Windows Phone 8 has only been official for a single day, but information about the first wave of handsets from Huawei and HTC has already begun to surface. Huawei, a newcomer to Windows Phone, has decided to get ahead of the curve and announce an unnamed Windows Phone 8 handset carrying the company’s Ascend branding. It will, of course, be a “best-in-class smartphone.” The device will initially launch in the US, Europe, and China, with other markets to follow later on.
On the flipside, the specs for three of HTC’s third-generation Windows Phone handsets have already been leaked. The HTC “Rio” is somewhat similar to existing Windows Phone 7.5 devices, thanks to its 4-inch WVGA display, 5MP camera with 720p video, 512MB of RAM, and 14.4Mbps HSPA network speeds. It will, however, include a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 (MSM8227) processor. The HTC “Accord” is a step up, sporting a 4.3-inch 720p Super LCD 2, 8MP camera with 1080p, 1GB of RAM, and 42Mbps HSPA+ network speeds. It will also be one of the first devices to include NFC and a dual-core processor (which The Verge’s sources believe could be a Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8260A). Finally, the HTC “Zenith” improves upon the “Accord” with a 4.7-inch screen and a Qualcomm Snapdragon quad-core processor. The first two devices are expected to be available in October, followed by the release of the “Zenith” during the fourth quarter of 2012.
