In a rather surprising move, HTC has announced two new additions to its ‘Desire” line up of Android smartphones. The two handsets that see the light of the day are the Desire V and the Desire VC. Of these two, the Desire V happens to be a Dual SIM offering – a first for HTC which for some reason had not ventured into dual SIM handsets – until now.
Dual SIM handsets, if you might be aware are quite popular in emerging markets like India, China and Indonesia and these new models are targeted at these specific markets.
The Desire VC is identical to the Desire V in all respects except for the fact that it skips the dual SIM capability on the V. It however adds support for CDMA/EVDO networks in China. It also gets a single SIM card slot that will also enable it to roam internationally with Tri-band GSM support.
As for the dual SIM Desire V – the main SIM card slot on the phone supports GSM/EDGE + Dual Band HSPA while the secondary SIM would only gets Tri band GSM with EDGE.
As for other “mainstream” features, both the devices sport 4 inch WVGA displays. Under the hood, powering the device is a 1 Ghz ARM Cortex A5 Processor housed inside a Qualcomm MSM7227A chipset. This chipset also houses the Adreno 200 GPU and lends 512 MB of RAM for the phone to use.
For all your imaging requirements, there is a decent 5 megapixel camera at the back. The phone is not capable of video recording in HD and supports on VGA recording – which is a major let down, if you ask me. Connectivity options though are comprehensive with support for WLAM, Bluetooth 4.0, USB and micro SD slots.
Both the devices also run the latest version of Android – the Android 4.0 ICS which is hidden under the Sense UI 4.0 skin. The phone also supports Beats Audio and supported accessories.
The Desire V will see a pan Asia launch by July with the pricing to be expected at around the $345 mark. As for the VC, it is expected to hit Chinese shores at around the same time – but for a lower $318 price tag.
