With LG having made official its G Pro 2 flagship device and Samsung spoiling us with teasers as the big date (24th February) of its Galaxy S5 nears, what about the other guys from Taiwan who make design of the most beautiful smartphones on this planet? Well, they are not being left behind. On the eve of the HTC One’s first anniversary, they have made it clear that they have plans for the 25th of March.
Thanks to HTC UK’s Twitter feed, we now can confirm that the successor of the gorgeous HTC One will be unveiled almost 10 days after the One’s main rival in the past year, the Galaxy S4, marks its first anniversary. The Galaxy S4, announced at an event in New York on the 15th of March last year went on to outsell HTC’s finest despite the latter’s impeccable design effort. This year, roles will be reversed and there’s no telling who will come on top even though Samsung’s marketing genius and HTC’s teething financial problems and seemingly endless internal squabbles could be its main undoing no matter how beautiful the One+ or One Two or whatever the device will be called will look like.
While we’re not sure of the name HTC’s 2014 flagship device will be called, we know that its internal codename is the M8, much in tandem with the M7 codename that the HTC One was known as before its official unveiling on 19th February last year. We also do have in mind what we think the M8 will pack:
- A 4.9-5.0 inch full HD display. Most likely HTC won’t be joining the pixel-race which Samsung is likely to ignite with its rumoured 2K display on the Galaxy S5.
- A Snapdragon 805 chip. This is the latest from Qualcomm for mobile devices. Though not going into mass production till the second half of the year, most of the upcoming flagships are touted to begin shipping with this chip. I won’t be surprised though if like the G Pro 2, HTC goes with the proven beast, the Snapdragon 800 which is available at the moment. Since HTC ain’t Samsung which does endless refreshes of its flagship device (I’ve lost count of the Galaxy S4’s refresh), it makes a lot of sense for HTC to go with the Snapdragon 805 since they are surely not going to be doing an international refresh of the One’s successor till around the same time in 2015.
- A 6 or 8 megapixel camera with the same ultra-pixel inspiration and dual camera setup may suffice on this device too. No one is too sure since one of HTC’s senior executives came out guns blazing and deemed the leaked render of the device that made rounds two weeks ago a fake. All we know is that HTC won’t be sleeping in the camera department nor are they likely to be threatened by that rumoured 16 MP (or 20 MP) sensor that the Galaxy S5 is likely to come with.
- Android 4.4 KitKat with a new version of HTC’s Sense UI (Sense 6?)
- 2900 mAh battery
Though March 25th may seem far away, we should have some very significant leaks and leads on how this device will look like and what it will really pack in the next few days (over to you @evleaks) or maybe the good tech bloggers will unveil it (like they did with the One) thanks to the difference in time zones making embargoes and NDAs seem awkward…but wait, they managed to hold up well with the HTC One Max so…
