HTC One M7

It is March 2013, and HTC has just released a phone that is being hailed as the most beautiful Android device ever made. The HTC One (retroactively known as the M7) has ditched the plastic-and-glass norms for a ‘Zero-Gap’ unibody aluminium chassis that takes 200 minutes of CNC machining to produce. In the UK, it is the darling of the tech press, a 143g masterpiece that feels like a solid ingot of high-grade tech in your hand. It is a bold technical statement that challenges the dominance of the Samsung Galaxy S4 by prioritizing quality, audio, and ‘meaningful’ innovation over raw megapixel counts._x000D_
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The technical headline is ‘BoomSound.’ Instead of a tiny, tinny speaker on the back, the One M7 features dual front-facing stereo speakers with dedicated amplifiers. It is, quite simply, the best-sounding phone in history; watching a movie or playing a game on this device is a transformational experience. The screen is a 4.7-inch Super LCD3 with a Full HD (1920 x 1080) resolution, offering a staggering 468 PPI. It is arguably the best display on the market, bright, pin-sharp, and with viewing angles that are virtually perfect. Powering this beauty is a 1.7GHz quad-core Snapdragon 600 processor and 2GB of RAM, making the ‘HTC Sense 5’ interface feel incredibly snappy._x000D_
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On the imaging front, HTC has gone against the grain with ‘UltraPixel’ technology. Instead of chasing 13 megapixels, they’ve used a 4-megapixel sensor with physically larger pixels that can capture 300% more light. Combined with Optical Image Stabilisation (OIS) and an f/2.0 aperture, it is a low-light monster, though it loses out on raw detail in bright daylight. It also features ‘Zoe,’ which captures a three-second video clip with every photo, bringing your gallery to life. Connectivity includes 4G LTE, Wi-Fi ac, and an IR blaster hidden in the power button that turns your phone into a universal remote._x000D_
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The user interface introduces ‘BlinkFeed,’ a tiled home screen that aggregates your news and social feeds into a visual stream. The 2300 mAh battery is a solid ‘one-day’ performer, though that gorgeous screen and powerful speakers are thirsty for juice. The HTC One M7 is a technical and aesthetic triumph; it brought premium materials and high-end audio to the Android world in a way that had never been seen before. It is the definitive ‘connoisseur’s’ phone of 2013, a legendary bit of kit that proved HTC was at the absolute peak of its powers.