PC Magazine July 2017

There’s also the mystery that is HTC’s Sense
Companion. It’s supposed to suggest local attractions to
you, and things like when to recharge your phone, but I
didn’t get any suggestions from it during my test period.
It may simply need more time to work.
Other bloatware on the phone: UA Record, a fitness app
that’s part of HTC’s deal with UnderArmour; Viveport,
HTC and Valve’s VR app store; Boost, a memory
optimization app; and HTC’s Zoe video editor. In
general, though, HTC managed to hold off from adding
too many redundant apps. The browser is Chrome, the
photo app is Google Photos, and the music app is
Google Play Music.
The most
exciting new
feature, of
course, is the
squeeze
sensor,
which HTC
calls Edge
Sense.
HEY, ALEXA!
One of the U11’s most interesting features cannot be
tested right now: It’s the first “dual wake word” phone.
That means you can say “OK Google” to get the Google
Assistant or “Alexa” to wake up Amazon’s voice
assistant. You can even switch back and forth, query by
query, depending on which one tends to give the best
responses.
This isn’t a mandatory feature. Alexa will be a
downloadable add-on you’ll be able to get later this
summer. And HTC has some potential kinks to work
out: You’ll probably have to set all of your Amazon Echo
devices to a different wake word, or the phone and your
Echos will fight over your query.
But with the growing popularity of Alexa, it’s worth
keeping an eye out for this feature. No other carriersold
phone in the U.S. lets you holler “Alexa!” to wake
up Amazon’s assistant. And for what it’s worth, “OK
Google” works fine, just as it does on other leading
Android phones.