The HTC Desire really caught us off-guard. If I’m honest the HTC Legend looked to be the better handset when we first saw them both. It was the design of the Legend that won us over, but the sales of the Desire seem to have proved otherwise.
This is the “Android HD2” that many people have asked us about. Inside is the very latest HTC Sense interface with Android 2.1 and a super-fast 1Ghz chip making everything zip along at a rate of knots. A bright AMOLED screen bursts out of the plastic and an optical trackpad makes navigation easy and quick.
The specs are pretty impressive and include..
– 1Ghz CPU
– 5 Megapixel camera with face detection, auto-focus, flash and geotagging
– 3.7″ 480×800 WVGA AMOLED capacitive touch screen with pinch-to-zoom
– 3.5 mm audio port, microUSB connector for charging / sync
– G-sensor, digital compass, proximity sensor, light sensor
– Internet tethering through the USB
– Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR
– FM Radio, 512MB ROM, 576MB RAM, microSD expansion (up to 32GB)
– 1400 mAh battery
– WiFi, quad-band GSM, dual-band 3G / HSPA
The Desire now appears to be available on a range of networks and is in high demand. Our forums (as I type) are buzzing about it and the new HTC Sense interface adds both speed and a backup system to ensure that your data is kept safe even in the event of a reset.
The AMOLED screen impressed me straight away. Out of the box, even on our classic “wobble cam” videos in the car it showed a clear and sharp picture. The Desire used to be known as the “Bravo” when we first heard about it and is almost separated at birth from the Google Nexus One.
Around the back (and excuse the greasy finger mark on this shot) is a 5 megapixel camera with flash. It produces very good quality pictures and you can see the photos I took with it in our gallery here. There’s a wide selection so take a look.
At the bottom is the standard microUSB port which is now going to appear on pretty much every handset on the market. This is for charging and sync’ing with your computer. You can of course turn the phone into a USB storage device by selecting it when you connect.
On the top is the earpiece, power button (for waking the phone up) and 3.5mm audio port. You can plug your own earphones in or use the provided hands-free kit ones.
Meanwhile down the bottom is the main navigation control. You can tap the screen of course, but the optical trackball in the centre here does help a great deal, especially when selecting text. The trackball can also be tapped down to select objects on the screen. The other buttons take you back to the home tab (or zoom you out as you’ll see in the videos), menu, back and the search button.
As we’re only getting a few days with these handset (the Desire was here for just 48 hours), we’ve added the videos below to show you around the handset. It’s a great way to review the phone in a short space of time. Don’t forget to check out the many other photos that we have taken plus the photos taken on the Desire.
Links – Full Photo Gallery – Photos taken on the Desire