Tuesday 16 February 2010

HTC HD2

HTC never fail to impressed me with their latest gadgets. Do you know why? That is because I'm so looking forward to Nokia releasing a mobile device which will utilise the 1Ghz Snapdragon cpu by Qualcomm. Well, I'm not sure whether the Finnish company will do so but time will tell. After all, I'm pretty sure that somehow Nokia will do something about the threats from companies like HTC and Samsung especially with the release of HTC's HD2 and Google Nexus and Samsung Omnia HD.

At this moment, I had the perfect opportunity to have a go with HTC's HD2. After using it for a while, I have noticed that the HD2 is actually quite good as compared to the Apple Iphone 3GS. HD2's screen is awesome at 4.3" with capacitive movement. Running on a Snapdragon 1Ghz cpu from Qualcomm, it works like a charm. Moreover, the interface of the HD2 is superb!!! I was quite unhappy with the fact that HTC would not allow users of HD2 to flash their device to their personal language. It is not possible without the help of some cooked ROM and some good instructions from xda-developers.com.

I was quite happy with the fact that those good fellows at xda-developers.com had some proper cooked ROM for flashing. I have the say that the instructions given were clear and easy to follow. Obviously, if you were to install the HSPL, you will void your device's warranty. Never say that I did not warn you. Well, if you have installed HSPL, you will be able to flash some proper cooked ROM to suit your taste.

I did flash an Asian WWE original ROM and instantly, my HD2 had chinese support which I was pretty happy about it. With the cooked ROM in place, it was time for me to deal with HD2's functionality. I do pretty like the version 1.66.707.1 firmware coming from the HD2. Picture quality was so much better as compared to the old 1.48 version. The screen is superb and everything looks so much better than the Iphone 3GS. This includes executing social networking applets like facebook and bebo. It works like a charm. You do get almost instant pop up of the application without a shadow of a doubt. Bluetooth and 3G works perfectly without any problems. The only problem which I had with the HD2 was the speaker. The speaker was rather puny and the fact that it runs on Windows Mobile 6. I do hope that HTC will be able to upgrade its ROM to improve on their wireless connection. I did get drop signals when I am on wireless network.

Another good thing about the screen is that the UI features Iphone's pinching multi touch and that is just so cool!!! Perhaps HTC should have a pair of stereo speaker just like the Nokia 5800 but HTC might want to save some juice. The unit comes with a 5MP digital camera with dual LED flash. With the updated ROM, picture quality was so much better! The unit is just perfect! I love it so much!

However, the only downside with the HD2 lies with its OS - Windows Mobile. I could not find many useful programmes for my work. Perhaps I have not been looking hard enough. I'm sure that there will be some good applications just like those featured in Nokia using the Symbian OS s60 with FP2. There was no jerking when I tried to watch HD videos on Youtube. It was just marvellous!!!

For a heavy £480 for a brand new HTC HD2, will you take it or should you just take the Google Nexus instead? You need to take into account that both phones are priced almost the same though. Well, that's another story to come in the future.

In a nutshell, the HD2 is quick, snappy and good at taking high quality pictures and videos. The problem with the unit is that it is a finger print magnet and the battery will only last for about 1.5 days under normal usage. The E72 would have made it for more than 2 days. The e-mail client on the HD2 is superb too as you also get push e-mails. It is also a slim unit.

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