HTC's Hero is now official, features HTC Sense UI

By on Jun 24, 2009 at 7:45 AM
News June 24, 2009

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)

 

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  • Lazaro C

    i tried the hero rom on the g1 a few weeks ago and while it was a pretty buggy port, I must say the UI is fantastic. All the widgets are great. The full facebook integration with your contacts book is very cool too!

  • in4am0spun

    Whats up with these touchscreen’s w/ a trackball? whats up with the jay leno chin AND, will the hero work in landscape mode? not one thing did they show in there (writing messages in general) that was in landscape

  • Johan Krüger-Haglert

    Regarding having UI modifications on top of the OS it’s not a big deal. It still runs the same OS, making simple applications is much less tiresome than developing a new OS, it may be easy to implement different UIs and finally I assume android will shape up once it gets more time and people working on it. It’s still small and kinda half-beta I’d say :D

  • Justin

    I like the trackball. It gives you extra precision you don’t have with just a touch screen. For example if you type a text and notice a typo and want to add a letter somewhere. Picking the spot with a touch screen does not work the best. But sliding the trackball around works great. Also the trackball is used in many games.

  • Justin

    @Palfrei the digital compass was on HTC phones long before apple added it to the 3GS. HTC is not copying apple here. Instead Apple is copying HTC. Both the g1 and the magic have a digital compass.

  • MightyMidget

    This is the coolest thing I have seen! Oh please come to AT&T!!!!!!!!! BTW, does anyone know if Orange is a GSM company?

  • Tyrone D.

    Nice looking but the chin is lame. Processor is week.

  • V for Ve…

    Competition is awesome. This is one sweet looking device. Good thing HTC dumped WinMo and went with Android. I hope a CDMA version is anounced soon, with WiFi.
    BTW, the chin is what makes it unique. I want it, with or without the chin. C’mon Verizon, you got to catch these things early.

  • BKBRAM

    Actually, as a long time blackberry user the trackball has been horrible! As well as a good majority of my buddies, and online searches reveils the same issure with hundreds of others. I had my blackberry bold for 2 months and the trackball has already gone to shit…once again trackball problems with my blackberry. I got rid of my bold and recently got the HTC Magic, the “chin” as people call it doesn’t bother me, and the trackball is much nicer from the start on the HTC then it was on Blackberry. So, yes,the chin design DOES provide protection for the trackball.

  • AT&T

    I’m sorry for any VZW users but stop crossing your fingers it will NEVER! EVER! Come to VZW why? Verizon is CDMA and AT&T is GSM and this is GSM version so sorry but you know this is why verizon and AT&T should make one network but that’s just my opinion!

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