| HTC phone features fingertip browsing |
May 06, 2008
 HTC has announced a Windows Mobile 6.1-based phone featuring an enhanced, more finger-friendly version of the company's distinctive animated 3D "TouchFlow" user interface. The Touch Diamond also sports a diamond-faceted case, 2.8-inch VGA-resolution touchscreen, three-megapixel camera, GPS, FM radio, and 4GB of storage.
(Click here for a larger view of HTC's Touch Diamond)
The original HTC Touch garnered extensive publicity because of TouchFLO, which sugar-coated the standard Windows Mobile applications with a finger-friendly front end. HTC says it has now further enhanced the 3D UI with better support for one-handed operation, and for using fingers instead of a stylus.
The thin Touch Diamond has a diamond-faceted case
"TouchFLO 3D" is touted as a "great leap forward" in touch screen innovation, offering "animated access" to contacts, messages, photos, music, and weather, HTC says. The Touch Diamond's five-way controller doubles as a scroll wheel. In addition, the phone is said to switch automatically from portrait to landscape orientations, thanks to signals received from a built-in accelerometer.
Previously, TouchFLO ran only skin-deep, but HTC has now modified a key application as well. A customized version of Opera Mobile 9.5 allows zooming in and out of web pages by touching the screen or using the scroll wheel. HTC has also included a video application claimed to offer "the best YouTube experience on any device." In addition, the HTC Weather program is said to provide a constant view of weather "at home and abroad."
The Touch Diamond's faceted case houses hardware that is a little more ambitious than most Windows Mobile phones. For example, its Qualcomm MSM7201A processor is clocked at 528 MHz, and the phone has 192MB of RAM and 4GB of flash storage. The phone likely also includes a microSD expansion slot, although this was not specified.
Initially offered in a version that operates in Europe and Asia, the Touch Diamond has three-band (900/1800, 1900MHz) GSM/GPRS/EDGE connectivity, plus 900/1200MHz HSDPA (high-speed downlink packet access). The latter is said to provide uploads at 384Kbps and downloads at up to 7.2MBps.
Other wireless interfaces include not only GPS and FM radio receivers, but also Bluetooth 2.0 and 802.11b/g local area networking. The device has a 2.8-inch touchscreen with VGA (640 x 480) resolution. It includes a 3.2 megapixel main camera with auto-focus. A secondary camera, intended for videoconferencing, provides VGA resolution.
Features and specifications listed by HTC for the Touch Diamond include:- Processor -- Qualcomm MDM7201A clocked at 528MHz
- Memory -- 192MB of RAM and 4GB of flash storage
- Display -- 2.8-inch screen with VGA resolution
- Cameras -- 3.2 megapixel main camera, and VGA-resolution secondary camera
- Wireless:
WAN -- three-band (900/1800, 1900MHz) GSM/GPRS/EDGE and 900/1200MHz HSDPA
- LAN -- 802.11b/g wireless
- PAN -- Bluetooth 2.0
- GPS
- FM radio
- Other I/O -- HTC ExtUSB (11-pin mini-USB 2.0 and audio jack in one)
- Battery type/life:
- 900 mAh lithium-ion battery
- Talk time up to 330 minutes
- Standby time up to 396 hours
- Dimensions -- 4 x 2 x 0.5 inches (102 x 51 x 11.5mm)
- Weight -- 3.9 ounces (110g)
There is apparently a high level of interest this morning, since, as WindowsForDevices.com discovered, the HTC website remained swamped for several hours after the Diamond's introduction. The phone will be available to customers across all major European carriers in June, and later this quarter in Asia and the Middle East, says HTC. North American and Latin American versions will ship in the second half of 2008.
Probable pricing was not released.
Related stories:
(Click here for further information)
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