HTC Desire review

The HTC Desire comes hot on the heels of the HTC Legend. The two are quite different in specs and in price, with the Desire at the higher end on both counts. Yes, the pair share a lot of characteristics, but there is no denying that the HTC Desire is the powerful big brother.

Among the things that make the HTC Desire stand out over the Legend are that it has a larger screen and a more powerful processor. It also has a bit more internal memory. And the physical design is different too.

On the design front the Desire looses the Legend’s lip in favour of a flatter, more standard look. There is still the tiniest trace of a lip at the bottom of the shell, but you’ll need to peer really hard to see it. The chassis of the Desire has a rubberised finish making it a less slippery fish than the aluminium clad Legend.

And, without the aluminium of the Legend, the Desire has room for a proper backplate. Sadly HTC has not taken full advantage of this. The microSD card slot is under the backplate and you have to remove the battery to get to it. No hotswapping of cards, then.

But it is the other points of differentiation that really make the Desire stand out as the more power-packed of the pair. The HTC Desire has a bit more internal memory than the Legend - 576MB as opposed to the Legend’s 384MB.

More noticeably, the AMOLED screen is a real stunner. At 3.7 inches across diagonal corners and offering 480x800 pixels it is great for viewing video, looking at pix, visiting YouTube, using Google Maps and viewing Web pages. All of which you can do right out of the box, of course. We do have to say, though, that in brighter sunshine the screen isn’t the most viewable outdoors.

The capacitive screen is very responsive to finger sweeps and taps, and the qwerty keyboard is probably the most responsive we’ve used in both wide and tall formats. The predictive text system means you can play fairly fast and loose with finger-accuracy and still enter text at a good old lick.

Just one additional word about the screen. If your hands are small you may not be able to reach right across it for one handed use.

Pinch to zoom and double tap to zoom both work really well in the Web browser, with pages zooming in and out quickly and efficiently. This efficiency is in no small part due to the 1GHz processor that beats at the Desire’s heart.

We didn’t find ourselves waiting for the Desire to do anything very much. The GPS pinpointed us in Google Maps really quickly, new Web pages loaded at speed, and generally the Desire is a speedy beastie.

There is plenty of other drool inspiring stuff going on here. Android 2.1 is supported by HTC’s Sense UI which offers no less than seven home screens for you to populate with widgets that take you to apps, Web links, friends, and provide hard information such as weather, email and twitter alerts.

Just as in the HTC Legend there’s a neat feature called Leap for moving through the home screens. Pinch in on any home screen and they all appear as thumbnails ready for you to tap the one you want to go to.

If you are a social networking junkie then FriendStream, which brings together your Facebook and Twitter activity in one place will be useful. And the Desire’s ability to gather contact info from Gmail, Outlook and Facebook without too much intervention from you is a real plus point.

The 5-megapixel camera, with LED flash, autofocus and face detection is surprisingly good. Cameras aren’t a strong point for Android handsets, but this one has accessible controls and takes a reasonable picture too.

Music playback benefits from a provided set of in-ear buds that have inline music controls, and the 3.5mm headset slot is on the top edge of the Desire’s chassis so pocket snagging potential is minimised. However, we’d have liked a two-piece headset so we could ditch the horridly uncomfortable flat in-ear buds that just refuse to stay in place. When you tire of your own music, you can listen to the FM radio.

If your pockets are small there may be a size issue with the HTC Desire. That large screen obviously needs a big chassis and the HTC Desire measures 60mm wide, 119mm tall and 11.9mm thick. It weighs 135g. This makes it significantly bigger than the HTC Legend (112mm x 56.3mm x 11.5mm).

In use we had no problems with call quality, but we did have an issue with battery life. Now to be frank, this is not unusual. Android handset have a lot going on, GPS, Wi-Fi, social media alerts and email coming in all the time, and if you want to make the most of these features you need to have 3G data switched on, Wi-Fi available and GPS in use some of the time. These are all battery drains.

We reckon you can get a day out of the HTC Desire if you go easy, but if you are a serious user of its features you may need to find a power source at some point during your day too. We found the same with the Legend.

Overall the HTC Desire is a top-notch piece of kit and its big screen and fast processor are huge plus points. If you don’t need these and want to save some wonga, the less expensive Legend might be a better choice. But the Legend doesn’t have quite the wow factor.

Recycle your phone: Sell HTC Desire

Check out cheap mobile phone deals from Dialaphone and browse their offers online. They have lots of packages available on their website.