Stunning design, loads of power and some big upgrades; HTC's done it again
To say there are great expectations of the freshly announced HTC One (M8) would be a massive understatement. This is, after all, one of the flagships to shape the entire season. But a predecessor that failed to turn warm reception into good sales is adding more weight on its shoulders. The Taiwanese manufacturer's confidence may've been shaken but the new one cannot afford to show it.
HTC One (M8) official photos
At a quick glance, the HTC One (M8) appears to be a solid upgrade to
what was already a highly-acclaimed smartphone. Perfecting the instantly
recognizable, gorgeous design of the first generation, HTC has improved
the latest flagship in several key areas.
The good looks of the HTC One (M8) are backed by the most powerful
hardware available on the market today, while the screen has grown at
the expense of the capacitive keys thus keeping the body size in check.
The software has received a boost too - the new HTC One runs the latest
Android version, dressed in a brand new edition of Sense UI.
Compare the latest HTC One (M8) deals
So
it's all the more impressive that HTC, fresh from making the
best-looking phone of 2013, has managed to make the HTC One (M8), a
phone crammed full of power and great features while improving the
design that won it so many accolades.The poor naming aside, the One (M8) is a phone that takes the superb DNA of last year's device, improves it in nearly every area and then packs it full of all the latest technology...and still finds space to pack in a microSD card slot.
On top of that the chassis has been retooled to now be made of 90% metal, up from around 70% last year, and the result is a brushed aluminium design that seems compelling the second you lay eyes on it.
The brand needed a reboot, and the HTC One was just that. It wasn't a commercial success in the same vein as the iPhone 5S or the Samsung Galaxy S4, but it was critically superior.
So HTC had a tough choice: make a sequel that was mere evolution, an HTC One S (wait... that's been done)
if you will, which would make the world realise it truly believed in
its design trajectory, or reinvent the wheel again, try and different
kind of impressive phone and run the risk of offering up a flop?
Somehow the company has managed to navigate these choppy waters and create something that stands astride both categories.
The
HTC One (M8) is an even better designed device that takes the
principles of the original One, expands them in the right places and
adds in some more HTC sauce here and there.
The result offers up
something that can compete with Samsung on the technological front yet
still stand toe-to-toe with Apple, arguably the producer of some of the
best-looking devices of all time.
Of course, the One (M8) isn't a
phone that's going to be to everyone's tastes. It's expensive, coming in
at least £500 SIM free (AU$899, around US$820), but that's to be
expected from a flagship phone like this.
You'll
need to be ready to pay top dollar for the HTC One (M8), but once you
hold it you'll accept that it deserves to command such a premium.
There
are other things that will put off some too: the fact that the screen
is now 5 inches mean this is a larger device, one that can take two
hands to operate at times, and it's even bigger than the 2013 version as
a result.
HTC needs to sort out its efforts in the mid-to-low
smartphone arena, but that's a topic for a different day. The HTC One
(M8) is a phone that's supposed to offer the best of the smartphone
market, one that will survive the onslaught of the iPhone 6 and the Galaxy S5, while preserving HTC's heritage and bringing the bottom line closer to something more healthy.
Through
a clever combination of technology and design, it appears the company
has managed to just do that - and in today's impossibly congested
smartphone market (especially at the high end) that's something to be
applauded.
Design
As you can guess from the introduction, the HTC One (M8) is a phone that is as much about premium design as it is about packing in the latest version of Android and a decent processor.The brand took great pains to point out that the One (M8) is a phone that builds on the heritage of last year's One, but improves in just about every arena. The metal chassis is still there, and the aluminium casing now makes up 90% of the frame, up from about 70% previously.
There will be very few brand-agnostic people that wander into their local phone emporium, pick up the HTC One (M8) and a couple of competitors, and find that the Taiwanese brand's new device is streets ahead in the design stakes - and I'd bet that most would be unable to resist a purchase after that.
There's a subconscious reaction when you pick up something for the first time, a natural expectation of how it might feel in the hand, and the HTC One (M8), with its 9.35mm thickness and 160g weight, marries those two very well.
It's no coincidence that smartphones are packing on the grams a little bit these days. Where around 120g was the fashion a couple of years ago, now we're seeing heavier phones as designers try to meet a new paradigm (plus all that new technology needs to go somewhere, after all).
The flagship version will be this metallic grey, although a silver version that evokes the previous model and a champagne / rose gold option will be both available too. However, this brushed metal effect is stunning, and helps distance the One (M8) from its predecessor.
Quite rightly some will baulk at the larger chassis, mostly down to the decision to include the Boomsound speakers above and below the screen, but once you've heard them in action you'll struggle not to agree that they're not a worthy trade-off.
The headphone jack has been moved to the bottom of the phone, which will anger some users. I still think this is an unintuitive place to add the port, as I've become used to having it at the top. Arguments that it makes it easier to slip in and out of the pocket don't hold water, and it makes the phone hard to hold in portrait when listening to music.
It's always good to see a brand climb down when consumers ask for something, and now this means that there are no issues about filling your phone up with photos and home videos as well as music and movies.
The top of the phone is all plastic still, and this is to with antenna technology as well as allowing the infrared signal to control home theatre devices.
This, combined with the thin plastic strips on the rear of the phone, allow for phone and Wi-Fi signal to permeate through the chassis... when you hear engineers talk about how hard it is to make a metal phone that can still connect to other devices, the design language of the One is even more impressive.
One area I'm really happy about is the button travel, as the original One has very flat keys that were hard to find and press. The One (M8) improves on that massively, making everything easier to find in the pocket or bag and tap.
The power button is still on the top of the phone, which I can live with, but it's been moved from the left to the right side. I've argued with a few people about this, as it seems that some people prefer this orientation where others find it incredibly hard to hit.
I'm in the latter camp, as my finger naturally sits on the left of the phone and I found it very easy to unlock the first One. Now not only do I have to shuffle along to find the power button, but whenever I do so I accidentally engage the volume key, meaning I always keep turning the ringtone up and down.
I'm also a bit perplexed about the fast HTC decided to drop the capacitive buttons (understandable given Android 4.4 KitKat's love of on-screen keys) yet keep the same big black bar that contains the HTC logo. This feels like a lot of wasted real estate on the front of the phone, and could have allowed the brand to keep the same footprint as the previous model if it had found another place to chuck its name.
The reason for this is probably due to the need to pack in the necessary internal components while maintaining the Boomsound speakers, but given the level of intelligence on show here when it comes to packaging the device, it seems like a missed trick.
The improved use of metal in the chassis really works, and the shape is updated without losing any of the heritage of last year's popular model. The addition of a microSD slot is inspired, and while I can't say I'll ever get on board with the headphone jack being on the bottom, it's something that you can live with.
Key features
- Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE support; 42Mbps HSPA+; LTE connectivity
- 5" 1080p capacitive touchscreen with 441pi pixel density; Corning Gorilla Glass 3
- 2.3GHz quad-core Krait 400 CPU; 2GB of RAM; Adreno 330 GPU; Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 chipset
- Android 4.4.2 KitKat with HTC Sense 6
- Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac (2.4 & 5 GHz); DLNA
- Dual 4MP AF "UltraPixel" (2µm pixel size) camera with 1/3" sensor; 28mm f/2.0 lens; dual-LED flash; HTC ImageChip 2
- 1080p video capture with HDR
- HTC Zoe
- 5MP front-facing camera with BSI sensor; wide-angle f/2.0 lens; HDR; 1080p video recording
- 16/32GB of built-in memory
- microSD card slot; 50GB of free Google Drive storage for 2 years
- GPS with A-GPS; GLONASS
- MHL-enabled microUSB 2.0 port
- Bluetooth 4.0; NFC
- IR remote control
- Accelerometer; gyro and proximity sensor; ambient light sensor; barometer
- Best audio output on the market
- Fitbit fitness tracker app
- Active noise cancellation with a dedicated microphone
- Front-facing stereo speakers with BoomSound and built-in amplifiers
- Gorgeous metal unibody with superb finish and tactile feel
- 2,600mAh battery; Extreme Power Saving Mode
Main disadvantages
- 4MP camera can't match higher-resolution rivals
- No 4K video recording or OIS
- Non user-replaceable battery
Much like with the original, the biggest question mark in the new HTC One (M8) is hanging over the camera. HTC insists on the 4MP sensor and has chosen to teach it cool new tricks rather than up the pixel count - that's the same questionable move that got it into trouble with the last generation.
This time, there is a second camera unit to collect distance data, which enables some really nice effects in post processing. However, we are yet to see if that will be enough at a time when the competition is moving to larger sensors and 5 times the resolution of the One (M8).
HTC One (M8) live photos
We will not waste any more time introducing the HTC One (M8) and we'll get down to testing instead. As always, we will begin our in-depth review with an unboxing, followed by a design and build quality inspection.
Duo camera and smart flash
Like the battery talk above, I'm not going to spoil the larger section later one where I discuss the camera power, but the new snapper on the back deserves highlighting here as it genuinely is the stand out feature (along with the design of the phone) that will mark out the HTC One (M8) from the competition.Yes, it's still the same Ultrapixel technology from last year, and it's not been bumped up much in the megapixel space. Actually, not at all. But the output is much enhanced, and not just in low light, leading to a more robust system.
It's one that all the main manufacturers are placing within their flagship devices, but HTC is the only one that does it with hardware instead of software, leading to really impressive speeds when taking pictures and still having this advanced functionality.
You can check out the tests with the new Ultrapixel Duo Camera later in the review - and I'd really recommend that you do if you're the sort of person that likes a really strong day to day snapper.
Better Boomsound
HTC has gone to great lengths to talk up its improved speakers on the front of the device, and it needs to, given its added so much size to the One (M8) to accommodate them.The good news is they're SO much better than last year, and the original One's sound wasn't bad at all. However with the new speakers everything is so much clearer, meaning better clarity between the bass and the vocals when listening to music, or just a cleaner sound when pumping up the volume to the max.
HTC told me that this was because it had separated out the channels within the sound, allowing it to clip the likes of the bass when things got too much for the speakers without affecting the other elements. It's a system that certainly works and side by side the difference is marked.
I never found myself watching a full movie using the speakers when alone, as I still prefer the headphone experience for that.
The Boomsound speakers feel akin to a really nice bodywork set on a premium saloon car. They'll add a lot when it comes to cornering speeds and general performance, but you know that mostly you're using that car for getting to work and taking the family or friends to the beach.
The same here: the speakers are great, but they add a lot of height to the phone and I wonder how much use you'll get out of these premium features given modern smartphone use is still a very private thing.
But don't get confused - the sound that comes out from the speakers is really great, with crisp notes and deep bass for a smartphone.
Storage wars
And just briefly, let's have a 'hands in the air' moment for the fact HTC has caved in and brought a microSD expansion slot to the One (M8). I thought such a thing was impossible for future HTC devices, assuming the company had bent to Google's apparent will to have more emphasis put to the cloud.But HTC told me that it had listened to users, some of whom had said they wouldn't buy the One thanks to the lack of expandable storage, and so popped one into the One (M8).
That's not the worst out there, but if you opt for the 16GB version and get really friendly with the Zoe feature on the One (M8) as well as downloading some large apps, you would have run into trouble.
Now, all your media needs can be siphoned off and the internal space dedicated to apps instead, which is a big help, and it's good to see a brand backing down over a big issue.
Fitbit
HTC has tried to join the fitness game with the One (M8) by bundling the Fitbit app with the phone from the outset.
It's a strategy that you could consider two ways: on the one hand, given that smartphone fitness is still a burgeoning area, it doesn't seem worth spending millions to develop a real core fitness API that allows you to get fit with your smartphone in the way Samsung is doing with S Health.
At least there's no unnecessary heart rate monitor here.
On the other hand, having a phone acting as a pedometer is a poor substitute for an actual tracker as you'll spend large swathes of the day with the phone on a desk or a bedside table.
Add to that the fact that there's every chance that smartphone fitness will take off, especially as Apple and Samsung start ramming the message down users' throats, and HTC's half-hearted attempt to be in the fitness mix could come back to bite it when the next version of its flagship phone appears.
Battery life
The HTC One (M8) has a slightly bigger battery than its predecessor, but it has to feed a bigger screen and more powerful chipset. The end result is a great improvement in endurance rating - from 48 hours to 71 hours, practically a full day more!Part of that improvement comes from a leap in 3G call performance, the One (M8) beats the old One by over six hours. The two proceed to trade blows in the web browsing and video playback times with an hour of difference.
For more details, check out our blog post about the HTC One (M8) battery life.
An important addition to the battery efficiency arsenal of the HTC M8 is the presence of the Extreme Power Saving mode, not unlike what the recently announced Samsung Galaxy S5 has. Only allowing access to basic features such as calls, email and text messaging , HTC claims the said mode will stretch a mere 5% of charge left to a whopping 15 hours.
Following next is a look at the software features of the smartphone, headed by a brand-new HTC Sense UI, running on top of the latest Android build.
Android 4.4.2 KitKat with brand new Sense 6
The HTC One (M8) boots Android 4.4.2 KitKat, dressed in a brand new
version of HTC's own Sense UI. HTC Sense 6 brings new features on board
and improves the existing functionality of the user interface.
Here goes a quick video of HTC One with Sense 6 in action.
The lockscreen looks different but hasn't changed its functionality. There's a clock, weather info and four shortcut slots. Missed calls and incoming messages are duly displayed too of course.
HTC Sense 6 lockscreen
Swiping up the unlock button gives you three different options. Swiping up takes you to the last app you used, while swiping to the left or to the right will take you to the homescreen or BlinkFeed respectively.
The unlock button gives you options
A useful new HTC Sense 6 feature is the ability to unlock the device via a swiping gesture while its display is turned off - that's the new Motion Launch feature. Swiping up in portrait mode unlocks the device. Swiping down activates a voice calling feature, while swiping left and right takes you to the homescreen and BlinkFeed respectively.
Furthermore, the display of the HTC One (M8) can wake up with a double tap. The gesture takes you to the lockscreen. A second double tap on the lockscreen would turn the screen back off.
Double tapping on the homescreen however doesn't lock back the smartphone. The double tap functionality is only available on the lockscreen to allow users to quickly look up time and notifications.
Perhaps the biggest change to the UI layout introduced by the Sense 6 is the presence of on-screen navigation buttons bringing the One in line with what most other makers have. This move has allowed them to get rid of the buttons under the screen, but it also has a certain downside. The buttons are almost always present (fullscreen images and videos excluded) and thus they eat up some of the available screen real estate.
The on-screen navigation buttons are a Sense 6 novelty
The leftmost homescreen pane of the One (M8) is once again reserved for HTC BlinkFeed. It aggregates content from your social networks, as well as from over a thousand news sources. You can pick what topics you're interested in and BlinkFeed will automatically pull relevant content. You can also search for specific content.
BlinkFeed is back
You're not stuck with BlinkFeed if you don't like it - the rest of the homescreen panes are the standard affair with shortcuts and widgets. You can also fully remove the BlinkFeed panel if you wish.
BlinkFeed panel can be fully removed
The new HTC Sense finally brings power toggles to the notification area - they can be accessed by tapping at its top right corner. The feature is handy and it is great to see it available.
Power toggles made it to the notification area
You get up to five homescreen panes to fill with shortcuts and widgets (the sixth is reserved for BlinkFeed). You can set any of the panes as default - including the BlinkFeed.
Adding and removing homescreen panes
Widgets are pulled out of a dedicated container as opposed to being displayed in the app drawer next to the apps, which we find to be the more intuitive approach. Adding a widget is as simple as long-pressing it and assigning it to the desired screen pane.
Managing widgets
The default layout of the app drawer is a 3 x 4 grid of app icons, which does not make best use of the large, high-res screen. The icons aren't even bigger than usual; they just have plenty of padding. Luckily, you can switch to a 4 x 5 grid. You can sort app icons alphabetically or chronologically or have a custom sorting like you would on iOS, for instance.
The app drawer grid can be resized
HTC has remodeled the task switching interface - recent apps can now be accessed via a dedicated on-screen button. They are displayed in a 3 x 3 grid of thumbnails, which makes good use of the available screen size and resolution. It's a single screen that cannot be scrolled, so nine of the most recently used apps are the most you can get (which is far from ideal).
The app switcher
The settings menu isn't dramatically changed in the latest Sense. It has the same design, but with single-color, flat icons and toggles. Everything is where you'd expect it to be.
The settings menu
Wallpapers, lockscreen style, ringtones, notification sounds and alarms can be customized via a dedicated menu. This time around, the lockscreen styles cannot be changed.
Personalization options
As before, HTC Sense has a dedicated Car mode screen, which has been styled to look like the rest of the interface. There are five big controls shown by default alongside the clock and weather. There's music info too, which takes a whole row by itself, along with shortcuts to Navigation, Dialer, the Music player (again) and for Voice commands.
Car mode is really handy
HTC One (M8) also has a built-in restricted access Kid mode. It is an app that lets you set up a profile for each of your kids, with a photo and birthdate and pick which apps they can have access to.
Kid Mode
Spesification
GENERAL
Body
Techradar HTC One (M8) Review (Design 5/5, Features 4.5/5, Performance 5/5, Usability 5/5, Value 4.5/5) *Techradar Rating - March 31, 2014
Engadget HTC One (M8) Review (Critic Review 8.8/10) & (User Review 9.7/10) - Apr 2, 2014
GSMArena HTC One (M8) Review (Popularity 33%) & (Voting Result: Design 8.4/10, Features 8.2/10, Performance 8.5/10)
Where to Buy
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