It’s that time of year again when someone associated with Taiwanese-based manufacturer HTC lets slip a few snippets of things to come. In the spirit of minor civil servants and junior ministers leaving confidential files on trains, the HTC “roadmap” has flashed its way through the ether, raising eyebrows as it passes.

Five Android and three Windows Mobile handsets are due to hit the streets in the next six months, continuing HTC’s decision to spread the load between the less favoured mobile operating systems.
We are currently talking the Legend, Salsa, Bravo, Tide and Buzz for Android; the Trophy, Photon and Tera for WinMo. The names will no doubt be changed before launch to protect the innocent and confuse the rest of us.

If the specs are to be believed, the bar stays high and the norm just got tastier, notably with the use of the Qualcomm processor platform in three of the handsets and 256 Mbytes’ RAM in the Androids.Take the Bravo due next April, sporting a big, big 3.7-inch capacitive AMOLED display that will muscle into top-of-the-range spot for HTC. It is set to be a multimedia powerhouse with DivX support and superior video recording, fuelled by a 1GHz Snapdragon CPU. Internet will be via 3.5G/HSDPA, with quad-band roaming potential and a 5 megapixel still camera.

The Tide, also expected in April, is to be equipped with 3.5G/HSDPA, Wi-Fi, GPS and quad-band, again with a touchscreen (QVGA, 2.8-inch), 3 megapixel camara and, like the Salsa and the Buzz, a 528 MHz Qualcomm CPU. The Salsa – due in June 2010 - will be less pricey, so consequently less exotic, but still full-featured. It is likely to offer 3.5G/HSDPA, Wi-Fi and GPS, plus a 2.6-inch landscape QVGA touchscreen and full QWERTY keyboard among its goodies.

The 11.4 mm thin Legend is scheduled to be first out of the traps in March, with a 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen and 5 megapixel camera. Connectivity, again, will be 3.5G/HSDPA with Wi-Fi and GPS: HTC is determined to make GPRS/EDGE so old hat.

The Buzz, due in May, will be quad-band, 3.5G/HSDPA with Wi-Fi and GPS, too, with a 3.2-inch touchscreen display with QVGA resolution and a rear panel that will have some swap around ability for the fashion conscious.

Pride of place in the Windows Mobile 6.5 stable will be the Trophy, due in May, with a full QWERTY keypad, 3-inch capacitive touchscreen with VGA resolution, 5 megapixel camera and top-notch connectivity via 3.5G/HSDPA, Wi-Fi and quad-band roaming to name but a few. Its brother in arms is the Photon, due in April, except the screen here is larger at 3.2-inch though with lower resolution (HVGA).

The successful Touch Pro2 has had its feature set slimmed down and resized to form the Tera, with its 3-inch resistive touchscreen and 3 megapixel camera. But even its cut-down functionality does not mean compromising on 3.5G/HSDPA internet connectivity, Wi-Fi and GPS.

So HTC is upping the ante in 2010, in speed, in video capability (720 pixel HDTV recording) and consistently of connectivity and everyone looks set to be a winner.

View all current HTC phones

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.