Your HTC Questions Answered

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Lately, we’ve been given a glimpse of HTC’s new offerings and can’t get wait to get our hands on it. I know I can’t. However, the problem is that USA will be getting these models much later than their European and Asian carriers. Ever wondered why? And if you’re wondering as to why there’s only triband 3G phones coming out from HTC instead of quadband bands or higher, I’ve got the answer you’ve been looking for as well.

There’s actually an official response from HTC as to why they’re launching in the European markets first:

The initial models of Touch Diamond and Touch Pro have been optimized for European / Asian bands because HTC is launching with partners in those countries first. These models do not feature 850/1900/2100 3G as on many of our previous flagship models as European partners have now begun operating 3G on a second band – 900 MHz, and it is difficult to optimize for 4 bands of 3G as well as multiple 2G bands. The considerably smaller size of the Touch Diamond and Touch Pro compared to our previous 3G devices makes this task even more difficult, especially as many of our smaller previous models did not feature GPS. Additional models of both handsets optimized for other regions will launch in the second half of 2008.

Does not really explains the earlier launch dates if you asked me but it seems that msmobiles.com has an opinion on this:

One obvious reason is of course that in Europe there are many times more operators than in USA and on top of that these operators are much more willing to sell HTC-manufactured phones. Notably T-Mobile Europe and Orange are always very eager to sell Windows Mobile phones. On the other hand in USA there are only 4 major operators and only 2 of them use UMTS/HSDPA-based 3G cellular networks, so in reality it is only T-Mobile USA and AT&T, but T-Mobile’s 3G network is still under construction and AT&T has other priorities than Windows Mobile related to Apple corporation… so naturally no operator in USA is ready to get new HTC phones right now…. and selling phones without operators in USA is very difficult as subscribers are used to buying phones at operators (carriers)!

But what about the triband limitation of 3G that we see you ask? It’s all got to do with how many bands there are in 2G (the days of GPRS and EDGE) and what we now have for 3G technology. Pocket PC Thoughts says it best when they say:

So, reading between the lines a bit, it really comes down to size - and the number of bands each type of chip needs to support. 2G is limited to four bands in total, so I think that’s why we saw a few 2G quad-band phones. When you look at 3G, however, things get much more complicated: in Europe the 3G bands being used are 2100 MHz and 900 MHz, and 1800 MHz is coming down the pipe. Australia uses 2100 MHz and 850 MHz, and the US needs to support 850, 1900, and 1700 MHz (T-Mobile’s 3G network). So a true world phone would require five or six bands for full 3G support, plus the four 2G bands - we’re up to nine or ten bands now. And you can’t forget about the WiFi, Bluetooth, and GPS, so you have to add antennae for those as well.

Looks like it’s not just an HTC problem because just about every phone manufacturer will be facing the same problem if they want to incorporate all bands into their devices. Unless of course you plan on carrying those satellite phones where ever you go.

There you have. Your most common questions regarding HTC answered.

P.S. No word on the small capacity of a battery (900mAh) they use for the Diamond though. Maybe we’ll hear something about that in the future?

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