HTC Touch

Developed by HTC Corp, the world's leading provider of Microsoft Windows Mobile-based smart devices, HTC Touch might appear confusing at first, especially if you've never used a Windows Mobile smartphone before. However, getting some hands-on time with the new device could easily turn you into a fan.

HTC Touch is the world's first phone to feature intuitive touch screen technology. The phone presents a whole new way of managing touch screen-based devices by recognising and responding to the sweep of a finger across the screen. It is smart enough to differentiate between finger and stylus input and responds accordingly.

What's special about this phone is its TouchFLO feature, the new underlying touch screen technology developed by HTC. With TouchFLO you can access different functions just by swiping your finger in different directions on the phone's 2.8-inch, 65,536-color touch screen. Move your finger upward to display an animated, three-dimensional interface comprising three screens: contacts, media and applications. You can play around this interface by swiping your finger right or left across the screen, providing you access to a variety of features. This feature is also the enhancer of finger touch scrolling and browsing when navigating web pages, documents, messages and contact lists.

The manufacturers of the device claim it is the smallest touch screen smart phone produced to date. This, along with its soft-touch finish, gives the phone a comfortable grasp and makes it easy to carry around in your bag or slide it into your pocket.

Combining a wide variety of Windows Mobile 6 Professional functionalities, the HTC Touch incorporates Outlook Mobile, Office Mobile, supports push email, integrated Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP supported) and Wi-Fi, a microSD slot, and 128MB ROM/64MB RAM, and has the capabilities to run thousands of third-party applications.Users can surf the web with Internet Explorer, send and receive emails, chat and upload files to the internet. HTC Touch also features a two-megapixel camera and comes with a 1GB microSD card, giving users the versatility to store, upload and share multimedia content with ease. Moreover, the phone displays current weather conditions and forecasts for hundreds of cities around the world with a friendly and illustrated display.

It's not all rosy, though, and BlackBerry fanatics will have noted that one of the downsides of the phone might be its text input method - comprising of a small virtual keyboard and a stylus to enter text messages and emails.

The phone has just this week been made available for sale to customers across the UAE, and other Middle East countries. This is the first time that HTC has introduced an HTC product globally, and comes almost exactly a year after the company launched its first branded products in June 2006. In addition, HTC Touch will also be the first HTC-branded product to be sold in Asia. The handset makes a lasting impression - even if you're not yet a Windows Mobile fan.

Prices start from US$586. Arabian Business received complimentary use of the product for a period of one week.