HTC One M8 vs HTC One M9
**HTC has finally unveiled its latest flagship smartphone, the HTC One M9! **But now that MWC has showcased the latest HTC handset, how does it stand up to some of its competitors?
One of its fiercest rivals will be its predecessor – the HTC One M8. However, with a year between both devices, does the One M9 really stand head and shoulders above its older sibling? Or might you bet better off spending your cash on last year’s effort?
HTC One M9 vs One M8 Design
Many of the elements of the HTC One M8 have been directly transferred over onto the One M9, including the aluminium metallic body. The new device will utilise a similar 5.0” display as well, with the very same resolution of 1080 x 1920 pixels. Once more, the display is engineered for a wide viewing angle and protected behind Corning Gorilla Glass.
There is more exciting news in the audio department with the handset including HTC BoomSound speakers once again. The overall feel of the handset is less slippery than before, but does actually measure up fractionally thicker than with the previous handset, which is a surprise.
Processing power is the most exciting prospect for the new smartphone as the older quad-core 2.3GHz processor with 2GB RAM gets dropped for an octa-core 64-bit Snapdragon 810 processor with 3GB RAM.
The power of Android 5.0 Lollipop
The HTC One M8 was powered by Android KitKat with the addition of HTC BlinkFeed – the service which feeds news, sports and social updates through in real time. Android Lollipop is featured on the new HTC phone but this doesn’t change a whole lot when you’re actually looking at the One M9.
Instead, the main alteration comes through the updated HTC Sense 7.0 UI design, which keeps the standard style, but adds a unique twist to the software.
The HTC One M9 has also got a battery update from 2,600mAh to 2,840mAh, and the conversion of this into something meaningful will be heightened by Android 5.0 which is both less demanding on power and gives you more control over apps that eat power in the background.
The demise of the UltraPixel camera
It wouldn’t be unfair to say that the whole UltraPixel camera concept was neither understood by or welcomed by prospective consumers when it featured on the HTC One M8.
In fact, the UltraPixel technology itself was reportedly supreme under low-light conditions as the bigger pixels allowed in more light and were less prone to image noise. However under lit circumstances a 4 megapixel resolution could hardly be expected to compete with 20 megapixel cameras used by other brands.
The HTC One M9 puts this to rest by featuring a single 20 megapixel main camera backed up by an UltraPixel secondary camera on its front side.
HTC is promising plenty of quality from both lenses; with picture editing and camera features paramount.
The camera on the One M8 did have many features that will crossover onto the M9 and these include the entertaining Face Merge as well as Live Makeup, the Split Capture Crop-Me-In-Tool, Pan 360 with simple tilt controls and voice activated selfie control.
HTC One M8 vs HTC One M9
The initial signs are good for the HTC One M9 and it wouldn’t be a surprise to see it do well. Whilst it doesnt offer too many differences from the One M8 on the design front, it definitely outshines it with its camera and internal specs. Of course, the real challenge will be to see how it does against the likes of the Samsung Galaxy S6 and other flagship releases from other manufacturers.