the home button can now double as a fingerprint sensor. Moreover, while the iPhone 5 was only available in black or white, the iPhone 5S is available in three colour options: with gold or silver backs and a white front, or with a grey back and a black front. Along with a silver edition with white glass surfaces and bright silver trim, a new gold version (above) pairs white surfaces with metallic gold trim, with a finish that appears to subtly shift between a tinted silver into a rich gold. Apple also offers a series of five leather form-fit cases ($39 each) for the three metallic finishes of iPhone 5s, in yellow, beige, blue, brown, black and Product(Red).Length: 123.8mmWidth: 58.6mmThickness: 7.6 mmWeight: 112 gScreen Size: 640 x 1136 pixels, 4.0 inches (~326 ppi pixel density)Operating System: Apple iOS 7Camera Resolution: 8 MP, 3264x2448 pixels, autofocus, dual-LED (True Tone) flash. Features: 1/3'' sensor size, 1.5 µm pixel size, simultaneous HD video and image recording, touch focus, geo-tagging, face detection, HDR panorama, HDR photoVideo Resolution: Yes, 1080p@30fps, 720p@120fps, advanced video stabilizationProcessor: Apple A7Connectivity: Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, dual-band, Wi-Fi hotspot, Bluetooth 4.0High-speed Data: DC-HSDPA, 42 Mbps; HSDPA, 21 Mbps; HSUPA, 5.76 Mbps, LTE, 100 Mbps; EV-DO Rev. A, up to 3.1 MbpsBuilt-in Memory: 16GB, 32GB, 64GB, no SD-supportBest Value -- Nexus 5Given the sheer amount of choices available in the market, it was hard to choose the winner. Google released the Nexus 5 in October, partnering again with LG for an Android flagship. Though the Nexus 5 doesn't offer the groundbreaking, off-contract experience found with the Nexus 4, what's important is the price tag. It costs $349 for a model with 16GB of storage ($399 for 32GB) compared to nearly twice as much for comparable devices from Motorola and Apple. The device offers a beautiful screen and clean Android 4.4 KitKat experience. The Nexus 5 is fitted with a 5-inch Full HD display, delivering 445 ppi. The Nexus 5 also gets a protection layer of Gorilla Glass 3. The smartphone is powered by a 2.3GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 processor coupled with 2GB of RAM. On the camera front, there's a 1.3 megapixel front-facing shooter and a 8 megapixel rear camera, which has been seeing some bad press. Google has launched the 16GB and 32GB variants of the Nexus 5 for Rs 28,999 and Rs 32,999, respectively.In a nutshell, the Nexus 5 is an amazing smartphone that offers full value for money. It comes with cutting-edge specs and performance that tops almost all of its rivals.Best Phablet -- Samsung Galaxy Note 3 Samsung Galaxy Note 3 is probably the best phablet to come out of Korea. The Galaxy Note 3 handset has evenly balanced proportions and offers the classic leathery feeling, which will remind you of a real notebook. A chrome surround peeks just around the edges contrasting nicely with the rest of the bodyshell. The Note 3 comes with a 5.7-inch display offering a 1920 x 1080 pixel resolution, giving you 386ppi. The Galaxy Note 3 is particularly capable outside in bright light conditions, even in direct sunlight. The whole phone is only 8.3mm thick and altogether it's very neat and tidy to look at from the front. Incredibly, though, Samsung has still found room for a pressure sensitive stylus, which stows in the phone's bottom right-hand corner. The stylus is used for photo editing, note-taking sketch scribbling and handwriting recognition. The Samsung Galaxy Note 3 uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 with 3GB of RAM, an Adreno 330 graphics processing unit (GPU) and is clocked at 2.3GHz. Performance is simply marvelous. The handset deftly handled everything ranging from apps, browser, 3D games or streaming HD video. The benchmarks are no less impressive, with the Galaxy Note 3 outgunning most of the competition. Vellamo clocks it with a score of 1180, Quadrant at 20903 and AnTuTu at 32837 – higher than the HTC One and Samsung Galaxy S4.Connectivity options include full dual-band Wi-Fi capabilities with Wi-Fi Direct and Wi-Fi Hotspot, and connectivity to Wi-Fi networks is very reliable indeed. There's also DLNA, Bluetooth 4.0, NFC, GPS, microUSB and MHL TV-Out.Note 3' USP is its S Pen. By clicking the S Pen, you can now run the Note 3's Air Command for access to five key buttons: Scrapbooker, S Finder, Action Memo, Pen Window and Screen Write. Galaxy Note 3 comes with a 13MP rear camera that has optical image stabilization, autofocus, face detection and panorama.Though the Note 3 isn't cheap, it is an outstanding device.Best Design – HTC One Again it is a difficult category to pick the right choice. The HTC One also won the T3 design award and the coveted gadget of the year, as well as being nominated for tech brand of the year."The HTC One is HTC back to its best, producing one of the most capable and stylish smartphones ever. It's not only a beautiful looking phone that stands out amid a lot very similar handsets, it's also a superbly powerful piece of kit," said said Kieran Alger Editor-in-chief of T3.According to Claude Zellweger of One & Co., the aptly-named San Francisco-based industrial design studio responsible for the One's hardware, says the phone's design philosophy revolves around three key principles; it had to be simple, crafted and human.The One is machined from a solid block on aluminum, each piece taking 200 minutes to carve out. It is pretty light (5.04 ounces) and thin (0.36 inches) but it feels rock solid. The curved back sinks into your palm, while the slightly angled edges help you grip it.The front of the screen is dominated by the Super LCD 3 screen nestled under Gorilla Glass 2. It's 1080p (1920x1080 pixels) spread over 4.7-inches, which gives you 468 pixels per inch (PPI).The phone offers minimal bezels. Above and below the screen are speaker grates to give you actual stereo sound. HTC opted to include just two capacitive buttons—Home and Back. The micro USB port on the bottom doubles as an HDMI port for connecting your phone directly to a TV.Under the hood, the phone comes with 2GB RAM, 32GB or 64GB storage, NFC, LTE (on the U.S. versions), Bluetooth, etc. It also has Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 600 – a quad-core chip clocked at 1.7GHz.Best Performance – iPhone 5S The iPhone 5S is clearly the master of the largest mobile ecosystem around. The iPhone 5S experience is pretty refined, mature and intuitive. Aptly called the future-proof iPhone, the new iPhone now has a 64-bit "A7" system-on-chip (SoC) inside along with a new coprocessor dedicated to handling the motion sensors provide the potential for new directions. While benefits for the average user regarding 64-bit chip will initially be minimal and mainly involve keeping iOS 7 up to speed. However, in the future, a 64-bit chip will also help bring the operating systems on Apple's tablets and mobiles closer to the PC experience. The transition to 64-bit processors first started on desktops around 2005 with a clear goal to allow for more RAM. 32-bit systems are limited to supporting only around 3GB of RAM, and 64-bit systems allow for 4GB and more.Hence, despite its dual-core processor and only 1GB of RAM, performance tests show that Apple's iPhone 5s positively overshadows every other smartphone on the market, including quad- and eight-core Android phones. The phone comes with a Touch ID system, which is terrific, faster, more secure and more accurate than entering a PIN. It is also incredibly accurate and is not prone to errors. Apple's fingerprint scanner takes about 10 seconds to learn and store a fingerprint, and the learning process is as simple as touching different parts of your finger to the home button repeatedly until the scanner has saved enough surface area to account for the majority of your print.Best Display – Samsung Galaxy Note 3 Clearly, it goes to Samsung Galaxy Note 3. The image quality experts at DisplayMate found that the Note 3's display is “better than the Note II in every measurement category, and also comparable or better than the display on the Galaxy S4. DisplayMate said the Note 3′s display consumes an impressive 26 per cent less power than the earlier Samsung flagship devices.The Note 3's Super AMOLED display offers vibrant colours and pin-sharp image quality. The 'Super' part of the Super AMOLED equation is Samsung's own twist on the technology, which embeds the touch-sensitive layer into the screen itself rather than using an extra layer on top. As well as slightly reducing the thickness of the screen, this helps reduce the reflectiveness of the display and improves viewing in bright sunlight.Best Android Phone – Nexus 5 The Nexus 5 wins in this category as it offers stellar specs in almost every area, including a faster processor, a bigger screen, faster processor and a better camera. It's also the first device running the latest version of Google's Android OS, 4.4 Kit Kat.Google's new phone is also a great value-for-money phone, much cheaper than comparable phones. It is also good in terms of performance – only a handful of high-end Samsung and Sony smartphones best the Nexus 5 on popular benchmark tests like Geekbench 3 and GFXBench.Best camera phone – Lumia 1020 Clearly, it is one of the best smartphones in the camera category. Good light, bad light, low light or no light, the 1020 takes pictures that are far superior than any other smartphone in the market. The Lumia 1020 is fitted with a 41MP camera that utilizes a back-sided illuminated (BSI) sensor that has optical image stabilization (OIS). The lens is the aperture equivalent to a 26 mm lens with a fixed aperture of f/2.2. The camera also has a mechanical shutter which will allow for sharper images and help the optical stabilization reduce motion blur.