Unveiled at IFA in Berlin on Thursday, HTC’s new Desire 820 smartphone comes with a solid set of specs at what should be an affordable price when the mid-range device hits stores in the next couple of months.
Successor to the Desire 816, the plastic-body Android handset comes with a 5.5-inch 1280 x 720 display, and a 13-megapixel rear camera with an f/2.2 lens. On the front, in a clear bid to grab the attention of selfie fans (HTC describes the phone as “setting a new standard for selfies”), there’s a front shooter with a whopping great 8-megapixel sensor.
Under the hood you’ll find 16GB of storage, 2GB of RAM, and Qualcomm’s octa-core Snapdragon 615 processor with 64-bit support, which will bring better all-round performance once Google releases Android L, the latest version of its mobile operating system.
HTC BoomSound speakers and a microSD card slot (up to 128GB) are also part of the package. At 7.74mm, it’s slim, too, and tips the scales at a respectable 155g, and, as with the Desire 816, the updated handset will launch in a range of bold colors – both glossy and matte.
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But it’s the Desire 820’s camera capabilities that HTC seems keen to tout most of all in its release bumph for the phone. For example, with this handset, you can “merge your features with a friend’s or celebrity’s for a modern mashup,” an offering that until now you probably didn’t know you didn’t want.
There’s also a Live Makeup feature that lets you “preview the image you just took and set the desired level of skin smoothing before taking the photo” – perfect for grandma and grandpa, by the sounds of it.
There’s Photo Booth, too, where you can capture a burst of shots, meaning that for group shots you should be able to grab at least one photo where everyone’s got their eyes open.
As we said at the start, HTC hasn’t offered pricing details yet, or an exact launch date, but promises it’ll be available “later this fall, with availability varying by country and region.”
