If you are not a fan of touchscreens (and let’s face it, many of us aren’t) but appreciate their uses in some situations, such as answering instant messages, you may well be on the lookout for a smartphone that has a slide out qwerty keyboard along with a capacitive touchscreen.
Two such phones are the recently released Windows 7 phone the HTC 7 Pro and the already popular BlackBerry Torch 9800. They have pretty similar specifications, but let’s have a look at them side by side.
First up, dimensions. The HTC 7 Pro is slightly bigger and slightly heavier, measuring 59 x 118 x 16 mm and weighing 186 grams compared with the BlackBerry 9800 Torch’s vital stats of 61 x 112 x 14 mm and a weight of 161 grams, which means the HTC might be a little bulky for some users, while others (particularly those with bigger hands and fingers!) will appreciate the extra space.
Next, camera. Both the BlackBerry 9800 Torch and HTC 7 Pro come with a 5 megapixel camera, which means you can be confident of snapping high quality pictures of days out with the family or nights out on the town.
The cameras also shoot HD video and there’s plenty of space to store your photos, videos and other media files on both smartphones, although the HTC 7 Pro is a few leaps and bounds ahead because it ships with a built-in storage capacity of 16GB, compared with the BlackBerry 9800 Torch’s 4GB.
In terms of connectivity, the BB 9800 Torch and HTC Desire Pro are again pretty evenly matched. The BlackBerry 9800 features Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, 3G and GPRS, much the same as the HTC 7 Pro.
For the busy business user, constant access to email is vital. The HTC 7 Pro not only provides this via its Wi-Fi and 3G capability, but also helps you to organise your emails with Microsoft Outlook. Added to this is the ability to stay on top of the stock market with the Stocks app, which enables you to check prices and indices whenever, wherever. Rotating the 7 Pro horizontally will show you full-screen landscape charts, while the app also allows you to define up to 30 stocks and track their progress.
The BlackBerry 9800 Torch is also app-rich and great for business users. A great feature, universal search, is always accessible from the Home Screen. It enables you to search through email, messages, contacts, music, videos and more on the smartphone, as well as extend search to the internet or to discover applications on BlackBerry App World.
Simplified management of social networking and RSS feeds (Social Feeds), and provides integrated access to the BlackBerry Messenger (BBM), Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and various instant messaging applications available on the BlackBerry Torch smartphone.
The BB Torch 9800 is available for £442.80 including VAT from Clove Technology.
Clove are currently running a special promotion on the HTC 7 Pro smartphone. It is available for £432 including VAT and comes with a free HTC BH M300 Bluetooth headset worth £30.
Contact Details
Clove Technology
Phone: 01202 552936
Clove Technology
PO BOX 4367
Bournemouth
BH3 7YS
UK
http://www.clove.co.uk/
[email protected]
