In a year in which we will see new Apple and Samsung handsets, one of the most obvious competitors to the big two smartphone manufacturers has announced a new device. HTC has officially unveiled the all-new HTC One M8, a handset intended to enable the Taiwanese corporation to gain a real foothold in the premium smartphone market.
HTC’s previous smartphone offerings have been well received in critical terms, but have perhaps failed to live up to expectations in terms of sales. Can the new M8 significantly change the public perception of HTC and improve its market share? Let’s have a look at what the M8 offers in terms of specs.
HTC One M8: Appearance
The first thing to note about the HTC One M8 is that its design comprises an all-metal, zero-gap unibody chassis. This marks it out in the marketplace from the Samsung Galaxy S5 immediately, with the Korean manufacturer’s flagship smartphone featuring a plastic body. This should help the HTC One M8 have the appearance of a premium handset.
Display
It seems that virtually every smartphone manufacturer has cottoned on to the market preference for so-called ‘phablets’ and the 5-inch and above screen can be seen as a standard feature in all major smartphones from hereon in. Thus, the HTC One M8 features a 5-inch 1080p HD display which will make it at least the equal of anything on the market.
Processor and Memory
The HTC One M8 will feature a Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor, a pretty standard beating heart for a premium smartphone. With 2GB of RAM, the HTC One M8 will certainly be competitive in terms of processing power, although there is nothing here to really make it stand out from competitors.
Storage
HTC has indicated that the M8 will come with 32GB of internal storage and a microSD slot which will boost its internal storage up to 128GB. This would put it in the same ballpark as the Galaxy S5 as well as the mooted specs of the iPhone 6.
Camera
The HTC One M8 comes with a pretty decent HTC UltraPixel Duo Camera. This is a 5-megapixel front camera which should offer decent photography functionality. HTC has not focused on the camera element of its smartphones as much as Samsung in particular, but the M8 will do the job more than competently for most people’s needs.
Battery
The HTC One M8 is fitted with a 2,600mAh battery. This will enable the device to offer 21 hours talk time, which is 40% longer than original HTC One. This looks to be a pretty strong selling point of the device, considering battery power is increasingly at a premium in these high-end mobile devices.
Conclusion
The HTC One M8 looks to be a pretty good music player in particular, with BoomSound speakers which are now 25% louder, and users able to play music seamlessly through any Bluetooth speaker with the swipe of three fingers. Aside from that, the specs list looks extremely solid, but HTC has always impressed with the intuitiveness of its devices. It is assess this until the M8 is released, but the handset at least looks to be a legitimate rival to the market leaders.
