MWC 2009
HTC and Vodafone today announced the Magic, Vodafone's first Android phone and HTC's second.
The Magic is essentially a G1 sans keyboard. Stripping out the keyboard and slider mechanism makes is noticeably thinner. The styling is similar; perhaps a less blocky, but still very clean and basic, and with a "chin" angling out from the bottom. The trackball and capacitive screen remain the same, though.
On the hardware side, it has HSDPA 7.2, Wi-Fi, GPS with compass, and a 3-megapixel camera. Compared to the G1, the battery is larger at 1300 mAh, and there is more internal memory (500 MB versus ~70 on the G1.) The memory card slot remains, but if you were hoping for a 3.5mm headphone jack, you'll be disappointed.
(One thing to note is that some of the prototypes we saw were an old design. The newer, final design has large buttons with icons on them; the tiny sliver-size keys on some of these photos are not how the final device will look.)
(The two paragraphs below were updated late on Tuesday, February 17.)
As for entering text, there is of course a virtual keyboard. We saw two different versions demo'd on two difference Magics. One has dark gray keys while another version has lighter gray keys. The dark gray version was demo'd in both portrait and landscape mode, but only supports one layout: QWERTY. This keyboard version is the one that will come on the Vodafone Magic.
The lighter-gray keyboard design sports QWERTY, 20-key, and 12-key layouts. We were told the QWERTY layout will also work in landscape mode. These virtual keyboards look a lot like HTC's on-screen keyboard for their other (Windows Mobile) devices. The lighter one won't be on the Vodafone version of the Magic, but it was hinted that it could end up on other HTC Android devices.
The Magic has one very new feature, the ability to record video. The software has been added to the Android platform and will ship on the Magic. Here are some shots of the video gallery.
The rest of the OS is exactly as you would expect. It's Android, and not very different from the G1.
The hardware announced today is designed for European networks with 3G supporting only the 900 and 2100 MHz bands. It is, however, possible that another version could be announced later with support for US 3G networks.
Here is a video where we take a closer look at what's NEW in the Android OS:
Here's a full video tour:
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Nokia Brings New G Series to US
Orbic Reaches Beyond Verizon's Orbit with the Magic 5G
Nokia G300 Lands at TracFone with 5G
iMovie Makes it Easier to Create Polished Videos
