HTC Touch 3G and Touch Viva Unveiled

Today's announcement of the Touch HD has drawn the lion's share of attention, but HTC has unveiled two other smartphones at the same time: the Touch 3G and Touch Viva.

These will offer the features people have become accustomed to from other members of the Touch series; they will be touchscreen-oriented models running HTC's finger-friendly user interface TouchFLO 3D.

In appearance, both models will have more in common with the original HTC Touch than they will with the more recent HTC Touch Diamond. As part of this, they will have 2.8-inch QVGA displays, not the VGA or WVGA screens in other recent HTC models.

These devices will be less expensive than the other Windows Mobile smartphones this company is debuting this year.

HTC Touch 3G

As its name suggests, the Touch 3G will emphasize its support for high-speed cellular-wireless networking. It will have support for HSDPA 7.2 Mbps, the fastest version of 3G currently available.

In addition, this quad-band GSM phone will have Bluetooth 2.0, a GPS receiver, a microSD card slot, a 3.2 MPx camera, and an 1100 mAh battery.

This device will run Windows Mobile 6.1 Pro on a 528MHz processor, and have 192 MB of RAM and 256 MB of Flash ROM. 

It will come in four colors: black, gold, blue, and brown.

HTC Touch Viva

The Touch Viva is expected to be the first entry-level model in the Touch series, and will therefore sport and relatively stripped down feature set.

For example, although it will have Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, it will not include support for 3G cellular-wireless networking. It will function as a quad-band GSM phone, though.

The Viva will also run Windows Mobile 6.1 Pro on a relatively slow processor: 201 MHz. It will have 128 MB of RAM and 256 MB of Flash ROM. 

This smartphone will also include a GPS receiver,  a microSD card slot, a 2.0 MPx camera, and an 1100 mAh battery.

Coming This Fall

HTC says the Touch 3G and Touch Viva will be available in early October in a variety of markets, though it declined to be any more specific than that.

Related Articles:

• HTC Touch HD Will Feature Widescreen Display, 3G *Updated*