HTC's offering: Legend. Desire. HD mini.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010 at 11:30PM I felt right at home, at MWC, after having sat through HTC's press conference this morning.
Why? Because their announcement actually felt like one that would typically be made at such an event. Every press event that I've been to so far has either been underwhelming or has brought absolutely no surprise.
Anyway, what's most important here are the products announced…
First up is the Legend, a Hero upgrade (in short) that gets a brand-spanking new aluminium-based unibody design, just like that of Apple's MacBook Pro line. Its display and electronics are huddled inside the empty space between the enclosing panels, offering a perfect fit for everything plus the removable battery.

Two rubber-like panels are also used: one encasing the radio antennas and integrated loudspeaker; and the other acts as the battery cover. Even the on-board navigational device has been upgraded to an optical trackpad, where it was previously a mini-trackball on the Hero.
And then, there was the Desire, the ultimate Android device that Google would never have gotten their hands on. It takes on a somewhat-similar design to that of the Nexus One, but betters it through several different provisions: an optical trackpad; hard buttons over touch-based ones (situated below the display); and - most importantly - the HTC Sense integration (it's an updated version too, if I may add!)

Finally, the HD mini is a Windows Mobile 6.5.3 device offered as a shrunken-down version of the current HD2 model (you know, the one with the whopping 4.3-inch display - remember?) It will offer many of the key features found on its larger cousin, including: a capacitive-type touchscreen; Wi-Fi router capability; and the HTC Sense user experience.

HTC's CEO, Peter Chou, also (very eagerly) speculated his company will become one of the top three smartphone makers in the world by the year 2013. Given their recent performance, I am confident that this target is indeed very much reachable.
Release of the Legend, Desire and HD mini is expected for sometime in April, initially in the European region.
Kinny Cheng | Comments Off | 


