Sleek metallic good looks, fine HD screen, powerful processor, good battery life
Camera doesn't match quality of rivals
A previous version of this review incorrectly stated the HTC One M8 did not have an expansion slot for additional storage. This affected its score in our original version. In light of this, with the error corrected, we have raised the phone's score from an 8 to a 9. We apologise for any confusion this caused.
HTC's One flagship just got a whole new makeover, with a new casing, a bigger screen, more powerful processor, improved camera and the very latest version of the Sense user interface.
Body
The stylish metal unibody case is thin at 9mm, relatively lightweight at 160g and has a pleasingly curved shape at the back that helps it to fit very comfortably in the hand. The brushed metal effect looks very classy too and apparently more of the aerial has now been incorporated into the case supposedly improving reception. We'll have to take HTC's word for that, but in practise we didn't come across any reception issues.
The SuperLCD3 screen has been expanded from 4.7-inches to 5-inches and is accordingly just that little bit more imposing. It has the same HD resolution of 1080x1920 pixels which looks rather lovely, but the extra size means the sharpness actually drops just a little, from 469ppi to 441ppi. Try as we might though, looking at the two side by side we really couldn't tell the difference. HD movies look terrific, with vivid but realistic colours that aren't over saturated and good contrast levels.
The speakers have been beefed up with a new design and now promised 25 per cent more volume. We couldn't measure that precisely but they certainly sound beefier and louder than the previous HTC One. Pair them with the HTC Boom Bass mini subwoofer and you've got yourself a pretty decent little sound system -- it won't power a party, but it will fill a room pretty well.
Processor
The quad-core 2.3GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 is fast. Very fast.
It's clocked at 2.3GHz, backed by 2GB RAM and whips through apps and menus seemingly at the speed of thought. Our AnTuTu benchmark test gave it a score of 33,730 which puts it right up there with the very fastest, only a whisker behind current power stars the LG G Flex and the Samsung Galaxy Note Pro. HD games like Real Racing 3 looked terrific too, beautifully smooth in gameplay with absolutely no hint of lag.
HTC claims that this processor draws less power than most and it's included a large 2,600mAh battery too. Sure enough, it easily lasted us through a full day of near-constant use and there are a few battery-saving options on board too, including an "extreme power saving mode" that will last for two weeks on standby.
Android OS
It's running the very latest 4.4 KitKat version of the Google Android operating system and this being HTC, it also has the latest version of the company's Sense interface running on top. Sense 6 (sixth sense, geddit?) has a slightly more streamlined appearance than previously (the menu icons now float in space rather than appearing within a bar at the bottom, for instance) but the compulsory BlinkFeed media aggregator is still there, pulling your news and social media updates into a magazine-style interface. Not everyone's a fan, especially since you can't remove it, but it's been steadily adding more and more content providers with dozens of big players to choose from. Once you get used to using it, it becomes second nature to get your updates this way.
There are also colour themes for different areas of the OS, so BlinkFeed comes bathed in green, messaging apps in blue, media in red etc. It's a small, almost subconscious detail that helps you find your way around a little more intuitively.
Gesture controls include the three-fingered swipe upwards that immediately takes you to HTC Connect and any devices you can connect with wirelessly. This could include Bluetooth players or lighting, as well as DLNA or Wi-Fi Direct for connecting to your TV or sound system. The IR blaster in the top of the M8 gives you remote control of your TV and the enhanced Sense TV app lets you browse the channels and find highlights.
You can also double tap the screen to wake it up and show the time, and there's the "Dot View" case/screen cover available as an optional extra that displays a dot matrix time, weather and message updates when you double tap it. And when the phone rings, you're automatically connected when you hold the phone to your ear.
Photography
The main camera may only have four megapixels but they're UltraPixels, underlining HTC's commitment to bigger, rather than more pixels as the way forward in camera innovation. It comes with a wealth of extras including autofocus, LED flash, a BSI sensor for improved results in low light, as well as a range of modes including HDR, macro and panorama as well as a variety of editing options.
It also has two lenses which allow you to add depth effects to your photos -- you can keep elements in the foreground in focus while putting background elements out of focus or vice versa. It can be quite an impressive effect, but the digital processing isn't always subtle enough for it to be as effective as we'd like.
There's plenty to play with, but a lot of the features tend towards the gimmicky and although the quality of the results are generally pretty good, they fall a little short of the consistently good pics we've come to expect from the best of Nokia or Sony for example.
There's 16GB of memory on board, which can be can expanded by up to 128GB via microSD card.
Conclusion
There's no doubt that the HTC One (M8) really is a very good phone indeed. With its high quality metal casing, fine screen, powerful processor and capable camera, it has some of the finest hardware available anywhere, and Sense 6 includes a range of features that enhance standard Android to new levels of usability and intuitiveness.
But it's not cheap by any means, and with handsets like Motorola's Moto G costing less than half as much, but delivering specs that are considerably more than half as good, the premium price is becoming increasingly hard to justify.
Software: Google Android 4.4 KitKat
Processor: Quad-core 2.3GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 801
Memory slot: No
Display: 5in SuperLCD3, 1080x1920 pixels
Connectivity: Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 4.0
Ports: microUSB, 3.5mm headphone jack
Camera: Duo Ultrapixel with autofocus, LED flash and BSI sensor; 5 megapixel front-facing camera
Video playback: 3gp, .3g2, .mp4, .wmv (Windows Media Video 10), .avi (MP4 ASP and MP3)
Audio playback: aac, .amr, .ogg, .m4a, .mid, .mp3, .wav, .wma
Radio: Yes
Battery: 2600mAh
Size: 146x71x9mm
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
