Nexus what? HTC's latest smartphones include two that could spark Android envy, and the first Windows Mobile phone to feature a capacitive display.
Foremost among these new phones is the HTC Desire. Its hardware and design closely resemble Google's Nexus One, including a 1 GHz processor and 3.7-inch AMOLED touch screen, but with an optical joystick instead of a trackball. The big difference, however, is in the software. It's still running Android 2.1, but with HTC's Sense interface on top, which includes widgets for e-mail, weather and other important information. One new feature of Sense is "Friend Stream," which aggregates Facebook, Twitter and Flickr updates into one stream, as is the trend these days.
HTC's Legend is less powerful than the Desire, with a 600 MHz processor, but it's got more style with a body constructed from one piece of aluminum. It's like the MacBook of phones, again with HTC's Sense interface atop Android 2.1. The Legend also uses the optical joystick for navigation in conjunction with its 3.2-inch AMOLED touch screen.
Finally, there's the HD Mini, which is basically a smaller version of the existing and popular HD2. Like the Android phones introduced today, the HD Mini uses the Sense interface, but with Windows Mobile 6.5 underneath. According to CNet, this is the first Windows Mobile phone with a capacitive display, and it's taking full advantage with pinch-to-zoom on websites, Microsoft office files and PDF documents. Screen size isn't specified, but the phone measures 4.09-by-2.27-by-0.46 inches.
HTC's new phones will hit European markets in April. Asian markets will get the HD Mini around the same time, but won't get the Android phones until later in Q2. Unfortunately, there's no word on a U.S. release window for any of the phones, or pricing for that matter.
