HTC Annouce Radar and Titan Widows Phones at London Show – Titan is Huge!
HTC threw a special launch bash in London last night to unveil their HTC Titan and HTC Radar (aka Omega) Windows Phone Mobile Mango phones.
Cut to the chase
Before I start getting down n dirty with all the deets here’s a quick glance guide of HTC‘s Windows phones:
The Radar has a 1 GHz processor, 8 GB storage, and a 3.8-inch LCD, and a 5 megapixel camera.
The Titan has the brash swagger awarded by packing a humongous 4.7-inch screen, 16 GB storage, an 8 megapixel camera, and a 1.5 GHz processor. That screen! Samsung classes 5.3-inches enough to be a tablet!
These phones are obviously aimed at different sectors. The white and silver Radar is the middle-weight fighter with a body “crafted” from a single piece of metal and priced at €399. The Titan is the Daddy with its 9.9 mm thin unibody construction, and premium price-tag of €599.
As you’d expect from the lower price the Radar is missing some things – no compass or gyroscope here. It does, however, pack GPS, proximity and ambient light sensors, and an accelerometer. Of course, Titan ticks yes to all of the above.
Both phones come loaded with front-facing cameras (1.3 megapixel on the Titan and VGA on the Radar) so there’s the answer to the “will Windows Phone Mango support video calling?” question. 😉
The odd thing is that the only built-in application that can make use of those self-portrait cameras is the standard camera app by way of a button for switching between the main camera and the front-facing one. The rest, I guess, is down to Mango developers to utilise them fully.
It’s all about the HTC Titan
So – that was a quick run through of both the new HTC Windows phones but the Titan steals the show – mainly due to its size!
Supersize this
The Titan is literally titanic! That 4.7-inch, WVGA (800 x 480 pixel) screen is perilously close to becoming a mini-tablet now that Samsung have released the Galaxy Note. I reckon that HTC missed a trick with that measly resolution though – just imagine that size screen dishing out full HD. It is supposed to be a premium blower isn’t it after all?
Thankfully the Titan is premium in its vital stats – 9.9mm thin and tips the scales at 160 grams with a girth of 70.7mm thanks to that enormo-screen. Before buying check that your pockets can house a 130.6 x 70.6 x 9.9 mm mobile 😉
Titanic guts
It looks as though HTC raided the HTC Flyer’s garage as the Titan is rocking the very same 1.5GHz single-core processor as the tablet. That’s all well and good as the iPhone’s tend to share the chips with the iPad but what could be irksome is that the same processor is shoved inside that lower-level HTC Radar. Ouch!
If I was HTC I would’ve thought long and hard about slipping something multi-cored into the Titan but then, as Microsoft are calling the shots about specifications, it might not have been HTC’s choice.
Also under the hood is 16GB of flash memory and that processor is buddied up with 512MB of RAM.
Make it snappy
The Titan has a decent 8-megapixel camera with an F2.2 lens partnered by a dual-LED flash. Another crushing blow for those expecting full HD as video capture goes as far as 720p video.
Round the front is the awaited 1.3-megapixel camera which should pounce on the recently announced Skype integration for video calling.
When?
Both devices should become widely available in Europe in October.
To me it looks like the lines between tablet and phone will soon be getting fuzzy – is this a good thing or a confusing thing or don’t you care as long as the spec sheet looks value for money?
Let me know 🙂
