Huawei Ascend D1

When it comes to smartphones, the 3.5-inch screens of yesteryear are no longer the norm. These days, a phone needs to have a 4-inch screen or larger in order to catch anyone’s attention. And the Huawei Ascend D1 is representative of this current trend. It ships with a 4.5-inch HD IPS+ touchscreen display and runs Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. It’s one of the most well-equipped smartphones available on the market in its price range. But does it have what it takes to be considered the best one of them all?

With the D1, Huawei is trying to compete with the likes of Apple and Samsung and their respective flagship handsets. In a head-to-head comparison, it does come up as superior in certain aspects. It uses a fairly large high-quality color screen and runs on a powerful quad-core processor that’s not so hard on the battery. It also boasts a number of other high-end hardware features like an 8MP camera with dual-LED flash, 1GB of RAM, Dolby Mobile 3.0, and support for both HSDPA data and USB On-the-go.

But it isn’t without drawbacks. It ships with only 8GB of internal storage space—and less than 6GB is user available—plus, it lacks support for 4G LTE networks. Some reviewers have knocked it for using a mini-SIM instead of the standard-sized variety, and there are a few who have complained about it being entirely too big for one-handed use. If none of those sound like deal breakers, then the D1 might very well be a wise choice.

Need to Know: Huawei Ascend D1

1. 1.5GHz quad-core processor and Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. (The Good)

2. 8-megapixel camera with dual-LED flash. (The Good)

3. No 4G LTE. (The Bad)

4. Internal storage space is less than 6GB. (The Bad)