HTC Hero mobile phone - First Look review

Would Bonnie Tyler be proud?

HTC Hero mobile phone - First Look. Phones, Mobile phones, HTC, First Look, HTC Hero 0

Reviewer: Duncan Geere
Review Date: 24 June 2009
Manufacturer: HTC
Price as reviewed: £Dependent on contract
Latest price: compare

Our score

?/10

First Look

HTC's new handset strikes off a lot of firsts for Android. It's the first Android phone with a 3.5mm headphone jack. It's the first Android phone with multitouch. It's the first Android phone to support Adobe's Flash format for the web. Slightly bizarrely, it's the first mobile phone to be coated in Teflon.

But the smartphone market is getting increasingly crowded, and although Android is unquestionably a great OS, does the HTC Hero have the hardware to do Google's operating system justice? We got our hands on the new device at the launch and here are our first impressions.

First things first - this device is pretty. Although it's got the 15 degree "chin" that the G1 was mocked for, on the Hero it seems more refined, more ergonomic. Although the photos make it look a tad jutty, in person it looks right, in a way that the G1 never quite managed.

The 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen isn't an OLED, but still looks good. The 320 x 480 resolution might not be the sharpest on the block, but it suits Android with no problems. A black bezel surrounds the screen, and a white bezel surrounds that, making the screen appear bigger than it actually is.

The onscreen keyboard works nicely, in the same way that it works nicely on the HTC Magic. There's a 3.5mm headphone jack, making this a good choice for media consumption; Bluetooth, HSDPA, Wi-Fi, AGPS and an accelerometer are all present and correct.

We only got the briefest of looks at the camera, but it's a 5-megapixel, autofocusing monster compared to the 3.2 megapixels of its predecessors. Still no flash, though, making the N97 the only high-end smartphone that isn't primarily focused on photography to have one.

Memory expansion is available in the form of a microSD slot, but there's only 512MB onboard. We'd immediately advise pumping that up a bit if you want to use the handset for listening to music.

The processor is the weak point. A Qualcomm MSM7200A running at 528MHz isn't quite punchy enough to push through HTC's "Sense" Android add-ons, and left the experience feeling occasionally sluggish. It's not a horrible experience, but it doesn't match the iPhone in responsiveness, particularly when it comes to screen rotations.

Speaking of Sense, the customisation possibilities it offers are excellent. It's got 12 different clocks - 12 clocks! Widgets and homescreen apps are available in multitudes, and they're not just shortcuts to the application, like on some handsets. There's obviously the Android Marketplace too, which is slowly gaining traction.

Sense's contact management works well, too. Select a friend, and you'll see their latest Facebook updates, Twitter statuses, Flickr uploads, and all sorts of other useful info. The geolocation features will automatically update your time zone, meetings schedule and weather display to match where you are. It all makes sense, and does what you expect it to.

Lastly, the handset also mimics the functionality offered by some Nokia enterprise handsets, where you can set a "profile" of applications for different times of the day. A work profile might include your calendar and email on the homescreen, whereas a weekend one might add Twitter and a big photo of your cat instead.

At the time of writing, Orange says that it'll be selling the Hero free on £39.15 /month, 24-month contract. T-Mobile is calling the Hero the "G1 Touch", bizarrely, and will be offering an 18-month £40 deal.

First Impressions

HTC's Hero is better than the Magic, and better than the G1. It takes the best bits of other phones, and crams them all into one handset. We'd like more onboard storage and a meatier processor but even without them, this looks to be a solid contender.

We're looking forward to getting it in for a full review in the coming weeks to see how the phone stacks up against the competition.

Full tags

Phones, Mobile phones, HTC, HTC Hero

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Comments

This phone has thrown me into a quandry! I was starting to nail down which phone I was going to upgrade to, I was down to 3 alternatives; HTC Diamond 2 (because there was the guaranteed upgrade to winmo 6.5), the Touch HD (much more screen space and possible upgrade) or the Samsung Omnia 2 (i8000).

Along comes this phone and all the others are falling back into 2nd place. I am a tad concerned about your reviewer mentioning it can be a bit sluggish, but I temper this with the fact that I have had a Nokia N95 for about 18 months! If this is a bit slow sometimes, I think I can forgive it!

I am most interested in the digital compass. I do a lot of walking in the countryside and use Sports Tracker on my N95. Only trouble with that is that I have to move a minimum of a few meters before I can work out if I am going in the right direction, it is reactive rather than pro-active.

What effect will the built in compass have on how google maps displays? Will the map be displayed aligned to the front of the phone (or the way the phone is pointed) and will that map change if you swing about?

I have to say the custom interface HTC have programmed in looks very nice. I hope Orange will be offering the phone in the other colours other than that ordinary graphite colour, I think the white looks good.

So whatever happens its goodbye Nokia N series for me, I think it is going to be hello android! Keep up the good work on the website. Try not to get too carried away with yesterdays phones trying to modernise themselves (apple iPhone!). Posted by Tony Hedges, United Kingdom
I'm rocking an N95 too, and it wasn't any worse than that. It was nowhere near as bad as some touchscreen handsets I've tried. Hold tight for now and wait for the full review - we'll load it up properly and see how it performs under a heavier weight of apps and files. Posted by radioedit, United Kingdom
Hey, we are all N95 users here :) Like on the N95, I am sure the sluggishness will disappear after a few firmware updates. In my mind the N95 was not a good phone before version 14 Posted by misund007, United Kingdom
Oh fantastic! I am 'in' before the full review is done! Can you ensure you look into what effect the digital compass has on the handset (as I mention above). It's a shame there is no video camera in the front of the handset, but then we don't really have the scope for video calling anyway in the UK - right?

Look forward to your review soon. I'm green with envy you have your paws on this phone.! Posted by Tony Hedges, United Kingdom
"It's the first Android phone with multitouch."
This isn't strictly true. The G1 and the Magic both have the hardware to support multi-touch but it's not enabled by the software. Those of us with rooted G1s running custom firmware can quite happily use multi-touch in the browser at least. Posted by GK, UK
GK with a G1, I bet your hoping that HTC release an update so you can get that lovely looking "HTC Sense"? I'm afraid you sound like you are nit-picking with your comment about multi-touch.

GK can you tell us what it has been like with apps and the like with your android phone, you must have had it for a while now? Any good apps - must haves - that sort of thing? Think you could do a public service type post? ;o) Posted by Tony Hedges, United Kingdom
WHOOOOA NEDDY!

Just been on the phone, moaning at Orange, because I am due an upgrade in september, trying to see if I can get this phone when it becomes available, and the customer services person dealing with me, reliably informed me that the release date has been put back to AUGUST. He suggested that it might be software gliches, but offered no firm date, just 'august'.

I wonder if the same is true with the T-mobile G1 Touch? Posted by Tony Hedges, UK
Another N95 user who can't wait to ditch it. I almost upgraded to the G1 but I had some niggling doubts over whether the performance slugishness was due to hardware or software. The OS has been upgraded, as has the ROM/RAM but the CPU hasn't changed since the G1/Magic. It's a shame that HTC didn't leapfrog the smartphone competition by stuffing a Snapdragon CPU in there. Posted by Alexander Tsavalos, United Kingdom
I think it will work quite fast enough, Alexander, for us N95 users. Thing thats getting me is the delay. 10th of July already and not a peep yet. Not that I am too concerned, because nasty old Orange are being absolute stick-in-the-muds and will definately NOT upgrade me before september 5th anyway.

I think talking to carphone warehouse or dialaphone or phones4u might prove fruitless, but i live in hope. The closer we get to the Hero being available, the smaller the sum for me to pay-off Orange becomes... Posted by Tony Hedges, UK
I will definitely be getting this Handset. I've been wanting a Google Handset ever since Android was first announced. There are a lot of Android handsets coming out (like the Samsung Galaxy) but to me that just looks like it should slide up?! Maybe it's because I used to have a D-500 :/ Posted by Kiz, UK
Phone looks amazin!!! I think that it will be the best phone out there once released... Its about time we had more choices for phone op-systems.

I have jut bought a hTC Touch HD (sim free) to get rid of my Nokia N95 8gb. Worth every penny I paid, now its running on custom firmware, but I would have waited if I knew about this phone two months ago...

On the plus side my contract on three is up in october so I will be ditching them as soon as poss. This means that I have the choice to get another phone if need be... just dont know about the £40 a month tarrif!!! Way too much...

also with orange and t-mobile getting th iphone 3g I think there will be nice phones for everyone...

Posted by Graham , UK