CES 2010: HTC's HD2 has big features and a screen to match

Consumer Reports News: January 08, 2010 04:32 PM

HTC HD2
Photo: HTC

You're going to need a bigger pocket to hold HTC's HD2 smart phone, which boasts a gargantuan 4.3-inch display—the largest we've seen on any phone. The screen is multitouch (capacitive), so you can easily zoom in and out of displayed content by pinching or spreading your fingers. The phone, too, is big (4.75 inch x 2.64 inch), though surprisingly slim, at just 0.43 inch. The images on the 480 by 800 WVGA screen appeared quite sharp and bright in our in-booth demonstration.

The HD2 has a 5-megapixel camera with dual-LED flash and autofocus. It runs the Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional OS, so you'll get desktop-level Office capabilities such as editing, file creation, and document management. To help with all that multitasking, the HD2 has the ultra-fast Snapdragon processor.

Windows Mobile phones typically rely on TouchFLO 3D interface to tame their crowded, and often confusing, screen. But the HD2 instead runs the HTC Sense interface, which we've only seen on Android phones. One nice Sense feature: It integrates a Facebook and Twitter app (called HTC Peep) to provide some social-network relief.

Other features include Wi-Fi, stereo Bluetooth support, and an FM radio.

The HD2 will be available on T-Mobile this spring for an undisclosed price. I'll have more on the phone after it arrives in our labs.

—Mike Gikas