The number-one selling contract phone in Spring of 2010 has been the HTC Desire, and deservedly so. But the Desire isn't a cheap phone, so HTC have made the same technology available to a much greater audience with the release of the Wildfire.
With such a huge price differential between the Wildfire and the Desire, our first concern was that the features that made the Desire such a monster success have been sacrificed. But in fact, they're pretty much all still here.
First of all, we're delighted to see that there's been no sacrifice in overall quality. The Wildfire not only looks amazing, but it feels solid in the hand too. The screen is smaller, but at 3.2 inches in size it compares favourably with other smartphones in this price range. It's larger than the Palm Pre and the same physical size as the Nokia 5800, although admittedly it lacks the resolution of these phones. Nevertheless it makes up for this with its superbly responsive capacitive touchscreen.
The Wildfire runs the same operating system as the Desire, namely Android™ 2.1 (Éclair) with HTC Sense, making it both very powerful and very easy to use. The Android Market is maturing fast, with thousands of free games and apps now available, and we wouldn't be surprised if it overtook Apple's App Store in the near future. HTC Sense overlays the Android operating system, providing a very slick user interface with rich functionality. Friend Stream lets you see all your friends’ Facebook updates, Tweets and Flickr photos on the same screen. The new Caller ID shows not only the caller's name and photo, but also their Facebook status and birthday date too. The News App delivers your selected news feeds straight to your phone. There are now 7 home screens available, all easily customizable, and in case that sounds like too many to remember, Leap View shows you thumbnails of all 7 of your Home Screen panels at once. You'd be right to think that the Wildfire is as much about social networking and the mobile internet as it is about phoning and texting. That's why Google developed Android in the first place, but actually HTC are leading the way in making this vision a reality. This latest incarnation of Android and HTC Sense behaves just beautifully.
You also need your phone to provide basics like a good camera and media player, and the Wildfire ticks these boxes too. The camera has 5 megapixels, autofocus and a flash, so it can take pretty decent photos under most conditions. Likewise, the media player can handle all common digital formats, has plenty of playback options, and produces excellent audio quality via its 3.5mm headphone socket. An FM radio is included too. The one thing missing on the media side is video calling.
The Wildfire has fast internet access via 3G HSPA, giving download speeds of up to 7.2 Mbps - as fast as home broadband in theory. It also has Wi-Fi support, so you can access even faster data rates in a Wi-Fi hotspot. In addition it supports Bluetooth and USB connectivity.
As well as this, HTC have managed to pack in a GPS receiver with Google Maps, a digital compass, geo-tagging of photos and HTC Footprints.
There are a few other things worth mentioning about the Wildfire. The web browser is superb with full support for flash (move over, iPhone!) and the pinch-to-zoom capability combined with auto-rotation between landscape and portrait modes makes for a great experience, despite the limited screen size. We're delighted to note that there's support for Microsoft Exchange, so you can sync your email and calendar with your PC. And also that a dimmable flashlight has been built into the phone, just like those old Nokias - cool.
The hardware to support all these flashy features is in place too. The CPU isn't as fast as the Desire's, but at 528 MHz it's no slouch. It's the same processor that was used in the HTC Hero in fact. The phone also has a pretty decent 384MB RAM, with the capacity to accept a 32GB microSD memory card as well. The battery is a mighty 1300 mAh Lithium-ion battery, which is almost as big as the battery in the Desire. Now the Desire doesn't have the greatest battery life, so it might seem that supplying a smaller battery could lead to trouble. However, bear in mind that the Wildfire's display is smaller than the Desire's, and the processor is less power-hungry too, and things even up. In fact, HTC quote a longer battery life for the Wildfire than they do for the Desire, so we don't anticipate huge problems in this regard.
The Wildfire is a truly impressive phone. Finally, a budget smartphone delivering Android to the mass market without compromising on any important features. Compare the Wildfire with the Desire on a like-for-like basis, and the differences will be apparent: the lower resolution screen, less memory and slower processor. But remember that the Wildfire costs a fraction of the price of the Desire, and the Wildfire reveals its true worth. 2010 is definitely the year of Android.
Features of the HTC Wildfire include:
- 5 megapixel camera with autofocus and flash
- Video recording (3GP format)
- Display: Capacitive touchscreen with pinch-to-zoom capability, 240 x 320 pixels (3.2 inches) with auto-rotate
- GPS receiver with digital compass, Google Maps, HTC Footprints and geo-tagging
- Music player (aac, .amr, .ogg, .m4a, .mid, .mp3, .wav, .wma formats)
- FM radio
- Messaging: SMS, MMS, Email
- Ringtones: MP3 ringtones
- Internet: GPRS, EDGE, HSPA (7.2 Mbps download, 384 kbps upload)
- Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.1 with Enhanced Data Rate, micro-USB 2.0, Wi-Fi, 3.5mm audio jack
- Memory: 384 MB RAM plus microSD memory card (up to 32GB)
- Vibration alert
- Quadband GSM (850/900/1800/1900 MHz) plus HSPA/WCDMA (900/2100 MHz)
- Size: 107 x 60 x 12.9 mm
- Weight: 118g
- Talktime: 440 - 490 minutes
- Battery standby: 480 - 690 hours
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