Las Vegas – Sprint came to CTIA Wireless 2010
to demonstrate the U.S. market’s first 4G smartphone, the HTC-made
Android-based Evo 4G.
The carrier plans
a summertime launch at a price it didn’t reveal.
The
full-touchscreen Evo, also promoted as the world’s first Android-based 4G
phone, accesses Sprint’s 4G Mobile WiMAX data network and 3G CDMA 1x EV-DO Rev.
A data network as well as Sprint’s 3G voice network.
The Evo also
features a built-in Wi-Fi hot spot that connects up to eight Wi-Fi-equipped
devices to Sprint’s 3G and 4G networks.
The device
features the latest Android OS (version 2.1), 4.3-inch multitouch touchscreen
and a built-in kickstand for viewing
videos. It also comes with 720p HD camcorder, 8- and 1.3-megapixel cameras on opposite
sides, 1GHz Qualcomm-made Snapdragon processor, built-in HDMI output, and Flash
video support in its Web browser for viewing Internet videos.
It will ship with
HTC’s next-generation Sense user interface, this one adding “Friend Stream”
aggregation of all social-media updates into one organized flow.
Because it uses the Android 2.1 OS, it supports
the Google Goggles application, which lets users take a picture of a landmark,
logo, wine bottle label, book cover and the like and automatically search for
information on it through Google’s search engine.
Android 2.1’s Layar
Reality Browser is a camera-connected points-of-interest Internet-search
function that lets users view their outdoor environs through the camera and see
written information about businesses inside the buildings.
The Evo will be one of a small but growing
number of phones with built-in hot spots, HD camcorder, HDMI output and Android
2.1 OS.
The device will operate in 4G mode in 27
markets, but the WiMAX 4G network is being expanded to a population of 120
million people by year’s end.
