HTC Sets November Release Date for Windows Phone 8X and 8S

Those waiting for the new HTC Windows Phone 8 devices – the flagship HTC 8X and the medium-range HTC 8S – to arrive, the Taiwanese technology firm has announced it is slating a November release to more than 50 countries including the U.S., Singapore, and Australia. Now it also becomes official that HTC will be the face of the latest operating system from Microsoft.  

 

Windows Phone HTC 8X features a 4.3-inch HD super LCD 2 screen, made using Gorilla Glass 2 display. This comes with an optical lamination that helps reduce reflections and glare to let users see every detail seen on screen. This high-end model will support LTE and near-field communication or NFC.

 

This device also comes with an 8-megapixel camera with CMOS sensor on the rear of the device with LED flash. A backside-illumination (BSI) is also added to improve the quality of low-light scenes. 

 

An improvement comes in the front-facing camera that now comes with 2.1-megapixel, f/2.0 aperture, 88° ultra-wide to allow even up to four people and more to be captured at once. There is also a 1080p video capture support, f/2.0 aperture, 28-millimeter lens and a dedicated imaging chip. Even if the phone is locked, there is now an additional shutter button to allow quick capture of spontaneous actions. 

 

On the audio side, HTC 8X will exclusively feature Beats Audio, which offers a unique audio amplifier that can power the 3.5-millimeter audio jack and the speaker, that HTC says promises will boost the audio signal when users are listening to music, playing game or watching a video. HTC 8S will also feature Beats Audio.

 

The middle-end four-inch HTC 8S will be sporting a combination of Super LCD for clarity and colour contrast and Gorilla Glass for scratch-resistant panel to work.  This device’s CPU will be powered by a dual-core S4 at 1GHz, then augmented by 512-megabyte of RAM. There will be HSPA support and 4-gigabyte storage with a microSD slot for expansion. Battery is 1,700 mAh. 

 

The HTC 8S has ditched the front-facing camera but it comes with a 5-megapixel camera along with a 720p video capture. The entry-level is made of two-tone polycarbonate bodies and 10.28-millimeter thick that its tapered edges help bring a sleeker-looking phone.

 

With the now popular Live Tiles-sporting Windows Phone, HTC has ensured that this design feature will blend with the Windows 8X and 8S by utilising a 3D, unibody design based on this Windows Phone Live Tiles. Both the 8X and 8S were tapered to feel thin when in the users’ hands.

 

Colour is also becoming a new important form factor of Windows Phone, which HTC has embraced and adapted to the new smartphones. HTC 8X will be sporting a wide swath of colours, including California Blue, Graphite Black, Flame Red and Limelight Yellow. The HTC 8S, meanwhile, will be available in Domino, Fiesta Red, Atlantic Blue and High-Rise Gray.

 

HTC has not yet announced pricing of the two models but has announced that carriers participating are North American-based AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon Wireless, Europe's Orange, O2 Telefonica, MTS, Three UK, T-Mobile and Vodafone and Asia-Pacific carriers Chunghwa Telecom, Optus, Singapore Telecommunications, Smartone, Telstra and Vodafone Australia.