HTC One Mini 2

[old reece frost]

TL;DR: DON'T BUY THIS

 

I've never done a member review before, so any feedback would be great.

 

So the HTC One Mini 2 is the small version of the HTC One M8. This is great for many reasons, the main reason being that it is considerably cheaper than the One M8 [at launch]

Now, I've had this phone since Aug 1st last year, I really wanted a HTC cause of Linus' review of the M8, and figured that the Mini would be just as good...

 

Green - Good

Red - Bad

 

Design

Starting things off with a plus, the phone is beautiful. It looks almost identical to the One M8 on the front, apart from it being smaller, the back also looks great. The whole brushed aluminium thing is very eye-catching.

The phone fits in the hand nicely. It doesn't slip very easily, and even if it does, you'll most likely catch the phone before any damage is done.

The build quality is good too. The Mini 2 doesn't feature a uni-body design like its older brother, but does feature a metal construction. I've dropped my phone a few times and have a couple of dents, but the phone still works absolutely fine. The phone also has a micro SD card slot, which is amazing. More phones need this...

 

Screen

The screen on the Mini 2 is a great screen. It's a 4.5 inch, 720p display, which looks very crisp, the One M8 features a 5 inch 1080p display, but for the Mini 2, a 1080p display just isn't needed. The viewing angles are great too, you can use the phone at any angle you like, although, it's best if you point the screen towards your face, for obvious reasons.

The colours are nice too, not too over-saturated, and not to bland. The brightness however could be better. On a warm sunny day, even when the brightness is maxed out, I am finding myself having to put my hand over the screen, so I can see what's on it. Luckily for me, sunny days are a rare thing in North West Britain.

 

Audio

The front facing speakers on the Mini 2 are my favorite thing about it, the quality is so good, that I find myself using the speakers more than earphones. My dad has a One M8, and its speakers are louder than my Mini 2's speakers, but that's all that I can notice between the two.

I must admit, when I first got the Mini 2, I didn't use the speakers much, since every phone I had before then had a shitty mono speaker, but once you have stereo speakers that face you, it's hard not to use them. It's a feature I will surely miss when upgrading to a new phone.

 

Software

The phone came with Android 4.4 on it [KitKat] and still has 4.4... HTC have said that the One Mini 2 will not recieve the Lolipop update, which upsets me dearly. The phone is just over a year old and HTC have abandoned it. Seriously, what the fuck heck HTC?

As far as I know, the phone runs Sense 6, which is okay, blinkfeed was a 'feature' I disabled right out of the box though, it was unappealing to me. Honestly, I found sense ugly so I installed Nova launcher so I could get scrolling wallpaper, and other useful customization settings. The Mini 2 does not handle launchers well. I find doing everyday tasks such as opening snapchat to make the phone lag super hard, maybe it's just mine, but it is seriously annoying. At this point, I just use my phone to tell the time and play music to send me to sleep, because of the horrible lag.

If this issue was fixed, then the software would still be bad as it will never be updated, making the Mini 2 outdated just a year after its release. 

 

Camera

It's no surprise that HTC suck when it comes to integrating a camera onto a phone. The Mini 2 features a 13MP rear camera and a 5MP front camera, however, if you're not in sunlight, you will have terrible grain in your photos and videos. The dynamic range isn't anything special either on the Mini 2. [pictures below will show more than I can explain]

 

Performance

Performance on the Mini 2 is sluggish at best. Sometimes it will be fast and responsive, and other times it will just lag so bad that you can type a couple of words onto the keyboard, and when it unfreezes, vibrate like mad as it adds all of your letters to the text that you were sending. For some reason, ever since I got the phone, the Amazon app store has never worked for me, when I boot up my phone I always get the message 'Amazon App Store has crashed' which is annoying cause I never even opened it. That problem was fixed by uninstalling the Amazon app store. My phone lags as I have stated before, I am not sure why, but I am certain that it is because of the custom launcher. If anyone here has a custom launcher on their Mini 2 and also have bad lag, please tell me below.

 

Battery

The battery on the Mini 2 is meh. It can last me through a day of use, but I am a light phone user. All's I do is listen to music and text my friends, so it better damn well make it though a day without dying.

The Mini 2 features a 2100 mAH battery, which is a bit smaller than the One M8's battery [2600mAH] Battery life isn't great but it isn't terrible either, if you charge every night, then you should generally be fine, it's not like you'll be using the camera, cause all your friends have better cameras on their phones

For more heavy users, your phone will die.

 

 

Conclusion

Design - 9 [it's a beautiful phone] 

Screen - 9 [it's everything you could want in 4.5 inches ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)]

Audio - 10 [best speakers on any phone]

Software - 1 [Outdated]

Camera - 3 [Don't use this please, buy a good camera, or even a better phone...]

Performance - 5 [8 without launcher [if that's even causing the lag]]

Battery - 6 [not impressive, the phone occasionally dies on me, and I hardly use my phone]

 

Should you get this phone? No. If you're gonna get any HTC, then get the big brother the M8, or the M9, don't get the One Mini 2. I will be glad to get rid of this thing for my friends OPO when he upgrades to a OPT. Sorry if this review wasn't detailed enough, I was pretty tired when writing all of this, and will take some photos when I wake up in the morning ;D. Good night LTT 

 

Photos

will take them tomorrow when it's light

[Guest]

Nice review

But that it doesn't get Lollipop should be your first warning sign not to buy

[atrash]

One of the few reasons I'm not that keen with getting an android phone; sometimes no guarantee of getting future updates even from a big manufacturer. I'd get the L830 anytime over this. 

[Syfes]

My gf got this phone as well and her opinion of it is about the same as yours. It's too bad that there are so few high end smartphones with this form factor. Imo anything above 4.5-4.7 inches is just too bulky for one handed use. But because all these small form factor phones sit in lower end segments, they don't get software updates down the line which is a shame.

[david cassar]

It hast the same specs as the moto g, and it costs twice as much in the uk.

[old reece frost]

Nice review

But that it doesn't get Lollipop should be your first warning sign not to buy

Thanks, yeah, I definitely wouldn't have bought it if I knew that it wouldn't get any future updates.

 

 

My gf got this phone as well and her opinion of it is about the same as yours. It's too bad that there are so few high end smartphones with this form factor. Imo anything above 4.5-4.7 inches is just too bulky for one handed use. But because all these small form factor phones sit in lower end segments, they don't get software updates down the line which is a shame.

Yeah, I agree, HTC really dropped the ball with the Mini 2. Instead of making a small version of the M8, they really just made a cheaper version of the M8 with less features.

 

It hast the same specs as the moto g, and it costs twice as much in the uk.

I'm betting that the Moto G has a better camera too lol.

 

One of the few reasons I'm not that keen with getting an android phone; sometimes no guarantee of getting future updates even from a big manufacturer. I'd get the L830 anytime over this. 

This is my first Android phone. After this phone I don't think I'll be going back to HTC, which is a shame because I really do love the front facing speakers. When my friend upgrades to the OnePlus Two, I will be buying his OnePlus One, and will keep that for a while.

[Aniallation]

But because all these small form factor phones sit in lower end segments, they don't get software updates down the line which is a shame.

Well, there's the Z3C.

[Aniallation]

I'm betting that the Moto G has a better camera too lol.

 

This is my first Android phone. After this phone I don't think I'll be going back to HTC, which is a shame because I really do love the front facing speakers. When my friend upgrades to the OnePlus Two, I will be buying his OnePlus One, and will keep that for a while.

If this is the same camera as the E8, then it's better then the Moto G's camera (including 2nd gen)

 

OnePlus One speakers are actually fantastic. With MaxxAudio on and on the right settings (small speakers preset, MaxxTreble 100% and MaxxBass 50%), they do sound better then the M8's speakers, it's a shame they're not stereo or front facing.

[Guest]

One of the few reasons I'm not that keen with getting an android phone; sometimes no guarantee of getting future updates even from a big manufacturer. I'd get the L830 anytime over this. 

My iPhone 4s is getting iOS 9. Impressive eh?

[Aniallation]

My iPhone 4s is getting iOS 9. Impressive eh?

My S2 is running 5.1.1 Lollipop. So no not really. And if iOS 9 is going to be as bad of a mess as iOS 7 is on the iPhone 4, they might as well not update it.

[Guest]

My S2 is running 5.1.1 Lollipop. So no not really. And if iOS 9 is going to be as bad of a mess as iOS 7 is on the iPhone 4, they might as well not update it.

Is your S2 running Lollipop via an official Samsung update?

[Aniallation]

Is your S2 running Lollipop via an official Samsung update?

No and even if there was I wouldn't want it to. Nobody likes you TouchWiz

[Guest]

No and even if there was I wouldn't want it to. Nobody likes you TouchWiz

Exactly. My point was that I still receive software updates from my phone manufacturer. And it was directed at @atrash's comment above. I'm sorry if I wasn't clear enough.

[Aniallation]

Exactly. My point was that I still receive software updates from my phone manufacturer. And it was directed at @atrash's comment above. I'm sorry if I wasn't clear enough.

Still though, the question is will you want to, because as I said, look at iOS 7 on the iPhone 4. It's practically unusable. 

[Guest]

Still though, the question is will you want to, because as I said, look at iOS 7 on the iPhone 4. It's practically unusable. 

I'm using iOS 8.4 on my iPhone 4s now. Yes it's not as fast as it was before, but it is nowhere near iOS 7 on iPhone 4. The reason I think is that all the iPhones after the 4s are dual core parts, so anything above iOS 6 runs fine on them, but not on the iPhone 4. And that is also the reason why I think (and hope) that iOS 9 will not be too bad on an iPhone 4s. But only time shall tell.

[old reece frost]

If this is the same camera as the E8, then it's better then the Moto G's camera (including 2nd gen)

 

OnePlus One speakers are actually fantastic. With MaxxAudio on and on the right settings (small speakers preset, MaxxTreble 100% and MaxxBass 50%), they do sound better then the M8's speakers, it's a shame they're not stereo or front facing.

Sweet! Well then I cannot wait

[asim1999]

If you want a "small phone" get a Z3 Compact. You can get it dirt cheap off and on contract nowadays: £280 sim and £21 a month on contract. 

[Ryanh19]

nice