HTC One (M8) For Dummies

Introduction

The HTC One (M8) is a powerful smartphone — certainly one of the most powerful phones ever sold. It’s the flagship phone of HTC as of 2014, and supersedes the HTC One (M7). (From the rest of this chapter on, I refer to the HTC One (M8) simply as the HTC One unless it’s important to make the distinction.)

Each cellular carrier offers a slightly customized version of the HTC One. Some cellular carriers come out of the box with applications, games, or files. Some come with accessories, such as a corded headset; others don’t. This book doesn’t dwell on these kinds of differences.

Although the name for each network is different, these phones are largely the same. (At least one marketing person at each cellular carrier is cringing as you read this.) This similarity allows me to write this book in a way that covers the common capabilities. At a more core level, this phone, regardless of the carrier, is built for high-speed wireless communications. The cellular carriers have spent kajillions upgrading their networks to offer more coverage and better data speeds than their competition. Again, this book doesn’t dwell on these differences in network technology because they don’t really make much difference. (Again, at least one engineering person at each cellular carrier is cringing as you read this.)

I assume that you already have a phone and that you have good coverage where you spend more of your time with your phone. If you don’t have good coverage, you need to switch to ...