HTC Radar is the latest Windows Phone from the HTC stable.
Dubbed as the little brother of the HTC Titan, it comes with a 3.8
inch SLCD display, 5 MP Camera and a sturdy metal unibody design.
It is also one of the few phones to come out pre-loaded with WP7.5
Mango.
Hardware
HTC Radar is a beautiful looking phone and is sturdy and
well-built. The metal design adds to its weight but it feels very
solid in the hands and has a very rich and elegant look, all thanks
to its metal unibody design. Gorilla glass sits on top of 3.8 inch
multi-touch display. The WVGA resolution of the display makes the
text and images look very crisp and sharp. The performance is
decent in bright sunlight. The black levels are deep enough if the
display is set on auto-brightness mode.
The front features a proximity sensor, ambient light sensor and
a front facing VGA camera for video calling. Down below there are
three standard Windows Phone control touch-sensitive buttons (back,
home and search).
The left side of the phone doesn't have any buttons; just a
micro-USB port for charging and sync. The right side features
volume controls and a dedicated camera button. On the top, you have
a lock-screen button and a standard 3.5mm audio jack.
On the back you'll find the speaker and 5 MP Camera with single
LED flash. Though the speaker is loud and clear indoors, you'll
find that the sound gets muffled when the phone is placed on a
table or covered in pouch. This happens due to the placement of the
speaker on the back. It should have been placed on the top or
bottom.
Due to the metal unibody design of the device, the battery is
non-removable. This can pose a problem to frequent travelers and
people who like to keep extra set of batteries. The battery life is
decent. During the test, the battery lasted for about 1 and half
day with some calls, downloading apps on Wi-Fi and not to mention
that EDGE was always on for syncing. If you're low on battery, the
all new battery saver feature will come to rescue. The outer skin
of the device is not full metal; it also has some plastic bits for
connectivity. HTC Radar has inbuilt A-GPS receiver, Stereo FM
Radio, Wi-Fi b/g/n and Bluetooth 2.1 A2DP which is common in
smartphones available these days.
Software
HTC Radar runs the latest flavor of the Windows Phone OS called
Mango (WP7.5). Windows Phone 7.5 was previewed in May last year.
There are as many as 500 new features in Mango; some of the notable
features include the new task switcher, voice search, Twitter and
LinkedIn integration and improved messaging. HTC Radar comes loaded
with some HTC apps such as HTC Hub, HTC Watch, Locations, Connected
Media, Photo Enhancer, Flashlight and notes.
IE9 comes bundled with Mango. The page rendering is fast and the
text looks good. Overall performance of the browser is very good.
As a former Android user, the only thing that bugged me is that
when you zoom-in, the text doesn't reflow or auto-align itself.
Although it looks like a small issue but in my opinion it spoils
the browsing experience as you have to flick left and right
constantly to read the text. If you're one of those who often visit
Flash sites then you'll be disappointed as there is no support for
Adobe Flash and surprisingly there is no Silverlight support as
well. The multiple tabs feature is great but there is no easy way
to switch between tabs.
The Radar has a 5 Megapixel camera with autofocus and a single
LED flash. The f/2.2 lens captures quality pictures and works well
in low-light situations too. The camera app comes with a few extra
features such as panorama, facial recognition and burst mode. The
panorama mode allows you to take beautiful panoramic pictures. The
panorama mode makes use of the phone's accelerometer and stitches
the pictures to create a panoramic image. Unlocking the phone and
going to the camera app takes time but HTC has added a neat little
feature where the phone unlocks directly in to the camera app if
you press the shutter button for 2 seconds. The camera is capable
of recording 720p HD videos at 30fps. The quality of the captured
video is very good and sharp. The continuous focus mode tends to
blur the videos when the camera is panned. Camera takes some time
to adjust to the light levels around you.
Social services like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn are
integrated in to the contacts. There is no option to import or
export contacts. Windows Live, Gmail and Yahoo! Mail are supported
right out of the box.
Performance
The Radar houses a 1GHz Scorpion CPU and Adreno 205 GPU. It has
512 MB of ROM and RAM. Although dual core CPUs are the norm these
days, I felt the Radar was fast and snappy. I didn't experience any
lag while using any application or playing games. Even after
installing 10+ apps the performance was consistent. The inbuilt
memory is 8GB and there is no room for expansion as there is no
expandable memory slot. Also, the OS and the apps consume some
memory so only 6.5GB is left for user consumption. This might be a
deal breaker for music lovers who like to carry their whole library
with them.
Verdict
The HTC Radar is a decent looking handset and fairly responsive.
If you're on the lookout for a budget smartphone and won't settle
for Apple or Android then this might be a good choice. Before
buying it you might want to take a look at its competition. The
Samsung Omnia W and Nokia Lumia 710 are both in the same bracket as
the HTC Radar but are cheaper, faster and more or less better than
the Radar. Both, Lumia 710 and Omnia W run on 1.4GHz processor and
have their own proprietary AMOLED displays.
Thumbs Up
- Windows Phone 7.5
- Gorilla glass
- Metal unibody design
- Good battery life
Thumbs Down
- No expansion slot
- Non-removable battery
- No Flash support