HTC's latest flagship phone, simply dubbed the "10," is up for preorders now and is set to begin shipping next month. For those who picked up last year's One M9, it's time to determine if HTC has done things right with the 10 to warrant an early leap forward.
With its brushed metal back and powerful guts, the HTC One M9 was certainly worthy of bearing HTC's flag for 2015. But the rumors and hype surrounding the headset on its way into the 2015 Mobile World Congress may have set expectations too high for the One M9.
This time around, with the HTC 10, the company kept the tech press from getting early wiffs of the phone, which was code named Perfume. And with the expectations seemingly lower for HTC's latest flagship, the 10 doesn't have to live up to its own legend — it just has to be substantially better than the One M9.
While the One M9 was criticized by some as looking too similar to the One M8, HTC seems to have put more attention into giving the 10 more of its own identity and cranking up the wow factor.
"With the HTC 10, our design teams worked tirelessly to build a phone where even the power button has been beautifully crafted, where the speakers deliver a sleeker look and better sound quality and where the fingerprint sensor recognizes your finger from almost any angle," says HTC.
It's taller and wider than the One M9, but that's due to its larger display — it's 5.2 inches, while the One M9's is 5 inches. The 10 is also flatter and excusably heavier by just a touch, again due to the larger display.
Along with a bigger face, the HTC 10 pushes more pixels than its predecessor. It has a resolution of 1440 x 2560, while the One M9 has a pixel count of 1080 x 1920. That's a pixel density of 565 pixels per inch compared to 441 ppi.
With the 10, HTC has scaled back the camera's resolution to take a leap forward in quality. It captures pixels measuring 1.55 microns in size, which will enable the camera to record colors more accurately than the shooter on the One M9. The One M9's camera captures pixels 1.2 microns in size.
And as far as processing power goes, the HTC 10 is rocking the latest from Qualcomm, a Snapdragon 820, and an Adreno 530 graphics processing unit. The One M9 is powered by a Snapdragon 810 and an Adreno 430.
