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Talk me into the M8

K

kickaha

Newbie
Ok, so I went to Best Buy tonight to buy an M8.

The sales guy hands me a working M8 and I'm playing with it, then another rep walks up with a working S5 and hands it to me. I look at it, "Very nice," and hand it back to him.

I continue playing with the M8 while they continue playing with the S5.

As some point I noticed the S5 has a really beautiful screen, Samsung loaded some really vibrant, BRIGHT photos that show off that beautiful screen.

The M8 has some OK wallpapers, but nothing that *pops* and it looks pretty poor in comparison.

Next thing I know I'm holding a phone in each hand, comparing the two and after 5 minutes I realized I couldn't buy an M8 tonight because I can't justify it over the S5.

So now I need some good reasons to buy the M8 because, frankly, the S5 looks to me like a better phone.

My first HTC was an Inspire and I chose it over the Galaxy 3, I think. I didn't care for the super saturated colors on the Samsung and really liked the bright, clear color of the Inspire. But tonight all I could think was that the Galaxy's screen looked 100 times better than the M8.

Although I did take a few photos with the M8 and they looked very nice on the screen. Is this just a matter of HTC doing a crummy job of pre-loading their phone with appealing photos?

Another thing that bugs me about the M8 is the black bar at the bottom of the screen. The M8 and the Galaxy have the same size screens, but the M8 is almost 1/2" longer. That extra 1/2" makes me think back to when they ruined Jeeps by making them 12" longer. It was just...wrong.

So help me out here.

Why would I choose the M8 over the S5?

I love the HTC brand, but I really need a good justification to go with the M8.

Thanks!
 
It really comes down to what you want from a phone.
I like you and many others really have a choice between M8, GS5 and Z2.
Looks wise M8 wins, screen draw, though tests so far actually put M8 down as the best due to white balance and natural colours etc. (water proof phones often have an extra screen coating which can dull some colours). Size wise M8 is in the middle with GS5 being smallest and Z2 largest. Build quality has hands down gone to M8 so far. speed wise even though the GS5 has the highest specs reviews have said the M8 is faster, so this may be down to optomisation.

What gimmics do you need/like?
M8 has best speaker, and build, dot view case, but poorest camera, GS5 has many fitness apps integrated, finger print scanner and water proof (for a up to 30 minutes if think) but plastic build, Z2 waterproof and great cam, glass build but biggest of the 3.

all 3 have good and bad points so I think the choice is quite personal on what you want and what feels best.

Good luck.
 
I just got my M8 on Tuesday, I have to say this thing is awesome!

I build highways and bridges, so I work outside. I can see the screen on this thing a lot better than any previous phone I've owned! Next time you have the reps in Best Buy handing you both phones, check to see where they have the screen brightness set. I bet the brightness on the S5 is maxed out, and the M8 isn't, or it's set to auto. The screen is really good on this thing. Personally, I love the camera on this phone as well.

Ultimately it's a personal choice. Try the phone, if you don't enjoy it, take it back within 2 weeks and get the S5.
 
Granite1 said:
I just got my M8 on Tuesday, I have to say this thing is awesome!

I build highways and bridges, so I work outside. I can see the screen on this thing a lot better than any previous phone I've owned! Next time you have the reps in Best Buy handing you both phones, check to see where they have the screen brightness set. I bet the brightness on the S5 is maxed out, and the M8 isn't, or it's set to auto. The screen is really good on this thing. Personally, I love the camera on this phone as well.

Ultimately it's a personal choice. Try the phone, if you don't enjoy it, take it back within 2 weeks and get the S5.
Click to expand...

Typically when my screen looks crappy, it's because I have it dimmed. Before handing anyone my phone so they can test it out, I always max out the brightness level. Just like the M7, the M8 is money in direct sunlight. Whether driving or outside, you need to be able to use your phone in sunlight.
 
I've never seen a phone with this kind of build quality. I just got it yest. and it really is amazing. I have no issues moving from Sammy back to HTC after getting this in my hands. S5, PPSSS how needs it! I will say that this thing absolutely is right on par with any current new phones out and/or coming out soon as far as specs go. But build quality I don't see anything beating it in the near future.
 
The two biggest strikes Samsung phones always get from me are I dislike the plastic build and TouchWiz is a mess (to me). I love Sense and Vanilla Android. TouchWiz and a few of the other flavors out there just don't do it for me. I love Samsung as a company; All my appliances and TVs are Samsung after all. I also have a NExus 10 which was built by Samsung, which if they made their phones feel as solid as the Nexus 10 does then maybe they would have a shot. Samsungs typically have a lot of colors on their wallpapers and as the OP pointed out really vibrant pre-loaded photos. The colors do tend to pop but personally I like HTC's screen better. It is bright and accurate. Ultimately I would suggest you write down the things you care most about in your day to day usage with a phone and then compare that to what each phone has to offer.
 
I stopped by Best Buy on the way out of town this morning.

Different store but they were able to scare up a working M8 and they had a big S5 display with several working phones so I was able to compare both phones side by side again.

The display on the M8 was turned up all the way and the wallpapers looked just as crappy as last night. But there were quite a few photos people had taken in the store and they were all very bright.

Left the store and spent the day mulling over the two phones, then stopped at BB at 10 minutes to closing and picked up an M8. I was in and out in less than 30 minutes. Unbelievable. A trip to the mobile store has always taken at least an hour in the past. Wanting to go home must be a powerful motivator.

Anyway, got the M8 home, started playing with it, googled 'beautiful sunsets' and they look awesome, every bit as good as I remember the S5, so I guess it was just HTC doing a lousy job of promoting this excellent phone by putting ho hum photos on the phone.

I think what finally tipped me to the M8 was that I really like Sense and don't want to go through the learning curve for Touchwiz (and I really don't want my phone to use an OS that sounds like a bathroom accident) and I want to try Zoe.
 
Congrats. I think you'll enjoy it. For me after 24 hours of playing with the phone I'm kinda missing touch wiz a bit. If they could incorporate some of those features into sense that'd be great. Otherwise I'm still loving the phone. Also, I hope they give us more customization in future updates. The off screen motions need to be more customizable along with some other things.
 
I traded my G2 yesterday for either the S5 or the M8. I've had every htc and galaxy phone that Sprint had to offer, and decided to go with the M8. Completely happy with my choice. Both phones are good but everything boils down to user preference. For me it went like this: either go with a phone that is overly flashy, overly colorful, overly gimmicky and screams lookatmelookatmelookatme, yet feels meh and cheap. Or go with a phone that feels as good as it looks, performs the way that I want it to, and is just the SugarHoneyIcedTea through sophisticated elegancr without being overly flashy and gimmicky.
 
Damar1979 said:
I traded my G2 yesterday for either the S5 or the M8. I've had every htc and galaxy phone that Sprint had to offer, and decided to go with the M8. Completely happy with my choice.
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Same here,traded-in the G2 for the M8.The S5 wasn't in the equation for too long,w/an unbalanced Crapware to storage space/RAM Ratio.

Since I still have the G-FLEX as another option,I can't honestly say I'd done the swap from the G2 to the M8.IMHO,LG hit a homerun w/the G2,but,just came up a hair short of knocking it out of the park,with the slippery-print magnet body & lack of expandable storage.

If not for having the FLEX,I'd have kept the G2 & waited for an M8 MAX.
 
I'm happy too. But I'm still sad about the gunmetal color. I still have my M7 and it would be nice to have two silver phones. I like to match.
 
KOLIO said:
Same here,traded-in the G2 for the M8.The S5 wasn't in the equation for too long,w/an unbalanced Crapware to storage space/RAM Ratio.

Since I still have the G-FLEX as another option,I can't honestly say I'd done the swap from the G2 to the M8.IMHO,LG hit a homerun w/the G2,but,just came up a hair short of knocking it out of the park,with the slippery-print magnet body & lack of expandable storage.

If not for having the FLEX,I'd have kept the G2 & waited for an M8 MAX.
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Co-sign! I definitely liked the g2! But if they included expandable storage, I probably would have loved it. And also same thoughts as to choosing the m8 over the s5. Same price, significantly smaller fraction of the memory available. That and the M8 just looks and feels the price but its worth! Probably because it is
 
If you need to be convinced, you aren't ready. Stick with the s5 or 5s, whatever. Come back when you are ready. :D

Just having fun, love this phone! Best ever.
 
DILands said:
Your opinion of Sense vs the G2 interface?
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Still getting used to sense. But my opinion so far is that it is very intuitive. It's not as cartoony looking as G2's interface. And that is perfectly fine. What I like is that it has a knock on feature similar to G2, only it works more often. Turning it off however, you have to use the power button. Battery lasts longer than G2 also despite to 400 mah difference. LG's interface was similar to Samsung's touchwiz. Sense is definitely it's own beauty. Not a lot of gimmicks or mimics... Just a skin with features that really just flow.
 
I for one hate LG's UI, its just not my cup of tea, reminds me of Touchwiz. For me Sense is about as far as I would go in using an overlay, I just like stock to much!

After a few days with the M8 I'll say this, its pretty good, sense I'm getting used to, and all in all, its a really good piece of tech.

I was leaning towards getting the GPE after the first day of using my at&t sense version. But IMO, I'm not going to spend $700 to buy a phone without the stuff that makes the M8 special, which is after all the software that HTC has whipped up here.
 
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