New HTC Flyer unveiled at Mobile World Congress

PanARMENIAN.Net - The new HTC Flyer was unveiled at the Mobile World Congress Feb 18, as HTC’s first entry into the tablet marketplace. This 7 inch tablet runs Android 2.4 and features a 1.5GHz Snapdragon processor, also coming with HSPA+ capabilities and a pretty big price tag.

The HTC Flyer is similar in many ways to the Samsung Galaxy Tab, and looks like it will be a strong competitor when it hits the market in the second quarter of 2011. Key features include 32GB of storage, microSD expansion, a pressure sensitive stylus, 3G+ and 4G capabilities, WiFi, an internal GPS antenna, and dual cameras. The front facing camera is 1.3MP and the rear facing camera is 5MP.

The 7 inch screen on-board the new HTC Flyer sports a resolution of 1024 x 600 pixels, although we will have to wait and see how well this translates into color and contrast performance. Some of the software features include the new HTC Watch video download service and access to OnLive cloud gaming. The “Scribe” stylus input technology also looks like an interesting addition.

All-in-all, this looks like it will be a very promising tablet, but it is unlikely to come cheap. While the release date is still some time away, Amazon.de are taking pre-orders at the price of 669 Euros, or roughly US$900. However, with a second quarter release, and the addition of Germany’s Value Added Tax, this price is – hopefully – likely to come down. There is also the possibility of a WiFi only model that should be much less expensive.

Whether HTC manage to get their Flyer tablet flying off the shelves will mostly be down to the price. While it looks like a capable device, and HTC have a good reputation of updates and support, there are cheaper tablets like the Motorola Xoom and Optimus Pad with better specs at a lower price. The HTC Flyer is due some time in the second quarter, with a price announcement likely in the next couple of months, GWL reports.