HTC launches Touch Diamond 2, Touch Pro 2
updated 07:30 am EST, Mon February 16, 2009
HTC Touch Diamond 2 Pro 2
HTC's choice of introductions at MWC include major overhauls to its two most important phones. The Touch Diamond 2 jumps to a larger and even sharper 3.2-inch, 480x800 touchscreen as well as a 5-megapixel camera with autofocus. The company also tries to improve the interface by including a touch-sensitive zoom strip underneath the display to simplify centering in on photos or websites. HTC further switches to microSDHC cards for the bulk of storage and says the battery life is now about 50 percent longer.
The Touch Pro 2 in turn is a major reworking of the design that borrows the tilt-slider QWERTY keyboard concept of the TyTN II and expands the touchscreen to a 3.6-inch panel with the same resolution as the Touch Diamond 2; the directional pad has been scrapped in favor of slimmer front buttons and the zoom strip. It has a 3.2-megapixel camera and the same microSDHC storage and better battery life as the upgraded Diamond; unique to the Touch Pro 2 is a Straight Talk feature that unifies e-mail with conference calling to ease business meetings.
Both phones have an improved version of TouchFLO that includes more finger-friendly elements as well as a Push Internet feature that auto-caches certain favorite websites in advance, letting users get complete pages without having to always load them on request. Either has 3G over 7.2Mbps HSDPA, GPS and Wi-Fi.
The Touch Diamond 2 and Touch Pro 2 will both start shipping to certain Asian and European countries in early spring, with other major regions getting versions in early summer. Both support 850MHz GSM and EDGE and so work in North America, but none of the initial versions support the frequency for 3G and are likely to need special models before they ship to the US. HTC often makes phones available for AT&T in GSM form as well as Sprint and Verizon through CDMA.
Touch Pro 2
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Based on hardware
alone, it appears the iPhone is going to face some very stiff competition around the world. NYC is an iPhone paradise, so chances are I'll never see many other types of smartphones.
Still, some of these new smartphones seem to appear pretty awesome based on specs, so it's going to be tough for the iPhone to just slowly improve and still keep an edge.
Clearly the iPod didn't win on specs alone, so I guess the iPhone can still manage to hold a lead based on what I consider intangible factors. Ease of use, customer service, coolness factor, high visibility, etc.