 Now you wouldn't know it looking at the packaging of these two phones. This is the packaging for the 8X, this is the packaging for the 8S, but the 8S is actually the little brother of the 8X. So it has a bit of a lower spec overall, a 1 GHz processor versus the 1.4 GHz S4 processor in the 8X. It also has 512 MB of RAM, 4 GB of onboard storage, which probably seems like not that much in the context of installing like a ton of apps or anything like that, but this is more of an entry level phone overall. So the screen resolution is only 800 x 480, which is still a fairly respectable, I think, 226 pixels per inch or something along those lines. It is smaller than the 8X, so if you guys don't know already, I'm using an 8X as my daily driver phone. I switched from my iPhone 4 because I'm doing a 30 day challenge where I'm trying to see if I can survive in the sort of fewer apps available and sort of less well established ecosystem that is Windows Phone 8 as an Avid Eye OS user. So I'm in the middle of that. I don't remember where I was going with this, but yes, it is the younger brother of the 8X. It is smaller. It has more of a rounded shape to it that I actually find more natural to hold, and I'd actually go as far as to say I like the finish on the back of it better than the 8X as well because the 8X is a little bit slippery on the back, whereas the soft touch feel on the 8S is a bit more grippy. So the fact that I have small hands makes it easier to hold from the get go, and then the roundedness and the grippiness means I should be able to actually type more easily on an 8S than an 8X. One of the cool things about Windows Phone is the fact that the way they've optimized the UI, it should be snappy pretty much regardless of the processing power available on the phone, but while we're waiting for that to turn on, there's the screen, it's using Super LCD versus Super LCD 2 in the 8X version. So while we're waiting for that to turn on, let's do a quick iPhone size comparison just because it's what I do. So this is an iPhone 4, and then this is the 8S up here. You can tell because they look very, very, very different. So the 8S has a slightly, slightly larger screen. There you go. In terms of the width, it's fairly similar, but it is a little bit taller because it's 16 by 9, and then you can tell my iPhone 4 is pretty beat up overall. The rear camera is a 5 megapixel camera. It does have a built-in flash. Unlike the 8X, which has notification LEDs on both sides, so there's actually one built-in here and then one built-in under the grill on the front, it looks like the 8S doesn't get that feature, and it also doesn't get a front-facing camera, unfortunately. Now I don't want this to turn into a whole huge list of what the 8S doesn't have because it does have a few things going for it. It's got a micro SD expansion slot, which you can access by removing this bottom piece right here somehow. I actually haven't had it out of the box yet, so I don't know how to access it, but the SIM installation is down there as well as micro SD expansion, but part of that is to compensate for the fact that the 8S has 4 gigs of onboard storage. So that means for installing applications, you're going to have 4 gigs of space, including Windows Phone 8. So we figured out a couple of things off camera. Number one is that we all agree that it has a really nice feel to it, just with the reduced weight, the size, the grippiness of the back, and we figured out, there you go, that's how to remove the chin from the phone. So it actually comes off reasonably easily, and it looks like there's a built-in sensor there that will allow the phone to know that you've opened it up, so that's good. There's your micro SD expansion, there's your SIM card, and then you can go ahead and close it back up. Because it wasn't easy to remove, I would say that it was, oh yeah, there it goes, SIM error. I would say that it's not easy to accidentally remove, because you have to actually put pressure on it this specific way. We had to check the instructions in order to figure that out. So this is the Windows Phone interface. We can click get started. Now most, okay, the general consensus about this phone seems to be that the UI is still very snappy. Remember, that's what Microsoft has done. So here, we're going to sign in later. That's what Microsoft has done with Windows Phone 8 is they've attempted to say, okay, regardless of whether it's a 1 GHz processor or 1.7 GHz processor or whatever else, we still want the UI to feel very smooth and responsive. Now I've noticed this with the 8X, but obviously I haven't spent any time with the 8S yet, so I won't have any specific feedback on that. In terms of dedicated buttons, it's again in line with that Windows experience. So you've got a back button, a Windows key. The back button also serves as a multitasking button, so you hold that down to access your multitasking applications. So for example, here on, I'm sorry, I'm demoing on an 8X, but that's not what we're unboxing right now. So you just hold that down and you can skip between all of your different applications that you have open. So that's what that button's for. The Windows button goes back to sort of the main home screen, which is where you keep all of your live tiles. So there you can see little previews and notifications. You can scroll down and access other live tiles. And then the search button. So this is a dedicated search button, which takes you to a Bing search. Now the Bing search attempts to look at whatever you're searching for when you press it and go, oh, okay, if he searches for Hello Kitty, he's probably looking for pictures. Whereas if he searches for a guide on how to drywall something, then he's probably looking for a video or whatever else. So it tries to be intelligent that way. One of my complaints about Windows Phone is I wish it was more like a contextual search and it searches for whatever you happen to be looking at, but that's not the way it's designed. It's very, very sort of searchable. The phone does include 7 gigs of storage on SkyDrive. So that and the expansion using microSD should help to alleviate some of the issues people might have with having only 4 gigs of storage for installing apps. And for entry-level users, it may not be an issue. For me personally, I would find 4 gigs to be restrictive. But if that's the case, you can always step up to the bigger brother, the 8X. In line with that consistent Windows experience, you've got the buttons that are included. So there's your 3.5mm jack here. There's your power button here at the top, your volume buttons here on the side, and finally, a dedicated two-stage camera button. So this is for the 5 megapixel camera that is a back-mounted camera. And the way that it works if the phone is... The phone's booted up now, right? Nope, still setting up your phone. Okay, again, I'm going to do this. I'm going to show it to you on the 8X because this is the one that I actually have booted up. So the way that works is you actually hold it down to launch your camera app. And then you can focus with a half-click. And then take your picture with the second click. So I actually found it very, very quick, very responsive to use on the 8X. And we clearly haven't tried it on this one yet. Right, last thing to mention is that Beats Audio's... I was going to say sticker, but that Beats Audio branding on the back. The 8X actually has one of the better speakers that I've encountered on a phone yet, including Slicks S3 that we've got handy here for size comparison as well. Here, I'll let you guys enjoy that size comparison while I talk about the audio. So it has one of the better built-in speakers, but that's not actually what the Beats Audio branding is about. The Beats Audio branding is all about the headphone experience. So you can actually turn it on or turn it off. And what it does is it boosts up the audio level, so it does make the audio louder. And it also amps up the lows and the highs. So I personally didn't find it to make much of a difference for me. Well, I found it to make a difference, but I found turning on Beats Audio didn't make my music more enjoyable for me. But I didn't find the onboard audio for the 8X, again I'm talking about the 8X, to be objectionable either. So you can turn Beats Audio off, and then it's a perfectly good audio chipset in there. So it wasn't an issue that I had it turned off. So the Beats Audio branding is here. So this one has Beats Audio as well. We can have a look at what's included in terms of accessories. So you get a couple HTC stickers. You get a Windows Phone 8S by HTC quick guide that shows you some basic stuff like installing the SIM, which we used, customizing your start menu, customizing your ringtone, keeping in touch. So the People app is actually very useful. It takes sort of your Facebook, your LinkedIn, your Twitter, and all that stuff and just kind of puts it all in one place. And it works very well. It works better, I'd say, for consuming information than it does for posting information because I found things like tweeting from the People app somewhat limiting and a little bit non-intuitive. But it's great for just kind of seeing what's up with the people that you follow or the people that you're connected to at a glance. Rooms and Groups keeping things in sync. Another thing that I absolutely love about Windows Phone, all the apps finished installing, all done. There we go. So the 8S is fired up. One of the other things that I love about Windows Phone is moving media on and off of the phone is absolutely drag and drop. You plug in a micro USB cable and then it's just a folder, which is the way that every phone should work for copying music. I should not have to deal with iTunes to get some music on my stupid phone. That's just ridiculous. So here we go. That's how the UI smoothness is on the 8S here. So again, I can't really see anything that would particularly bother me about it compared to the 8X. Now, if you're browsing the internet, for example, you'd probably run into things that are a little bit slower on the 8S versus the 8X, but the Windows Phone ecosystem is designed for this. I don't know if I mentioned this before. It has 512 megs of RAM and, right, let's see if there's anything else included. Right. So you do get a wall wart. There we go. So that's the phone, as well as the USB cable that I mentioned before that you might need. And I think that pretty much covers it. Thank you for checking out my unboxing and first look at the 8S from HTC. Don't forget to subscribe to Linus Tech Tips for more unboxings, reviews, and other computer videos.