HTC’s Hero is now official, features HTC Sense UI
Right on cue, HTC has announced its latest Android device in the Hero. With many of the Hero’s specs being the same as the Magic, the handset does manage to beat out the Magic with its 5 megapixel camera with auto-focus, 3.5mm headphone jack (finally!!!), improved battery life and Adobe Flash support. But what makes the Hero really exciting is the fresh new GUI overlay. Much like with TouchFLO 3D for Windows Mobile, the new HTC Sense UI gives Android a much needed injection of style and functionality by allowing users to keep the content that matter to them — such as weather, contacts, photos, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and bookmarks — at their fingertips.
Another feature found within Sense is Scenes, which essentially allows users to switch from “work to weekend mode” (think of it as Modes on Nokia’s Eseries but sexier) and also helps organize emails, texts, photos, Facebook updates, call logs and more per contract entry much like Palm’s webOS. The Hero’s dedicated Search button features Spotlight-like search, meaning finding the contact, email, app, Tweet and more you’re looking for couldn’t be more simple. One last thing — the Hero is coated in Teflon that not only feels soft to the touch and thus easier to grip, but also protects the devices paint job from your greasy hands.
The Hero will be available next month in Europe with Asian availability coming in the later summer months (Orange UK has already announced it will be carrying the Hero in graphite for as low as £0 on contract this July). As for North Americans, well, we’re just going to have to wait for a little while longer. Hit the jump for the complete specs, some pics and a video.
- Android with HTC Sense
- 112mm x 56.2mm x 14.35mm, 135g
- Qualcomm MSM7200A 528MHz processor
- Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE, dual-band 7.2Mbps HSPA/WCDMA
- 512 ROM / 288 RAM
- 3.2″ HVGA capacitive touchscreen
- 5.0 megapixel camera with auto-focus
- Gravity sensor
- Digital compass
- WiFi 802.11b/g
- GPS
- Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR + A2DP
- 3.5mm headphone jack
- microSD
- 1350 mAh battery
- 420 minutes talktime / 750 hours standby (WCDMA)
@konklifer
Yeah, I was a long time WM user. Now, WM is dead to me. The interface feels like using Windows 3.11 while everyone else is using Windows 7. Or using GNOME 1.0 while everyone else is using 2.26 (for you Linux using people). Or like Newton while everyone else is using the iPhone 3GS.
WM has an old outdated interface that everyone is trying to cover up like a band-aid so you don’t see the ugly underpinnings. HTC tries hard to mask WM because it is embarrassing.
Gee.. Gonna keep Palm on their toes…
Here is a demo from Orange.co.uk
http://newsroom.orange.co.uk/2009/06/24/video-htc-hero-demo/
Enjoy!
I like the 5 Megapixel camera with auto-focus but is it just me or did HTC make it a little too windows mobileish…? I’d still rather this over the myTouch 3G though. I wish this was coming out on T-Mobile instead.
I am a G1 user and wish the chin wasnt there or at least smaller. The chin on the Hero looks as if it is even larger than the the chin on the G1. If you were to type on the soft keyboard on the iphone in landscape and the soft keyboard on the G1 in landscape, I absolutely do not believe you can honestly tell me that the G1 was more comfortable. I am not an iphone fanboy at all so please do not try to imply that. I tried it out once and returned it within the 14 day trial period because I was not as impressed as everyone else is.
are you happy to see me or is that a chin in your pocket.
i can’t fucking belive it a 3.5mm jack wow thats like the second device that they put a standar jack the first one was the touch HD
I just realized there was a video on this page. Was that MULTI-TOUCH that I saw at 3:11 ???
I think this phone LOOKS awesome. The teflon idea is intriguing. Quad band GSM means that its T-mobile or ATT stateside, not Verizon. The story says US a ways out on getting this in the first place, by the time they ever made a CDMA phone for VZ it would be a good 2 years after the fact (see all VZ HTC phones). For you VZ users, like me, you need to resign yourselves to the fact that you aren’t going to get a state of the art, stylish phone ahead of the GSM crowd. You just need to hope some of the new BlackBerries coming soon will hold your interest. At least you’ll be able to read BGR while your GSM buddies are scurrying around the room looking for signal. Looks nice HTC. You guys should buy out Motorola and Palm so we could get some style stateside a little sooner.
Software TOP, Hardware FLOP (well, the 3.5mm headphone jack is nice but for everyone else besides HTC that was already standard). The Samsung i7500 has clearly superior hardware in every aspect (and maybe the xda-developers figure out how to install the Sense UI on it
)
That makes 4 Android phones until the end of July (at least in Europe). I’m still waiting for WVGA, but that needs Android OS 2.0 so it’s gonna be a while (maybe Q4 if we are lucky).
@ Doug
Yes multi-touch is what u saw.
after watching this video, i want this phone now. lol. Anyone wanna buy a iphone 3g:P
From blackberry to iphone was a big mistake. But this phone is best of both worlds.
Anyone know the music in the video?
A couple things.
-Black, please.
-Keyboard, please.
-Snapdragon, please.
-Verizon, please.
-HTC, you motherfuckers. Now you find your cache of 3.5mm headphone jacks?
I’m guessing Google game HTC an exclusive SDK for Android seeing that HTC was the first company to carry the Android OS on their phones. HTC can create some nice interfaces but I doubt they would be able to create an entire OS from scratch and be successful with it.
Wow thats a nice looking phone! Im impressed!
I can honestly say that this is the first time I’ve ever been impressed by Android. I actually think I’m interested, in stark contrast to how I’ve felt about the OS since it was released. Awesome HTC!
@Michael – thanks so much for the link!
The device and the OS look sick. The Leno chin is OK by me. VZW – get this sucker in your line up – I’ll take mine in graphite.
Wow!
That phone looks awesome and I hope Verizon picks this up!
@Doug: Are you saying typing in landscape on the G1 is better or worse than the iPhone?
For this baby, I will sell my iPhone ASAP!
LOL
1 million iPhones sold = 1 million iphone owners wishing they wouldn`t bought that iCrap
HELP — anyone know the music in the video?
i been using the hero ui on my google ion (magic/mytouch 3g) for a while now so this is nothing new to me… im just waiting for someone to dump the final rom already so i can put it on my phone. so why complain i have the best of both worlds
@konklifer…Typing in landscape on the G1 soft keyboard is worse then typing in lanscape on the iphone. Thats just my opinion. I just think HTC has more of a chance to turn people off by the chin then they do to turn them on. If it could be helped, I would leave the chin out of the design.