In Australia, HTC launched its first Android phone, the Dream in February 2009 - quite late compared to other countries, such as the UK and US that got the Magic in September 2008.
But we're among the first to get the Magic, which was first shown at Mobile World Congress earlier this year.
Differences between the Dream and Magic are severalfold. For starters, the included Android Operating system has been upgraded to "Cupcake", which has support for on-screen keyboards. That one change means that the Magic is a slimmer candybar shape, with no pop out keyboard as in the Dream.
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| HTC Magic, now with no keyboard. It uses an on-screen keyboard, much like the iPhone. |
Other changes include video recording and playback, which supports MPEG4 and 3GP formats and improved performance across the board - which HTC claims will improve battery life for the Magic compared to the Dream.
Anthony Petts, Sales and Marketing Director for HTC Australia said that in his time with the Magic, "I'm getting a full day out of it [using phone and push email]". That he sounded impressed is a damning comment on the state of smartphone battery life, but if true, it would be an improvement on the Dream. WE use a light use benchmark to measure battery life, which includes a 30 minute call, 50MB download and then left the phone on standby, aside from checking POP email checked every 30 minutes. Even so, we found that the Dream had barely a third of the battery life of the 3G iPhone at 31 hours 3mins.
The phone will be available through Vodafone and 3 in Australia, with slight differences for each.
- VODAFONE
Vodafone has partnered with both HTC and Google, and the Vodafone Magic comes with updates-over-the-air, geotagging, upload to Picasa and Youtube. Vodafone's Magic will come in black or white, and is available from Monday, June 15.
- 3
Three has partnered with HTC, providing a pre-installed Microsoft Exchange client and a PDF, Word and Excel file viewer. It updates firmware via PC only, and is available in black.It's available free on 3's $99 cap from mid June, as well as with a per-month pricing on plans from $29 up.
You can add the "missing" parts via downlodable updates from the HTC Market applications store, but which carrier you choose may depend on how much you need Google integration compared to Microsoft Exchange support. HTC told us that some parts of the Exchange client are paid applications.
Both phones come supplied with Google integration for Google Maps,
Specs:
Android "Cupcake" OS; HSDPA/WCDMA 900/2100MHz; Quadband; Bluetooth 2.0; Wi-Fi 802.11b/g; 11-pin miniUSB/audio jack; MicroSD memory card slot; GPS; 512MB ROM/192MB RAM; 3.2in 320x480 LCD screen; 3.2-mp camera; 118.5g; 113 x 55 x 14 (WxDxH)