Is the BlackBerry Z30 a big BlackBerry Z10? Yes and no. The 5 inch Z30 has a larger display, sure. It was the first device to ship with BlackBerry OS 10.2, but that playing field is now even and my Z10 runs that OS as well. The phones obviously run the same software, share gesture-based user interfaces, and have LTE 4G and robust security. So what's different about the BlackBerry Z30?

BlackBerry, formerly known as RIM, has made their best smartphone to date (unless you prefer hardware keyboards). While the Z10 was nice looking but a little plasticky and boring, the BlackBerry Z30 is cool looking and chic in a manly sort of way. The edge-to-edge glass with rounded corners, grippy but very attractive boy racer carbon fiber back and metal sides equal a great looking piece of hardware. It's not light at 6 ounces, but that helps it not feel cheap. Port selection and location is similar to the Z10, with the volume rocker and voice command button on the right and the micro USB and micro HDMI ports on the left side (not the bottom as on most smartphones). This is one of the few phones that still have a dedicated HDMI port rather than a combo USB/MHL port. The Z30 also supports Miracast wireless display.

This is also BlackBerry's fastest phone ever, but Android users won't be impressed since Android is a land of feeds and speeds where megahertz wins hearts quicker than honey attracts flies. The BlackBerry Z30 runs on a 1.7GHz Snapdragon S4 Pro dual core CPU with quad core Adreno graphics. It has 2 gigs of RAM and 16 gigs of internal storage (there's a microSD card slot to augment storage). Since the same manufacturer tunes the OS and hardware, we don't need massive computing power to have a quick experience, and the Z30 does feel faster than the Z10. Though there's no quad core killer CPU here, the S4 Pro makes for a pleasant and quick experience on the Z30.

The BlackBerry Z30 has 4G LTE, dual band WiFi 802.11n, Bluetooth 4.0, NFC, a GPS, front 2 megapixel camera and a rear 8 megapixel camera with LED flash. The phone has stereo speakers that fire from the bottom edge (along the curve, so they're not muffled by a desk). The speakers are fairly loud and clear, but they're not as full and rich as HTC's BoomSound stereo speakers on the HTC One.

The software and BlackBerry OS 10, are largely unchanged from the Z10 (BlackBerry's first device to run that new OS). There are additions and improvements, notably in the Message Hub, which is our favorite among smartphones: it unifies text messages, notifications and emails in a very manageable way. It's a real time saver and intuitive. Other parts of the OS are highly reminiscent of webOS, complete with multi-tasking represented as a card metaphor and heavy use of gestures (some of which you won't remember even after a week of use). Overall, we really enjoy the operating system, but while some things are extremely intuitive, others will have you banging your head.

Why is it so darned hard to get Sony Xperia smartphones here in the US? Happily, T-Mobile has decided to offer Sony's flagship Android smartphones, albeit with a few months delay from their international release. The Xperia Z1S is the T-Mobile US version of the well-received Xperia Z1, and just a few things have changed: LTE bands, the headphone jack has moved to the center on the Z1S and S is a hair taller. The Xperia Z1S has flagship specs including what's currently the fastest Android smartphone CPU, the 2.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 quad core, 2 gigs of RAM and 32 gigs of internal storage. The phone has dual band WiFi 802.11ac with WiFi calling and mobile hotspot, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS as well as NFC. Unlike some Sony phones and tablets, the Xperia Z1 and Z1S do not have the IR blaster and AV remote control feature. T-Mobile prices it at a reasonable $528, or zero down with 24 monthly payments of $22.

The Xperia is a good looking phone with a black glass back (sorry, T-Mobile doesn't offer different colors) and a slim 0.34", angular design. Those of you who detest plastic phones will likely find phones like the classy glass Xperia Z1S and HTC One more to your liking. The Xperia pulls ahead of the HTC One with a faster CPU and a much higher resolution camera: 20.7 megapixels of imaging goodness vs. 4MP for the HTC One. In fact, the Sony has the highest megapixel count of any Android smartphone on the market. That translates into more fine detail, which is useful for those who want to use larger images or make prints.

The phone is a bit larger than competing 5" Android phones, and the rectangular design looks great but is less comfy in the hand than curvy phones like the LG G2and Samsung Galaxy S4. The corners aren't sharp in the least, they're simply less hand friendly than gentle curves. The phone looks and is well made, and Sony's Xperia design language sets it apart from a sea of like-looking Android phones. It has a micro SDXC card slot and micro SIM card slot (under side doors), Sony's Xperia-style rounded metal power button, a dedicated camera button, a 3.5mm headphone jack up top and a speaker that runs the length of the bottom edge. Though glass-backed phones seem vulnerable, our also-glass backed Xperia Z has held up well, and we expect the same of the Z1S.

Here's something you don't usually see in a "designer" phone: the Xperia Z1S is waterproof and dust resistant (IPX5 and IPX8 rated). Most ports are covered by doors to prevent water intrusion, though the speaker and headphone jack are open and treated to be waterproof. For plumbers, outdoor workers, those who play by the pool and Adrian Monk types that want to wash their phones, this is a godsend. Underwater photographers will also enjoy the Z1S, but remember, you're limited to using the dedicated camera/shutter button the side, because capacitive touch doesn't work underwater.

Full HD displays are the norm for high end smartphones, and the Xperia Z1S doesn't disappoint with its 5" Triluminos display. Sony features like Mobile Bravia 2 and X-Reality are here as well to enhance photo and video for increased saturation and contrast. The downside is viewing angles aren't as good as IPS displays or the Super AMOLED on the Samsung Galaxy S4. We noted some contrast and color fading when viewing the phone off angle, but I could still easily read the display when it was sitting near me on a desk. For those who generally hold the phone directly in front of themselves, it's not an issue, but for those who frequently share their display when watching video, it might be. In the Sony's favor, color accuracy and saturation are some of the best we've seen on an Android smartphone, and movie watching feels cinematic: colors are natural and bold without being cartoonish, contrast is pleasing and human flesh tones are warm and pleasing.Like the LG G2 and Nexus 5, the Xperia uses on-screen Android back, home and multi-tasking buttons that take up a bit of bottom screen real estate, rather than capacitive or physical buttons like the Galaxy S4. When you're in an app, these buttons will generally turn into small dots as placeholders so they're visually less distracting than button graphics. On the downside, you have to remember what each of those three dots represents.

The Xperia Z1S is the T-Mobile US version of the Z1, thus it has worldwide quad band GSM and EDGE with support for T-Mobile's 3G HSPA+ and 4G LTE bands. The phone has pentaband 3G (850/900/1700/1900/2100MHz) and LTE on bands 4 and 17. That means it will work on both GSM and 3G in most places in the world, but only on T-Mobile for LTE (note that you'll have to get an unlock code if you wish to use another carrier's SIM card). Data speeds will of course vary depending on coverage in your area. Here in Dallas, Texas, T-Mobile recently rolled out wideband LTE (20 + 20MHz spectrum) for theoretical 150Mbps max download and 50mbps upload speeds. In fact, close to a cell tower beside a T-Mobile store, we actually did get 100.97mbps down and nearly 30mbps up according to the speedtest.net app. Wow! T-Mobile will roll out wideband LTE in some but not all cities, but all major metro regions should have standard 10 or 20MHz spectrum LTE by now.

Call quality is very good on the Xperia Z1S, and both incoming and outgoing voice are clear and full. Speakerphone volume is a bit lower than average while earpiece volume is average. Sony's waterproofing of the earpiece hasn't degraded voice quality or volume, but we suspect it might be to blame for the not terribly loud speaker. Headphone quality is excellent and we really enjoyed listening to music via a decent quality wired headset. Of course you can use Bluetooth wireless speakers, stereo headphones and mono headsets with the phone, and we found audio quality to be good over Bluetooth.

Just as with the Galaxy S4 and LG G2, the current all-star CPU is under the hood. The 2.2GHz Snapdragon 800 quad core CPU with Adreno 330 graphics is currently the best you can get in an Android phone, and it can handle anything you throw at it. 3D games like Real Racing 3, 4K video playback: it's all good. The phone feels fast and smooth in operation with quick app load times and fluid animations.

It helps that Sony's light customization of Android Jelly Bean 4.3 doesn't weigh down the phone, as do the heavier skins and customizations on the LG G2 and Samsung Galaxy phones. In fact, we really like Sony's tasteful and restrained approach to Android. They do add several programs that work hand-in-hand with Sony's various online services, including Album, Movies, Walkman and PlayStation Mobile. Even if you don't use Sony's cloud services or wish to rent/buy movies from them, these are great looking multimedia playback apps with quick access to EQ, locally stored media, cloud media and even native support for network hard drives that act as media servers via dLNA. PlayStation fans will enjoy PlayStation Mobile where you can download some of the same PS Vita and PlayStation 2 games but ported to Android. There's also a PlayStation app with access to your PSN profile, friends list, trophies and a PlayStation 4 second screen feature. It's refreshing that Sony's software additions make the phone more fun and easy to use for multimedia and gaming rather than just adding bloat.

Here's the star of the show: the 20.7 megapixel rear camera with a relatively large (by phone standards) 1/2.3" Sony Exmor RS sensor and a fast Sony G f/2.0 lens. No, it won't impress Nokia Lumia 1020 owners for sensor size and resolution, but the Xperia's speed will impress Lumia owners. The phone has quick shot times and fast focus times in good light. In a very dim to dark room, focus is slower, but the same is true of most camera phones. Image detail is excellent and noise is held in check with ISO under 400 to 800. Colors are bold and natural and exposure is good, though in intelligent auto mode, it does blow out some highlights in high contrast scenes. Certainly the images are good enough that you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference between images taken with the Xperia Z1S and a 16MP point and shoot.

Today's top Android phones have 13MP cameras and the Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom (more of a camera than a phone in terms of design and ergonomics) is 16 megapixels. More pixels don't always mean better images, but in this case those pixels mean better 8 x 10 prints or photo frame images and finer detail for larger images used on websites. If you rarely look at your camera phone's photos on anything but your phone, this won't matter. But for those who do use images for websites, photo sharing and playback on larger screens the Sony has an edge.

The camera can shoot 1080p video, but it uses digital image stabilization rather than optical image stabilization (OIS). Few phones have OIS, with the Lumia 1020 and LG G2 being two in that rare club. OIS increases hand motion smoothness more effectively than digital stabilization. That said, Xperia footage doesn't look jerky or jumpy, but we could see some jitter and jumps caused by our less than steady hands.

Sony sets their intelligent auto mode as the default, and it does a good job when the scene is well lit. In dark settings, I found using manual settings reduced image noise, though I suspect average users will be happy with auto mode's results. When in iAuto mode, you won't see lots of settings, but once you select manual you'll get a wealth of settings for shutter speed, ISO, metering, stabilization, white balance and a selection of scene modes. Sony offers additional modes including a background defocus mode to create SLR style bokeh, Info-eye (augmented reality plus 2D and 3D bar code readers), timeshift burst, sweep panorama and picture effects.

The Xperia has a front 2.1MP camera that can shoot 1080p video and yields clear and bright video chat footage.

Like the LG G2, the Xperia Z1S is an "average" size Android phone with a huge battery inside. That translates into excellent runtimes, even with brightness turned up and both LTE and WiFi on and active throughout the day. The 3,000 mAh battery is sealed inside, and we had no trouble making it through the day (8am to 10pm) with moderate to heavy use that included web browsing, HD video streaming for an hour, email, using the GPS for a 30 minute trip, playing music in the background with the display turned off for an hour and playing games for 45 minutes.

Smartphones are smartphones; generally they all look alike. So LG decided to throw us a curve ball with the LG G Flex. This is a curved and flexible phone, though the curve is gentle and there's little flex in this Flex. LG said they could've made it more bendable, but customers might equate a Gumby phone with cheapness. The G Flex is an Android 4.2.2 phablet with a 6" plastic AMOLED display. Don't worry; you wouldn't know it's not glass when looking at it, and plastic is what allows it to be flexible. Inside the G Flex is filled with flagship specs: a 2.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 quad core CPU, 2 gigs of RAM, dual band WiFi 802.11ac, NFC and high megapixel cameras. The price, at least on AT&T and Sprint is higher than flagship: $299 with 2 year contract rather than the usual $199. That's a $100 curve. T-Mobile will also carry the LG, but they price things using monthly payments, which in the case of the G Flex will be 24 payments of $28 ($672 total).

I had my doubts about curved phones, be it the LG G Flex or the Samsung Galaxy Round. But once I used the G Flex for a few hours, I found it more ergonomic and the screen produced fewer reflections than flat phones like the 6" Nokia Lumia 1520 and the 5.7"Samsung Galaxy Note 3. The 700mm radius curve isn't just there to fit the curve of your face; it also makes sense in the back pocket of your jeans (particularly if you have a 700mm curve to your bottom). I found videos more enjoyable on the curved display, even though there's no clear reason why this should be so: after all, it's not a 60" TV where a curve makes more sense to replicate big screen viewing at a movie theatre. Does the curve make this otherwise big phone feel easier to handle or more hand and face friendly? Yes, but this is still a very large phone.

It takes quite a bit of force to bend the phone, so it won't boing against your face or flap like a banana peel. The flexibility is there to make the phone more durable-- exerting force won't break it, it will simply flex a bit instead of cracking. Sure, if you try hard enough you could probably break it, but using bare hands that would be hard (I tried).

The smartphone has a bizarrely glossy gray striated back--does it look like metal? Nope. Does it look like classy plastic? Nope. It's a drab color and the high gloss attracts fingerprints and lint like iron shavings to a magnet. The saving grace is that the back isn't quite as slippery as you'd think and it's a self-healing polymer that can handle light scratches. Don't take your Xacto knife to it; we mean minor scratches from keys in your pocket or grit on the patio. It can take a few hours and some magic genie style rubbing to make scratches disappear: heat and friction are the key.

Like the LG G2, the volume and power buttons are on the back of the phone just below the camera lens. LG is sticking with this design element, and they feel it's ergonomic because your fingers will naturally fall on those buttons and it keeps the sides tidy. I'm not sure untidy smartphone sides bothered many of us, but the buttons do fall in approximately the right location for tactile use. I still find myself looking at the backside of the phone to make sure I don't accidentally hit the power button instead of volume when watching a video.

The phone has a micro USB port and 3.5mm headphone jack on the bottom, and the micro SIM card slot is on the left (you'll need a paperclip to eject the SIM tray). Overall it's a cleanly designed phone and the front face is dominated by the big display thanks to tiny side bezels. The G Flex uses on-screen Android buttons rather than hardware or capacitive buttons, so the phone's front is broken only by the earpiece and LG logo at the bottom.

The single rear-firing speaker is loud enough for personal playback in a quiet and it's not terribly shrill or harsh but it's not among the best in terms of volume or fullness. For visual notifications, the G Flex has front and rear notification LEDs and you can customize the LED colors.

We loved the Nokia Lumia 1520, and I personally said it was the best Windows phone that I would never use. Why? At 6", it was too big for me. Others who felt the same have patiently waited for Nokia to release a smartphone with the same cutting edge specs and 20MP PureView camera, but in a smaller package. Now we have it in the form of the Nokia Lumia Icon, a worldwide exclusive to Verizon Wireless.

The 5.9 ounce Nokia Lumia Icon has a 5" full HD Clear Black OLED display with outdoor brightness mode and heightened touch sensitivity for gloves but no Nokia Glance feature. Like the 1520 it runs on a 2.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 quad core CPU with Adreno 330 graphics and 2 gigs of RAM, giving it the same horsepower as top Android phones. It has 32 gigs of internal storage but no microSD card slot. The phone has dual band WiFi 802.11ac, Bluetooth, NFC, GPS and a front HD webcam. Qi wireless charging is built in- no need to buy a special charging back. The 20MP PureView camera that can shoot DNG RAW files? It's every bit as good as the excellent Lumia 1520 camera. And that makes it one of the top camera phones on the market, barring the 41MP Nokia Lumia 1020. The Lumia Icon runs Windows Phone 8 (specifically the "Lumia Black" release).

The only place the Lumia Icon lets us down is looks. Lumia has been synonymous with unique and attractive styling, but the Icon looks a little boxy and dull. Somehow Nokia's Lumia models suffer on Verizon and we can only guess that carrier prefers staid looks and eschews zingy colors. The usually curvy Lumia design is squared off here, and in fact the sides are broad and flat enough that you can stand it on three of its four sides (the side with all the buttons won't work). The sides are unibody aluminum and the back is Nokia's usual matte polycarbonate, and the back has a gentle bulge. It looks like a quality piece. Verizon Wireless offers the phone in your choice of black or white for $199 on contract and $550 with no contract commitment.

This is a CDMA phone with 4G LTE on Verizon's network. It also has unlocked GSM world roaming with 2G and 3G but no LTE for GSM networks. Call quality on Verizon was decent but not stellar, Nokia excels at voice phones for GSM, but their CDMA (Verizon and Sprint use CDMA) call quality lacks the fullness and clarity of their top GSM phones. That's not to say your conversations will be an unintelligible mess--that's not the case. You just won't enjoy landline equivalent clarity and bass to treble range. Data speeds are par for the course on Verizon's solid 4G LTE network and the Lumia Icon matched current Android phones and the iPhone 5S for download and upload speeds according to the SpeedTest.net app.

We're fans of Nokia's OLED displays because they're sharp, bright and color saturated without looking cartoonish or garish in terms of color. This is a full HD 1920 x 1080 display, currently a rarity on Windows Phone but standard fare on higher end Android phones. In a word: "great"! Videos look superb with strong black levels and high contrast, photos shot with the camera look scrumptious and text is clear with no jaggies. The display has an outdoor viewable mode to combat brightness, and it is indeed legible outdoors. Like other Lumia phones you can enable enhanced sensitivity if you wish to use the phone with gloves.

Beyond the top notch CPU and speedy internals, the 20 megapixel camera with f/2.4 Carl Zeiss lens and dual LED flash steal the show. Granted, it's not as impressive as the Nokia Lumia 1020 and its 41MP shooter (nothing is), but it's better than most high end camera phones on the market. It has a larger sensor than most: 1/2.5 inch (0.40" diagonally) that's just a hair smaller than point-and-shoot dedicated digital cameras that commonly use a 1/2.3 sensor (0.43" diagonally). Like the Lumia 1020 and 1520, the Icon by default shoots a 5MP image and a full res 19MP image that you can use for print and lossless zooming via crop. The Lumia 1020's shot times didn't impress us, and even the Lumia 1520 could be faster, and the Lumia Icon only slightly improves shot times over these two. For example, autofocus speeds are tolerable though still not quick. As with other Lumia smartphones, you can use software lenses to achieve different effects, and you'll find these on the Windows app store for free. Nokia also includes their Cinemagraph, StoryTeller and Nokia Camera apps.

Video is crisp and clear, and we found the camera a more than adequate replacement for a point and shoot when taking photos and shooting video. You can shoot in your choice of 720 or 1080p at up to 30 fps. Nokia's high dynamic range microphones make much better than average stereo recording while shooting video and optical image stabilization keeps shaky video at bay without degrading video and image quality as digital stabilization sometimes does.

The Nokia has a 2420 mAh Lithium Ion battery that's sealed inside. That's a similar capacity to Android smartphones running on the same CPU with a 5" full HD display, so we expected similar runtimes. Indeed, like the Samsung Galaxy S4 and HTC One, the Lumia Icon easily made it through a full day of moderate use with 25% left at 11pm. We used the web browser, email, social networking, played an hour of music with the display off, watched an hour of streaming video via Netflix, navigated a 5 mile trip with the GPS and shot 20 photos. We expect gaming to drain the battery more quickly, but in the Lumia Icon's case, shooting lots of photos and video will also drain the battery quickly.

You know the story: Windows Phone's app store selection is weak compared to Android and iOS, and that's something to keep in mind if you're a software junky looking to defect from those platforms. But the built-in programs like Microsoft's mobile MS Office suite, XBOX music, a strong PIM suite and social networking, MS Exchange support and a very good mobile IE web browser take core of core needs. Most of the top apps are available on Windows Phone, but some popular apps are still missing and the game selection is decent, but different from Android and iOS in terms of titles available. That said, I've managed to find apps to cover my needs with a few exceptions like my favorite grocery shopping list (Grocery IQ) and remote camera control and transfer apps from the likes of Canon and Sony.

The phone can sync with Google services for contacts, calendar and gmail, though push gmail went away when Google dropped Exchange ActiveSync support from free gmail accounts. POP and IMAP email are supported natively and as you'd guess MS Exchange works fine. The phone can use Microsoft's OneDrive (formerly SkyDrive) cloud services for easy access to all manner of files including MS Office documents, photos and videos.

The HTC One was one of our favorite phones for 2013: great construction and materials, a classy design, a large and sharp display and no manhandling of Android. For 2014 HTC is back with their flagship follow-up, the HTC One M8. It improves on most everything. There's even more metal in the casing and the brushed aluminum wraps around the sides so there's no polycarbonate sandwich. The display is even larger at 5" and it's still one of the nicer full HD smartphone panels on the market. HTC Sense 6 as ever offers tasteful, small customizations of Android without slapping on heavy skins. The old One's odd front buttons have been replaced by on-screen buttons, and we prefer that even if they do rob us of a little screen real estate.

As you'd expect, the internals have a boost too, with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 CPU clocked at 2.3GHz inside. This quad core CPU is fast yet power-frugal and it supports quick charging, unlike the old One that took forever to charge. This is a modest CPU improvement over the Snapdragon 800 that reigned king for a few months, but it does bring important support for DDR3 RAM, which can make for noticeable improvement in graphics performance. The HTC One M8 has 2 gigs of DDR3 RAM and 32 gigs of internal storage with ~23 gigs available. Even better, there's a microSD card slot compatible with SDXC cards for storage expansion. The phone runs Android 4.4 KitKat, and HTC Sense and BlinkFeed are now available as downloads from Google Play, so you won't have to wait for carrier firmware updates to get the latest tweaks.

The HTC One M8 will be available on all major carriers at the usual $199 with 2 year contract and $600 to $640 without contract. All carriers sell the new gray brushed aluminum "gunmetal gray" color, and Verizon also offers the light silver matte aluminum color matching the old One's finish. Lastly, there's a gold version that's available on AT&T, Sprint, Verizon and as a Google Play Edition (unlocked GSM) and unlocked developer edition (direct from HTC).

We have the new brushed aluminum model on Verizon wireless in for review, and it's simply stunning. It looks more like stainless steel and it's modern, elegant and unique. The white matte model looks much like the last generation HTC One and gold is the color of a gold bar. The phone's curves fit the hand perfectly and there's just enough straightness to the edges to provide grip. It's a tall phone among 5" models, but no taller than the Sony Xperia Z1S. It's taller than the Samsung Galaxy S4 and Nokia Lumia Icon. Why so tall? To accommodate the stereo HTC BoomSound speakers that flank the top and bottom of the display. Speaking of BoomSound, HTC says these speakers are 25% louder than the old One, and it is in fact as loud as some Ultrabooks we've reviewed. Beats audio is gone, since HTC sold their share of Beats, and that means a less bass-heavy sound.

This is a unibody phone with even more metal than the last model (90% vs. 70%). The polycarbonate on the sides is gone, along with the Oreo look. Some detail-minded folks fussed about the perfection or lack of perfection where the polycarbonate met metal on the old model, and now you've got clean wrap-around metal with a polished chamfer that's sure to please. In a world where most Android phones are shiny and plastic, the HTC One M8 is one of the few to take on the iPhone. Sony's Xperia line is the only other to pay so much attention to materials and design, but they do it with glass more than metal.

The top end cap isn't metal, but rather glossy black glass or plastic, and this area provides a window to the world for the many wireless radios in the phone. Metal edges surround this area so it's not vulnerable. The top power button might drive some folks crazy since it's hard to reach with one hand unless you have truly big mitts, so HTC added a tap to wake feature, not unlike LG's Knock On feature. Tapping twice on the screen gets the job done for me, so no complaints. The power button still does double-duty as the IR blaster window for the AV remote that works with HTC TV (powered by Peel and providing a TV programming guide in addition to remote control of your home theater gear).

The right side volume rocker is easy to operate (sometimes by accident) and it's well finished with no rattles. There's a nano SIM card tray on the left and a microSD card tray on the right--both require use of a paperclip or HTC's included poke tool to open. That's fine for the SIM since one normally doesn't remove that often, but annoying for the microSD card. I assume there wasn't enough room to add the SD card slot without resorting to the tiny little tray design. The micro USB port and headphone jack are located on the bottom and the 2600 mAh battery is sealed inside. This phone is locked up tight as a drum and it's not something that's easy to take apart for service. In fact, I suspect only factory service techs can do anything with the M8.

Display

The M8 has a 5" full HD LCD 1920 x 1080 display that's bright, extremely sharp and decently color accurate. It uses an IPS-like display and colors are natural rather than cartoony, and viewing angles are wide. It's viewable outdoors and whites are very bright and clean while blacks are decent but not as inky as AMOLED and Super AMOLED displays. Yes, it's a wee bit bigger than the last generation HTC One, but you do lose some screen acreage at the bottom for the three virtual Android buttons. These buttons will go into hiding mode when using full screen apps like Gallery or games, so they aren't visually intrusive. On the other hand, finding them can be trying-- tap in the vague area where they reside under a fog of black until they appear. Google wants manufacturers to move away from hardware buttons, so don't blame HTC if you dislike on-screen buttons.

The HTC One M8 on Verizon has very good voice quality and average call volume through the earpiece. Incoming voice was clear and full and our call recipients said we sounded quite loud and also clear. As you might guess, speakerphone calls can really boom thanks to HTC's BoomSound speakers. The M8 behaved better with a variety of Bluetooth headsets and my car's built-in Bluetooth than did the HTC One M7 (old One) that was generally quieter than average for calls.

Data speeds were above average on our Verizon Wireless review unit, and near a highway and tower the phone exceeded 50mbps download speeds. The updated wireless chipset with higher max LTE speeds is taking care of business nicely here. Like all modern smartphones, the HTC One M8 has a mobile hotspot feature so you can use your phone as a high speed wireless modem for a laptop or tablet (your carrier may charge extra for this feature).

We've already talked about the Snapdragon 801 quad core CPU with Adreno 330 graphics and DDR3 RAM support. It's currently the fastest smartphone chip on the market, and it leads the Snapdragon 800 by a small margin. HTC admitted that like Samsung, they game benchmarks, cranking up the CPU performance when the M8 detects popular benchmark apps are running. Samsung gave up the practice and removed the benchmark detection for Galaxy phones receiving the Android 4.4 KitKat update, and we'd like to see all manufacturers stop this.

Some HTC M8s (not US models at launch) have a setting in developer options to turn on high performance CPU mode for all apps. When playing 3D games, the phone gets warm on the back, but not hot. It gets warm enough that I wouldn't enable overclocking, since thermal throttling will likely negate it quickly enough.

The Cameras

The One has a very impressive 5 megapixel front camera with BSI and HDR. It can shoot 1080p video too, and that means high quality video chat. Given the popularity of selfies, we're glad to see a manufacturer actually care about front camera quality-- great stuff! I was truly impressed with video quality and you can see it in action in our video review.

The rear camera unfortunately sticks with the 4MP equivalent Ultrapixel camera seen on the last generation HTC One. The good part is just as with the M7, you get a wide aperture lens and larger pixel sites that capture more light, which can improve low light photos and generally improve shots. Indeed, the camera captures pleasing colors with good sharpness but it still handles high contrast scenes poorly with blown out whites. Colors tend toward the cool side, and are a bit less accurate than the iPhone 5s, Samsung Galaxy S5 and Nokia Lumia 1520/Nokia Lumia Icon. The drawback of the 4MP equivalent sensor is the relatively low resolution of photos; there isn't much opportunity for cropping without things becoming a blotchy mess. But taken as a whole, the images are good, and if you don't do more than post to Facebook or personal blogs, then it's a perfectly adequate camera. If you're a camera enthusiast (as I admittedly am) hoping to use your smartphone as a decent point and shoot digicam substitute, the M8's exposure and sometimes bleached look HDR shots won't win hearts and eyeballs. HDR certainly could be improved with a software update, and given how actively HTC is issuing software updates via Google Play, perhaps we'll see some tweaks soon.

Above: a pleasing photo taken in even lighting on a partly cloudy day.
Below: notice how high contrast results in blown out highlights and a loss of detail.

Sadly, the HTC One M8 loses the optical image stabilization that we loved in the old One and in various Nokia Windows phones. We particularly missed it for video recording where it would have helped calm video jitters. 1080p video capture has pleasing colors and decent contrast, though we noticed the same tendency to blow out highlights as we saw on with photos. In evenly lit settings, including night settings, the camera can acquire some nice footage with very good audio quality.

HTC added a secondary rear camera, and thankfully this doesn't herald a return to the failed 3D smartphone cameras of old. Instead it captures depth info to aide in software photo editing features like Ufocus that let you create background blur and Dimension Plus that does a 3D perspective shift that you enact by tilting the camera (if that's hard to imagine, watch our video where I demo the feature--it's actually cool). And yes, Zoe is still here so you can create a short presentation of moving photos.

Good news, the HTC One M8 has better battery life than the first gen One and it beats many other current smartphones on the market. We had a hard time killing the 2600 mAh Lithium Ion with a heavy day of use that included streaming video for an hour, using the GPS for a half hour trip, 30 minutes of calls, taking 40 photos and 5 full HD videos and playing 45 minutes of games (Real Racing 3 mostly). Rather than plugging the phone in before bed, we let it sit idle overnight and still had enough juice to power through until 11am. Nice. We didn't dip below 7 hours of actual screen on time, which is quite good for today's phones... watch out, LG G2 you have competition.