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Home » Mobile & GPS » Mobile Phone » HTC Desire S » Deals

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The HTC Desire S certainly isn't the flag bearer for a new era in super fast smartphones, with it lacking the headline dual-core processor. However, it is a well crafted, elegant, easy to use, fast and very capable smartphone that thanks to HTC's tweaks stands it apart from the Android crowd. Where it actually falls down is on a couple of mundane extras, namely the lack of a physical button for the camera, the quality of said camera and the lack of an HDMI output. Thankfully, these omissions are made up for in its price, which while not bargain basement is very competitive. Read full review

Overall

8/10

User Rating

7/10

  • Read 4 user reviews
  • Write your own review
Edward Chester

By Edward Chester
Reviewed 25 March 2011
Updated 03 November 2011

Price as reviewed

£381.98

  • Review
    • 1: Design and Features
    • 2: Screen and Interface
    • 3: Interface cont, Messaging and Web
    • 4: Apps, Camera and Battery
    • 5: Specs
    • 6: HTC Desire S
  • User Reviews
  • Comments
  • 26 Photos
  • Mobile Deals
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Awards

  • Recommended by TR

HTC Desire S details

Design
8/10
Features
7/10
Performance
8/10
Value
8/10
Overall
8/10

Pros & Cons

Pros

  • Elegant design
  • Brilliant screen
  • Well built
  • Easy to use

Cons

  • No camera shutter button
  • Not dual core
  • Camera fairly poor

Price as reviewed

£381.98

Manufacturer

HTC

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Coe62

6:04 PM on 25 March, 2011

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So no extended batteries then with the new back design ?? 1450Mha is too little for power users

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mudslide

6:25 PM on 25 March, 2011

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What I'd like to know is how the display of Desire S compare to the one in Incredible S?

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AHYL88

6:28 PM on 25 March, 2011

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Ooh that's a surprise; I thought this would come with 2.3 Gingerbread. It doesn't seem so greatly different to say the Incredible or the Desire HD; except for its size they are nearly all the same. Choice is certainly gonna be tricky nowadays as the original Desire is getting cheaper and other new powerhouse phones like the Atrix and Optimus 2X are coming soon. Particularly the giant-killing (on paper and hopefully price) ZTE Skate.

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myst

6:34 PM on 25 March, 2011

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Does this device has the HTCsense.com website feature with it?

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FrancisPhillips

7:02 PM on 25 March, 2011

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Android 2.2?? All the advance publicity said 2.3. I also note that the HTC website now classes all its new phones as just running Android whereas slightly older phones state the version. Are they having problems with 2.3??

I know its a different size phone but in pure spec terms, including processor, this phone doesnt seem to have gained anything over the Desire HD which was launched 6 months ago.

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Zero 1

7:05 PM on 25 March, 2011

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Why does HTC keep making same phones and then re-naming it.... yawn!!!! Btw before anything trying to bash me, I don't use iphone either.

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rav

12:25 AM on 26 March, 2011

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2.3 is supposed to be coming for a lot of HTC phones around June. I think the Desire/HD/S/Incredible should all be getting it.

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darkspark88

12:47 AM on 26 March, 2011

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It's called refinement. They could reinvent the wheel, but how do you update a fantastic product? You make it a little bit better. It's testament to the brilliant design team that few changes need to be made. Radical changes would lead to a new HTC series. (Note how they sell more than just one type of phone?)

I like the way they decided to take the excellent touch based keys of the wildfire and put them on the desire. I used a desire and did not get on well with the physical buttons. They were incredibly stiff and slow to navigate with.

Roll on HTC.

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Tony Young

11:41 AM on 26 March, 2011

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I had the original Desire until I left it in a million pieces on the A1009 (don't ask).

I've used HTC phones since the original Touch Dual (my current 'replacement with Win6 - yuk!) and including the original HD.

I have a Desire S on pre-order with Orange and having read your review I'm not minding waiting for dual-core as I'm not a gamer (apart from Angry Birds and Flight Control).

It's clear that there are some useful improvements, even though it must have been tough to do that AND reduce the price of the original. Strange that 2.3 isn't present, but can't wait to get the new one, aly body and all!

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Randy

7:41 PM on 26 March, 2011

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Sorry, but why do Nokia C2-01 deserve a video review and this phone don't?

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User reviews

Average user rating

7/10

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8/10

0 out of 0 people found this review helpful

Whoopee

18th July 2011, By philehidiot

  • Screen
  • Touch response
  • Build quality
  • Odd bugs
  • Multitasking
  • Battery

As far as I can tell, the only flaws in the build of this phone are the battery life and the lack of a macro mode on the camera - why??

The rest of it is software with the occasional very odd bugs which keep cropping up, the occasional resets and Android's lack of a decent multitasking system.

I've put the battery as a con - it will last a day with pretty heavy use and will easily get there with quite a few widgets and so on. Put simply you can use this phone with all the fancy stuff on (i.e. as it was meant to be used) and still get through a day. If you want more out of it, you can put a battery saving program on it and turn stuff off.

For those debating about the move from physical keyboard to touch screen - this is my first touchscreen keyboard and whilst I never, ever type the word I intend to, the HTC keyboard is fantastic at guessing the word and as a result I can type faster than with a good physical keyboard.

This phone is also built very solidly although dispite this I bought a case as my phones live a very hard life and to cover the holes when using in the rain. I would still be confident that it would survive without the case however and this does feel like a device you could lob at a wall without significant injury given the Gorilla Glass.

The screen resolution is about average but given the size it's nice and sharp.

Coming from a much less powerful android phone, the amount of programs this can run without any slow down is fantastic. There's a lot of RAM there and you'll rarely find yourself wondering why it's lagging.

I still lament the lack of a macro mode as I often use a phone camera to take a picture of text (menu, phone number, etc) and it came as a real surprise that this was lacking from an autofocus camera. The camera is adequate with some neat real time effects and is pretty responsive. A physical shutter button would be nice

Personally, I think this is the best compromise between the performance of the dual core monsters with their large screens and battery life. It's an evolution of a damn good phone, not a new model, so the flaws have been ironed out. The bugs will be dealt with in time and I can only hope a palm pre-esque multitasking system makes itself known as this would complete the Android OS.

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