Arguably more a mini-laptop come television than your typical mobile telephone, the HTC Hero sits in your palm like a new born baby waiting to be cuddled and caressed. It’s sleek hardware, seductively colourful display and generous screen size makes the HTC Hero a 3G phone that can legitimately rival the domination of the i-phone.
BY JASON CONLON
Simple features on the Hero become a joy for the user to behold. HTC claim the carefully angled lower-end of the handset is designed “to make the user actually feel that they are using a phone”. A small manoeuvrable button acts as computer mouse, menu selector and confirmation key all in one. This is a touch screen phone and so, as is the case with many of these third generation phones, texting on the virtual qwerty keypad can take a lot of practice and getting used to (especially if the user is generously endowed in the digit department).
The most appealing characteristics of HTC Hero are undoubtedly the vast internet capabilities that it has to offer. Users can Tweet n’ Peep right from the main screen, and important previously browsed websites set themselves up in a visual index on yet another easy to access menu homepage. It is the efficient organizing, nearly always literally available at the touch of a button, that helps leave the much championed online capabilities of the Blackberry in the shade.
The whole notion of downloading applications to your handset is still a remarkable and exciting idea, though it is nothing new of course. However, this phone provides you with an Adobe PDF file viewer, allowing you to access documents straight from the web or your email account. Users can also set up a Spotify interface on their phone, as well as downloading and watching videos. This last point is where the Hero delivers yet another impressive feature. Back in the 90s it was often the desire of many teenagers to have a mini handheld TV. But these were expensive, unreliable and required a ridiculous amount of battery investment. HTC have provided fantastic mp4 file capabilities with this phone, and access to apps such as BBC i-player, 4od etc allow the phone to shine brightly. You can even download an entire series of ‘The Sopranos’ or ‘Lost’ and store it simply on the generous hard-drive. As I say, it’s often more of a laptop than a phone.
Unfortunately though, all that glistens isn’t gold, and if you don’t live in Belfast City you may well begin to resent your shiny new friend due to the incredible difficulty of getting a signal. In the UK, the HTC Hero is mainly only available on the 3 Mobile network and pay monthly contract. There is not much point in the phone’s 3G capabilities, or indeed in paying £25 a month if you are told: “Walk two streets over and should get reception there” as one customer told me what they were advised by 3 when they complained. The entire time I had the Hero, travelling form the barren backlands of Tyrone to Belfast, I struggled to find any reception other than ‘Roaming’.
The HTC Hero is indeed a beautiful, useful and entertaining piece of technology – It’s just a pity the majority of users won’t be able to use the damn thing.