Introduction
The HTC P4350 is one of the latest phones released by HTC and is also known as the HTC Herald. The P4350 is currently the smallest Pocket PC with a slide out keyboard. The size is similar to the Imate JAMin but offers a keyboard in the same size. The P4350 is also the first Pocket PC with a sliding keyboard to have a spring loaded slider. The P4350 has a 200 MHz processor, Windows Mobile 5, slide out keyboard and a lot more. Is the P4350 worth getting? Is it worth the extra cost over the HTC wizard? Read on to find out!!  

Design
The P4350 is designed to perfection!! The phone is similar to the HTC Wizard but offers improvements in every form. The P4350 is almost half the thickness of the Wizard and the material is a lot more solid which does not feel like plastic.

Many people who have used the HTC Wizard have found that when using the function and shift buttons on the keyboard you make mistakes. This is especially true when typing passwords because you cannot see what you’re typing instead you see ******. On the P4350 HTC has included two small blue LED’s on the top left of the keyboard which tell you whether or not the function or shift buttons are on/off. These indicators help a lot especially when typing in passwords.    

The keyboard slider is spring loaded and similar to ordinary slider phones. This is an excellent feature and has not yet been seen on PPC keyboard sliders. The slider on the P4350 is a bit different from the Wizard because it slides out to the left. There is both a positive and negative to the new slider direction. The positive is that the phone is easier to navigate with your left thumb on the d pad and holding the stylus with your right. The negative is that when the keyboard is open the stylus is located on the bottom left which is awkward pulling out.

The Wizard had it’s numeric keys on the top row of the keyboard and was awkward when dialing. The P4350 is similar to the HTC TyTN/ Cingular 8525 and has its numeric keypad setup like an ordinary phone. The P4350’s keyboard also has shortcuts for the Comm Manager and file manager.  

Basic Features
The P4350 has all the same features that Windows Mobile 5 Pocket PC offers. You have basic calendar functions with appointments, calculator, PDF viewer, tasks and a lot more. The P4350 also comes complete with Microsoft Pocket Office which includes Word, Excel and PowerPoint. With Word and Excel you can not only view documents but edit them too. 

Advanced Features
The P4350 has many advanced features like a 2 megapixel camera, Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP, WiFi and much more.

The camera on the P4350 is standard and nothing special. The camera does not offer a flash either. The camera is capable of capturing pictures up to 2 mega pixels which is 1600x 1200 pixels. You can select the picture quality but it is best kept at super fine. The camera also has the standard white balance settings; auto, daylight, night, fluorescent and incandescent. 

The P4350 has Bluetooth version 2.0 built in but does not offer EDR (Enhanced Data Rate). The P4350 has many Bluetooth profiles too. The p4350 has the following Bluetooth profiles:

• SPP (serial port profile) for external Bluetooth devices such as a GPS receiver
• SAP (SIM Access profile) allows you to connect to a phone’s SIM using Bluetooth 
• HFP (hands free profile) for connecting a Bluetooth headset or speaker
• HID (human interface device profile) for connecting a Bluetooth keyboard even though it has a built in keyboard
• PAN (personal area network) surf the internet with your computer’s connection using Bluetooth
• OPP (object push profile) for sending objects like pictures, business cards etc.
• FTP (file transfer profile) for sending files over Bluetooth
• A2DP (advanced audio distribution profile) transfer stereo sound to a A2DP capable device like headphones or car stereo
• AVRCP (audio video remote control profile) remote control for headphones which lets you change pause/play and change songs.

The WiFi works great on the P4350 and will be discussed further in the internet section of the review.

Another amazing feature that HTC has included in this phone is the “X button” in the task manager application. Usually on Windows Mobile 5 devices when you click the X on the top right hand corner of a program it does not close but instead hides it in the background. Usually on Windows Mobile phones you would have to go to running programs in settings and close the program manually. HTC has included a small app which gives you the option of actually closing the application when you press the X button. This is a feature that was left out on Windows Mobile 5 and will be standard in Windows Mobile 6!!

The P4350 also comes with many great programs. Bluetooth explorer is one of the latest HTC programs and is included in many of the new HTC devices. With the Bluetooth explorer you can explore other devices and the layout is similar to the file manger application. As long as the devices are paired together you can take what ever you want from the other device. Another great program is the Audio Manager application. The Audio Manager has a setup similar to the iPod. Like the iPod you can find music through genre, album, artist, playlist or scroll through all the songs saved on the device.

The P4350 also comes with SPB GPRS monitor. With this program you can input your data plan and the program will calculate your total data usage. This is an excellent program for keeping track of your data connections so you do not go over your limit and get charged extra. The standard SPB GPRS monitor found on the SPB website does not seem to work on the P4350 but the one supplied with the phone works fine. Sprite backup is also included with the phone and is excellent for backing up all the data on your device. 

 Display
The display on the P4350 is awesome. The screen is super bright and has a great resolution. The resolution is 240 x 320 (QVGA) and displays 65k colors. The screen is touch-sensitive and is maneuvered with the built in stylus.

A key note to mention is that the display turns on when you slide out the keyboard. On older devices like the HTC Wizard the display would still be off if the keyboard is extended and you would have to press the power button to turn on the display.    

Audio
The P4350 is great for listening to music. Windows media player works seamlessly when listening to your favorite music. The headphones on the phone are mini USB like many new HTC devices. If you want to use your 3.5 headphones you can buy a mini USB to 3.5mm headphone converter. The converters are relatively cheap on EBAY (around 10 dollars). Make sure you get the ones specifically for HTC devices because they are different than others. The P4350 also has expandable memory in the form of micro SD card so you can store a lot of music on a 2GB memory card.

 Internet
The P4350 has GPRS, EDGE and WiFi built in. The WiFi on the P4350 supports both b and g wireless and works great. Usually when using the internet on a WM5 device you can only scroll from link to link. On the P4350 you have the option to scroll a page at a time. The down and up arrows located on the keyboard can be used for scrolling page by page if the function button is activated.

Storage
The P4350 has 128 MB ROM and 64 MB RAM. You can also add a micro SD for extra memory. Some users have found that some of the new HTC devices do not support 2 GB memory cards. Many people have reported that the P4350 has problems with a 2 GB memory card and sometimes gives errors when trying to open files. Others have reported that their 2GB memory card works just fine. HTC has said they are currently working on a resolution and hopefully be resolved on the new ROM upgrade.  

Unlike the P3300 which had the storage card underneath the battery, the P4350’s storage card slot is located on the left side of the phone. The card slot has a plastic cover on it so dust can’t get in. The phone is also capable of hot swap in which you can insert/remove the storage card while the device is on. 

Connectivity
The P4350 has Bluetooth 2.0 without EDR (Enhanced Data Rate). The Bluetooth works great with 2.0 devices and the range is a lot better too. The P4350 does not have built in infrared. Many new devices being released do not have infrared because Bluetooth can do almost everything infrared can at a faster rate

 Conclusion