Gadgetory

HTC's top shelf smartphone for 2015 bears a look and feel right out of 2014 and for that matter 2013 as well in a period of startling reinvention from the competition was sticking to the formula the right move let's find out i'm michael fisher with pocket now and this is our video review of the HTC one m9 HTC has made a name for itself over the years with hardware of uncharacteristically high quality and the m9 continues that tradition the new phone adds double anodization to last year's brushed aluminum housing giving our silver and gold review unit a two-tone dual finish appearance to go with its substantial feel in the hand last year's wraparound sides and slippery coating have given way to a blockier build and the somewhat tacky or finish and the result is a phone that's easier to hold than the m8 though i could do without the razor-sharp edges on the backside fortunately case makers like spec have already started churning out accessories that make the m9 a little easier on the palm less likely to get scratched as well but then of course you're covering up the design one of the phone's main selling points HTC has finally relocated its power standby key to the side for easier locking and unlocking and atop those buttons sits the micro SD card slot making for a fairly crowded side rail the m9 brings a familiar face to the equation with a Super LCD 3 display flanked by twin speakers and protected by a sheet of Gorilla Glass the whole thing held in place by a single piece bezel in a world where super high resolution displays are gradually becoming the norm the pixel density here might seem a bit low on paper but in real life I never once found myself wishing for a higher res what I did want was something a little more adaptable with some competitor screens able to go much dimmer and/or the m9s display feels somewhat limited by comparison the boom sound speakers at top and bottom have gotten even more capable with the addition of Dolby is 5.1 surround the price for the sound quality hasn't changed the m9 is still taller than many smartphones due to the speaker's themselves and the gap beneath the display which accommodates hardware displaced by the speaker's large chamber size if you ask me the trade-off is worth it against other smartphones with front firing speakers the One m-9s sound isn't always louder but it is richer and cleaner the audio upgrades carry over to the earphones as well with the increasingly common 24-bit audio support bolstered by a dedicated amplifier whether you use the included earbuds or you're wrong HTC took the opportunity to refresh its Android skin with the m9 shipping the new Sense 7 atop Android lollipop the tap to unlock gestures are convenient as long as you remember that their motion activated they depend on you picking up the phone first double tap to get to the lockscreen and depending on the time of day you'll get a customized recommendation for where to grab lunch dinner or a mid afternoon coffee nearby since has gotten a slight visual upgrade with more transparency throughout and the predominantly flat look of Android lollipop you also get a space for an extra button in the home key row probably best used as a toggle to trigger the notification shade though other options are available as well also HTC's 9x9 multitasking view is back and it now spans more than one page to accommodate more cards in its quest to separate the software experience from the old desktop models of your HTC has implemented what it calls Sense home a widget that tries to determine what apps you'll need based on whether you're at home at work or out on the town in my testing it delivered about halfway on its promise I like the new downloads folder for corralling recently purchased apps but the behavior prediction wasn't great it took several days to learn my preferences and even once it got to know me it was constantly shuffling at positions around which was annoying the irony is that while you're waiting for it to learn you're getting to your apps via the app drawer precisely the thing HTC is trying to leave behind the whole thing is great in theory but as of now it feels a little under on the brighter side blinkfeed remains for quick surfing through your social and news feeds and it's more customizable than ever before speaking of customization one of our few complaints from sense 6 was how difficult it was to make it your own with only four color schemes to choose from HTC has more than addressed that issue with sense 7 bringing an entire theming engine so you can tweak and tailor everything from the keyboard color to icon shapes to typefaces or have the m9 create its own theme based on the colors in a photo you take speaking of photos if you're a pixel fanatic you'll be right at home here HTC is stopped trying to reinvent the wheel with the m9 s camera as chewing ultrapixels and duo sensors for a more conventional 20 megapixel camera it's now protected by sapphire cover material a good thing since it protrudes slightly from the casing you might think that's a result of adding Hardware stabilization but no oh is is not on board the camera software has been revised and now includes a full suite of manual controls as well as a host of more modern dare I say more hip photo effects that will keep creative types entertained for hours face fusion is fun enough and yeah creepy enough with people you know but get celebrity screenshots in on the action and watch the lulls flow double exposure is a neat trick allowing you to blend elements from two separate photos to create something entirely new for something a little crisper you can blend photos using shapes and edgy masking it's all much more artistic than split capture though that's still here too for shooting with both cameras at once flying particle effects from snow flurries to bubble storms prismatic overlays it's by far the coolest effect suite available right out of the box the m9 s got itself a fun camera but is it a good camera well that depends on what time of day you're taking pictures the viewfinder is a snappy as ever and HTC has finally calmed down the wild exposure swings when using tap to focus and if it's a bright or even an overcast day and you're outside snapping away you'll really appreciate the high resolution which delivers crisp detail and fairly nice color particularly in the cooler tones move indoors and as long as the light keeps up the photo quality does too but with an F 2.2 lens and no optical stabilization photo quality diminishes dramatically as the light gets dimmer the phone has trouble keeping focus in low-light environments and the propensity to favor the cooler side of the spectrum gets much worse switching from automatic into night mode makes for much brighter photos but the longer exposure time paired with no optical stabilization leads to motion blur more often than not and digital noise is just everywhere fortunately HTC hasn't completely put its ultrapixel technology out to pasture the m9 z' front-facing camera is basically a repackaged version of the main camera from the m8 which makes for awesome selfies in low-light or otherwise the end of the day what makes the m9 s camera worthwhile is the feature load not the raw performance this is a very fun camera to play around with whether you're blending faces with Facebook friends or spamming Instagram with double exposures and if that's mainly what you're going to use it for you'll be fine but it's underwhelming in low-light it's often straight up bad in camcorder mode and its focus has a tendency to wander in many situations we shouldn't be seeing issues like this on a flagship smartphone in 2015 especially not from a manufacturer that's come up short in the camera category so many times before finally there's the m9s day-to-day performance I wasn't sure what to expect from the Snapdragon 810 and it's widely reported thermal issues especially given the m9 s metal casing but over eight days of use on t-mobile us I never found the phone too hot to handle it never heated up during normal low impact stuff like email texting and tweeting and since was as responsive as ever it's still one of the snappiest Android skins around I can only bug the phone down when installing many apps at once and I could only get the phone to run hot with graphics heavy games like sky gamblers air supremacy even then after 30 minutes of flying the metal casing was only 99 degrees Fahrenheit at its hottest point a half-hour of asphalt 8 immediately afterward managed to push it a bit past that but the highest temperature I got was 103 still far short of what we've seen on some older devices those games did blast a sizable hole in battery life as you might expect an hour total between the two of them knocked me down by 50% that's not uncommon though and with typical use including everything from social surfing to turn-by-turn navigation I was able to get between 14 and 16 hours between charges on the m9 without resorting to HTC's extreme power saving mode we advised that our review unit was a European model we'll have more details on voice quality endurance and network performance once we test a US branded sample so what we have with the one m9 is the very definition of a small subtle upgrade an HTC knows it the company wants you to focus on the little things with the one m9 with its beautifully crafted hardware and best-in-class third-party interface that's not hard to do if you already own a One m8 you could definitely be forgiven for sitting this one out the m9 is for people who haven't owned an HTC phone before like an S model iPhone it's meant to be familiar rather than groundbreaking accessible rather than revolutionary it's a worthy if unexcited custodian of HTC's reputation for connick smartphone design we have much more on the HTC One m9 including video samples and many more photos in our full written review at pocket now check it out at the link in the description below be sure to see our comparison and feature coverage in the videos link above and subscribe to pocket now while you're at it till next time this has been michael fisher with pocket now captain to phones on twitter thanks for watching we'll see you next time