If you’ve been following our Twitter feed then you’ll probably already be aware that HTC announced two new devices and a whole new online service today. We’ll be covering the HTC Desire Z and the HTC Desire HD in seperate stories shortly. The two devices also bring the new HTC Sense interface which hooks into a new web service on htcsense.com. The web portal will let you control your phone over the web, so (amongst other things) if you lose your phone you can make it ring, even if it’s on “silent”. HTC have realised that a mobile phone has become a deeply personal object. You can now configure it easier, change how it looks easier and switch between themes. The htcsense.com site will let you back up your phone, track it if it gets lots and then display a message on the lock screen. If all else fails, you can also do a remote data “wipe” of your handset and then, when you get a new device, you can restore everything onto the handset via your htcsense.com account. Neat.
The HTC Sense interface also includes a HTC mapping app, which is a little like Google Maps. Navigation appears to be included along with compass-driven views and, more importantly, there’s the ability to download the map data ahead of time so there’s no need to worry if you’ve got a choppy or non-existance web connection. The Sense interface also improves the people experience with birthdays, blogs, facebook details appearing alongside more traditional information. Oh, and that boot time is a whole lot quicker too according to HTC. We did give this a test after being told that the device could turn back on in “less than 10 seconds”. We tested it and it actually did it in less than 5 seconds, but it seems that there’s some clever “suspend” technology going on when you tell the devices to power off from the GUI as, when we popped the battery out to try a complete “cold boot” it took the normal amount of time. We’re guessing that this will still be brilliant though, especially if you’ve had the phone powered off whilst asleep or during a flight.
The HTC Desire HD will be coming soon to all UK operators except o2. HTC tell us that the reasons for o2 not carrying it, “will become clear soon”. The HTC Desire Z will be available on Vodafone with Phones4U and Carphonewarehouse also carrying it. Both devices will be part of the biggest ever advertising campaign from HTC which will also include the existing HTC Desire.
Click on to get our shots from the event along with hands-on photos of the devices.
Link – HTC London Event Gallery