HTC Thunderbolt is now available for purchase in the US market. This is a smartphone that can run on 4G LTE wireless Internet. Exclusively available at Verizon Wireless for $250, you may search more online to get some discounted price. The smartphone is running on Android OS. The handset was announced at CES 2011. This is the first 4G enabled smartphone offered by Verizon Wireless.
Display
HTC Thunderbolt features a 4.3-inch LCD display with multi-touch functionality. It has a light sensor of 480 x 800 pixels and proximity sensor. The excellent display would allow the users to enjoy high definition video.
Form Factor
The smartphone weighs 5.78 ounces and comes up with a measurement of 4.8 x 2.6 x 0.52 inches.
Battery Power
Its 1400 mAh lithium-ion battery ensures long-time working hours without a charge. However, HTC Thunderbolt, like other high-end smartphones, will need to charge up everyday. Even if run videos for a long time, it may need to charge during working hours too.
Processor, RAM and Storage
Besides supporting 4G LTE technology, HTC Thunderbolt also comes up with some excellent hardware features. It is powered by 1 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8655 processor capable of handling multi-tasking.
Moreover, the 4G smartphone features 8GB of in-built memory with 32GB pre-loaded microSD storage which can be increased via other cards. The smartphone has 768MB of RAM.
Camera
HTC Thunderbolt comes with dual-camera. The rear-facing 8-megapixel camera is capable of capturing excellent photos and handling HD 720p video.
Connectivity
Users will be able to use Verizon’s 4G LTE network and enjoy 5 to 12 Mbps of download speed and 2 to 5 Mbps of upload speed. However, the 4G LTE Mobile Broadband network of Verizon Wireless currently covers just one-third of the total American population, though they have plans to reach with 4G LTE technology to their whole 3G covered-area in the next three years.
So, naturally users can not get access to 4G LTE service from all corners of the country. However, users can use EV-DO, Rev A 3G and CDMA 800/1900 frequencies to get access to Verizon network in case of unavailability of 4G LTE network.
HTC Thunderbolt supports Wireless-N Wi-Fi networking for getting connected in Mobile Hotspot. It also has Bluetooth functionality for connecting with hands-free deices and stereo music streaming.
Ports and Other Features
HTC Thunderbolt also features a Micro USB 2.0 port which can facilitate the users to increase storage. There comes a speakerphone too for hands-free communication with others and the smartphone also comes with Dual microphones, 3.5mm headphone jack and Hearing Aid Compatibility (M3 and T3).
Thanks to the Android 2.2 Froyo OS, users will find an onscreen QWERTY keyboard for easy typing. Integrated speakers with Dolby Mobile + SRS WOW HD surround sound also exist in the smartphone. The phone has a built-in kickstand for those who want to experience an easy access to media viewing.
HTC Thunderbolt OS, UI and other features:
The HTC Thunderbolt is a powerful phone with a highly responsive UI and it is very fast. The phone boots up in just ten seconds. Do not expect anything less from this device. The phone comes with Android 2.2 Froyo and you will be upgraded to 2.3 OTA in future.
The Thunderbolt comes with HTC Sense 2.0 aka HTC Sense leap and its operation is super smooth. There are different layouts for different necessities. You just chose yours from the bunch.
The phone has a built-in list of websites such as Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, Skype. Choose yours from the list and start accessing. The same thing goes for mail. There is a list of mails from which you can choose your own. Overall, the Thunderbolt and its new UI will provide you nothing less than a superb user experience. Info Sync says: We got Leap, which allowed us to pinch and zoom a home screen to display all home screens minimized at once, and HTC Sense offered its famous Weather widget with live weather updates and animation. We really liked the fact that the dropdown menu displayed our most recently opened applications, and Androids Manage Applications program enabled us to kill programs that were hanging around and chomping memory and battery life. Overall, the HTC Sense experience was seamless and refined—certainly an example of premiere phone software.
It comes with integrated Android Market access. The phone has 40GB storage (8GB in-built and 32GB mico-SD) meaning, you would not have to worry about downloading high-end games that would take up lots of space. Here is a video clip of the HTC Thunderbolt:
Initially, it was said that the Thunderbolt will support Skype Video chat but latest news reports say that you will not get Skype in future. The Flash 10.1 support enables you to watch video right in your browser and it is very smooth. The phone’s 3D image handling capability is superb which makes it an ideal device for games. It has a highly sensitive accelerometer.
4G Internet
Since HTC Thunderbolt is the first smartphone supporting 4G LTE Internet, Verizon is trying to promote it a lot. Even the company has announced unlimited data plan for Thunderbolt for the time being. Of course you know that it wont last long and there will be some kind of pricing model instead of the unlimited data plan. Price
As for the price, we have already mentioned that it is available at Verizon for $250. There is a page in Amazon.com that has moved to Backordered and according to Engadget, the price was $180. You will surely find various prices at different websites but GizmoCrunch says, " Verizon has gone ahead and cleared the error by posting the following tweet as well as updating the price on their website: "#Thunderbolt is $249.99 with 2-year contract. $319.99 with 1-year contract and $599.99 with no contract"
HTC Thunderbolt has created a lot of buzz in Internet today. With all the good features but the absence of Skype support will disappoint some consumers. After all, HTC has made a powerful front facing camera for video chat.
