back to article HTC teases yet another make-or-break comeback flagship

Very few phone leaks are accidents, and a spate of teasers of HTC’s next flagship suggest a launch next month. The HTC M10 reportedly has a 5.1 inch QHD display and a revised camera. Its looks borrow from the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy families, with a front mounted fingerprint sensor, with availability from May. See here and …

  1. cmannett85

    " Its looks borrow from the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy families"

    As in, it's a rectangle inside another rectangle? I don't know why people moan about phones all looking the same, but not monitors or switches or microwaves...

    1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

      Not sure I like the bevel, but since these are CG models, I guess we'll see what it actually looks like when they launch it.

      I'm due an upgrade on my M8 in the autumn, and the M9 doesn't appeal, so I'll see how well this is received before then.

    2. NoneSuch Silver badge
      Pint

      " I don't know why people moan about phones all looking the same, but not monitors or switches or microwaves."

      None of them have an Apple logo on them.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Where's the diversity ?

    We used to have big phones, small phones, flip phones, slide phones.

    All available with decent specs.

    Now we can only choose from massive phablets, bottom-spec small phones, or the Sony Z5 Compact.

    Want to stand out ? Don't make phones that are exactly the same as your competitors.

    1. James 51

      Re: Where's the diversity ?

      There's the Priv, Password and Q5/Q10/Classic from Blackberry.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Where's the diversity ?

      I like my massive Phablet... but an upvote anyway as I also like choice and special features.

      Never did get one of those LG Chocolates with the double wide screen touch phone. But things like that keep the market interesting and provide for those with special requirements (like having fingers bigger than a gnats...).

  3. thomas k

    I only see one speaker!

    The only reason to buy a One was for the stereo speakers.

    1. The Quiet One

      Re: I only see one speaker!

      Same, the speakers on the M8 are pretty decent. I have been really happy with mine, but the power button is starting to give up and not work maybe one in 10 timies. I upgrade in June so here's hoping this is a worthwhile replacement.

      If not, I'll follow my Mrs and get a Priv as that is a truly brilliant phone.

    2. Obitim

      Re: I only see one speaker!

      I love the dual speakers on my one M8, it was the reason I jumped ship from Samsung and I love it for when I'm cooking!

      I think my next phone will be with dual front speaker as well...time to start researching!

  4. PaulR79

    HTC Galaxy One M10

    Oh for crying out loud... Samsung are bad enough with their totally-not-an-iPhone-copy Galaxy handsets but this is basically a Samsung Galaxy design on the front. Why such a pronounced button / fingerprint scanner? Are you telling me it couldn't be more subtle and still work? I find that very hard to believe. I used to be a big HTC fan but this just makes me want to avoid them even more than I have been.

    This isn't just a case of "mostly display, few buttons and looks similar" it looks almost identical to the Galaxy from the front. It's frustrating because from the specs it looks to finally have a good (Sony) camera part and that's always been the weakest part of HTC phones. For clarity I hate Apple, don't care about Samsung and liked HTC a lot. This is just stupid and I wouldn't be surprised if Samsung were looking at this carefully.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: HTC Galaxy One M10

      "Samsung are bad enough with their totally-not-an-iPhone-copy Galaxy"

      You're right about one thing, totally-not-an-iphone... but then neither was the iphone

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_Prada

  5. Anonymous Cowherder

    Get the alternate HTC releases, just like Microsoft.

    I've owned the HTC Desire, One X and M8. Each of these have been the leading Android (If not all) phone at the time.

    I skipped the M7 which was a humdinger and am waiting for the M10 before upgrading my M8. The M9 wasn't a bad phone, it was just that the M8 was so good that the leap to the M9 wasn't that noticeable. We reached a point a while ago that the rate of improvement in phones has slowed as the current crop of devices are pretty magnificent and only differentiated by tiny differences.

  6. Ross 12

    HTC are good at the software side, but they've always been a bit shit at the hardware.

    My smartphone life started with the HTC Hero, then the Sensation, then the One (M7). But after sticking with the One for so long, I needed to upgrade, and there just wasn't anything that felt worth upgrading to. So I eventually abandoned ship and got a Nexus 6P. And I love it!

    I've always loved the SenseUI, and some of the HTC apps are great. I do miss some of it - particularly the contact merging and social media integration. But I can't see them ever tempting me back unless they really pull something out of the bag.

    HTC are such a frustrating company, as, in *some* ways, they *are* 'quietly brilliant'. But in others, they're bloody useless. Their flagship phones never stay flagship for long at all, and until the One series, they'd be dropped, forgotten and left without updates well before a contract cycle was up.

    With hardware specs, there's always an critically underpowered bit, such as the GPU or memory or storage, so that it undermines everything else.

    They also have a habit of flooding the market with mid and low range models with way too many revisions that barely differ from each other, yet you get the feeling that they actually put a lot of development into them, and miss the mark every time. Whereas, at their peak, Apple made it look easy and got great results, HTC make it look like really hard work and get results that weren't worth the effort.

    They remind me of the second incarnation of Atari. I had an ST(e) back in the day, and I loved it, but despite some clever bits, it was flawed and just not as good as the Amiga. Then came the Mega ST, the Falcon, the Lynx, the Jaguar... all had the potential to be brilliant, but all ruined by flaws and weird business decisions.

  7. To Mars in Man Bras!
    Facepalm

    Suicidal HTC?

    The HTC One M8 is, in my view, the most 'beautiful' smartphone there is. The M9 marred these looks by having the camera housed in a zit-like ugly square bump. Now, if these leaks are to be believed, HTC are abandoning that classic design format completely, in favour of some bland Samsung-esque slab.

    Samsung might be a "great bunch of lads" when it comes to technological innovation, but I don't think even their most ardent fans would accuse them of being the best product designers in the world. For already troubled HTC to abandon their one stand-out USP in favour of aping Samsung's dowdy looks in this way, smacks of the suicidal.

    1. Tim Brown 1

      Re: Suicidal HTC?

      Have to agree there.

      Not being a fan of the massive phablet, I was happy to snap up an HTC one mini 2 last year at a bargain price since it apparently wasn't a popular model, but I'm very happy with it. But the rumoured design just leaves me cold.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So much love for HTC, I almost wonder if we're talking about the same phone.

    My M8 was so bad, it convinced me to buy my first Apple product. Rarely got any cellular signal. 50-50 chance the Wi-Fi calling would work. Required a reboot to connect to my car's bluetooth. Random crashes. Other stuff I'm happy to forget about.

    What do I miss about it now that I have an iPhone? The IR Blaster was useful and a 3rd party music player that was easier to use. The microSD card was useful at the time, but now even iPhones can have 128GB of storage. A 3rd party GUI and a Swype keyboard made it easy to use as well.

    But too many problems, so, now my M8 just sits on the endtable running BOINC until I need to use it as a remote.

    I did have the Sprint version of the phone, so perhaps that was my problem.

    1. Daniel Voyce

      Have the same problems on my M7 with Bluetooth - its just an awful stack built into pretty crappy software! They did however make it pretty easy to stick a custom rom on it!

    2. To Mars in Man Bras!
      Alert

      Re: So much love for HTC...

      Being the pauper I am, it's only in the past year I've been able to afford to buy an HTC One M8 2nd hand. And, so far, apart from 2 crashes [in the space of about 6 months] it's been pretty faultless. Mind you, the M8 was an upgrade from a prehistoric iPhone 3GS, so a well-greased abacus would have been a technological leap forward, by comparison.

  9. Tom 64

    Yawn

    Why copy your rivals? This looks like a samsung from 3 years ago, and that is not a compliment.

    The M8 was a great looking bit of kit, with an aggressive design, meaty speakers and pleasing symmetry. Looks like HTC will be accelerating their downfall with this crap.

  10. rchop

    Will not be buying an M10

    I loved my HTC phones until.... They used a daughter board for the usb/charging port. Before I could upgrade my phone became virtually useless because the charging was so flaky. Having six months to go before my upgrade was available, I had the choice of taking out insurance and a 75$ fee or buying a new phone. It was bad enough that I'd be adding 78$+ to my phone's cost (13$ times 6) but the REAL killer was finding out that no one will repair these things. The repair shops won't touch them even though they advertise that they will (a sure sign the M8 was the end of the line for third party repairs). Finally, the add-on market for the HTC is essentially not there. iPhone and Samsung have miles of add-on displays but you have to go online for what little exists for HTC. My vendor is Sprint and they weren't all that helpful, wanting to do try everything before biting the bullet and replacing my phone ... for a 75$ fee. At best, the combination of HTC and Sprint could be the real problem, ... But my next phone will probably be a Samsung. I love Android.

  11. leexgx

    if it lacks stereo speakers i not even consider it over the CUBOT H1 i got now (you cant beat 2 days Real battery use or 7-8 hours of constant screen on time or tomtom use) if it had stereo speakers and 1080p screen it be golden (but it have slightly lower battery life though, the 7-8 hour of constant use is perfect for me also means les likelt to brake the USB port to repeatedly topping the battery up)

    i love my HTC ONE M7 when playing and watching videos on it but don't like the battery life at all and it turns into an oven as well (HTC ONE M7 stops charging when it gets to warm in summer, not a fault of the phone but more a fault in the CPU design and thermal management that allows the phone to get to that point where you can cook eggs on it)

    my HTC ONE M7 that has my 3 AYCE sim in it you can nearly count in seconds how fast the % of the battery drops (ok not that bad but phone only lasts 2 hours) , would last a little longer but the phone now powers off at 30%, but i think that is just a % bug as it tends to hang at 56% for a bit before moving again

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