The flagship phone competes with the Samsung Galaxy S6 and the iPhone 6
HTC has officially revealed its latest flagship smartphone, the HTC One M9 - which positions itself squarely up against the Samsung Galaxy S6 and the iPhone 6.
The HTC One M9 was unveiled at Mobile World Congress along with a new fitness band the company is calling the HTC RE Grip.
The sleek, stylish smartphone follows in the footsteps of last year’s award-winning HTC One M8 with a stunning metallic design and huge processing power.
The HTC RE Grip meanwhile was co-developed with American sports giant Under Armour and features an understated black design as well as built-in GPS tracking.
See more after the cut...
When it comes to the phone, the “M” in the name stands for “metal” and the Taiwanese giant has gone to great lengths to ensure everything about the design screams premium.
Likening it to “a piece of jewellery that you take everywhere,” the HTC One M9 is machined from aluminium - like the Samsung Galaxy S6 - and features a “dual finish metal unibody” where a golden metallic inlay has been added to the silver frame to give a two-toned design.
HTC has added a hairline texture finish to the phone and given it a scratch resistant coating to save it from coming off worse in a battle with keys, coins and anything else rattling around in your pocket.
When it comes to the nuts and bolts of the specifications, HTC has ensured the One M9 can compete with 2015’s other top-range Android phones by including a Snapdragon 810 processor, 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. Crucially, this can be upgraded with the help of a microSD card.
However, other parts of the phone remain the same as last year's HTC One M8. The screen remains at 5-inches in size and keeps a Full HD (1,920 x 1,080) resolution, eschewing the QHD (2,560 x 1,440) display that was widely rumoured before the launch.
Camera fans everywhere will be pleased to know that HTC has spent some time refining and refocusing the camera on the HTC One M9.
Last year’s HTC One M8 featured a “duo camera” that was able to capture depth information as well as light, allowing you to add pseudo-3D effects to your shots after you've taken them. That feature has been dropped from the rear-facing camera but added to the “ultra pixel" selfie camera on the front.
HTC has also added an auto-exposure algorithm that, it says, mimics the human eye in how it interprets detail and light levels. It will adjust every pixel to make sure each picture has as much detail to it as possible.
On the back of the phone is a 20-megapixel camera that has the same auto-exposure algorithm and a dual-LED flash for low light situations. In keeping with the phone’s swanky premium construction, HTC has coated the rear-facing lens in expensive scratch proof sapphire glass.
Although the HTC One M9 runs Google’s Android platform, HTC has added the latest version of its Sense skin. That includes a separate look and feel from other Android phones as well as extra applications like the news aggregator BlinkFeed.
What’s more, HTC has added a “theme generator” function that will adjust the colour of the menus and the items to co-ordinate with your background picture, even if it’s one you’ve taken yourself.
The company is also playing up the phone’s ability to detect where you are and provide helpful recommendations. It will, for example, suggest apps relevant to your location (train timetable apps if you’re near a station) or change the display to remind you of something (like temporarily swapping the background image to a local restaurant at lunchtime).
Location is likewise an important feature of the company’s first wearable device.
Bearing a slight resemblance to the Nike Fuelband, the HTC RE Grip is a wearable fitness tracker like any other, with the exception of having GPS built-in. That means you can take it running, hiking or cycling and accurately track all aspects of your route.
Like any of the other fitness devices available at the moment, it will also keep close tabs on your steps, calories and sleep. What’s more, it’ll use Bluetooth to work with any phone - not just HTC - and will display calendar information and music on the screen.
HTC says that the 100mAh battery inside the RE Grip should be good for two days of continuous usage on a single charge. However, enabling the GPS brings that crashing down to a mere five hours at a time.
Unfortunately, HTC says the RE Grip will initially only go on sale in the USA and that the company will monitor the reaction before expanding it to the UK.
culled from mirror.co.uk
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