Leaks come in all different shapes and sized. Sometimes we get a massive leak about a new device that reveals some incredible fact we didn’t know or didn’t expect, and sometimes it’s just a picture that usually leads to more speculation than was present before. This time around it’s more of the latter unfortunately, but at least we’re getting more glimpses of what’s sure to be HTC’s next big flagship device. Codenamed the M8, there’s really no telling what HTC is going to call their next phone due to the last few years of bizarre naming conventions, but that’s not something we’re going to be able to clear up in this leak. Twitter’s other famous leaker of HTC devices, HTCFamily_RU, has presented us with two fairly decent glimpses of the upcoming phone, and they are a little shinier than we saw last time. It’s likely that some weird lighting in this shot created the shiny look on the device, as the HTC One was a much more brushed metal than this appears to be, but the other leaks of the M8 showed it to be more like the HTC One’s material than a shiny finish. Also very obvious in this shot is the dual LED flash for ultra-bright night shots, and the reappearance of that second mystery camera-looking hole at the top of the device. It’s said that this second camera is used more for focus purposes and getting better shots than taking 3D pictures; something HTC experimented with on the EVO 3D for Sprint a few years ago and didn’t seem to catch on the way they hoped it would. Post-processing focus wouldn’t be all that surprising given that LG just announced such a feature on the G Pro 2, however LG’s method is a software processing one whereas HTCs may be primarily hardware processing, giving faster results in the end.
The front of the device isn’t even on unfortunately, nor in focus, so there’s only so much we can derive from it. It looks exactly like the HTC One here, minus of course those silly capacitive buttons HTC stuck on last year’s One. As other leaks have pointed out HTC has gone fully software button this time around, meaning that the screen now takes up more of the face of the phone, and of course the software buttons hide when in immersive mode, giving you the full use of that gorgeous display. Boom Sound speakers are still present thankfully, meaning that amazing sound you’ve heard out of the HTC One will still be present in HTC’s 2014 flagship phone. We’ve seen from other leaks that HTC is keeping many things the same when it comes to the look and feel of the device, and why not? The HTC One is quite possibly the most lauded Android device ever created. Why mess with near-perfection when you can only enhance it?