HTC Touch Dual smartphone

Good to see HTC back on track

Of course one thing the TouchFLO party dress can't disguise is how crummy the Windows Mobile web browser is. In a web browsing competition the iPhone has the Dual beat like a red-headed stepson.

One small design oddity is the need to remove the back cover to access the soft-reset button; perhaps not such a great idea when you have Windows 6 as your OS. Having said that though you can of course just switch the thing on and off, which most of the time amounts to the same thing.

Battery life still remains adequate, much like its predecessor

Battery life has not been extended over that of the Touch, which could only ever be described as adequate. HTC claim five hours of talk time and 200 of standby, but in the real world even with Bluetooth switched off we only got a full day's (admittedly heavy) use from a charge. Leave it on charge overnight would be our advice - that way it should last a full 18 hours.

Signal strength was sometimes not all it could be either. Placed side by side with a Sony Ericsson K850i, the Dual often showed a weaker signal and had more trouble locking onto a 3G signal in areas where coverage was less than perfect. The Touch Dual is available as the MDA Touch Plus from T-Mobile or with HTC branding from Orange.

Verdict

The phone the Touch should always have been. The faster chip, addition of a slider keypad and HSDPA 3G along with various minor tweaks here and there have resulted in a handset that is easy to use, versatile, smart and robust. Good to see HTC back on track.