HTC Windows Phone 8S

The Windows Phone 8S by HTC, which is its suitable name don't ya know, launched alongside the HTC 8X at a unique HTC event in New York, where the Taiwanese firm unveiled its first Windows Phone 8 handsets.

Together,  will go on sale in early on November and the Windows Phone 8S will be available in a range of two-tone colour options; California Blue, Graphite Black, Flame Red and Limelight Yellow – the final being the one we've laid our hands on.

The HTC Windows Phone 8S price is currently un-known, but as this is clearly a mid-range handset we wait for it to rival the likes of the HTC One V and Sony Xperia U.

Design wise the 8S can be compared to the One V and Xperia U, with a separate hunk below the screen – although it stays flush with the device instead of curving forwards as on the V.

Similar to the Windows Phone 8X, the HTC 8S isn't the slimmest handset at 10.3mm, but the taped ends give the illusion that it is thinner than it is, and the tidy 120.5 x 63mm frame gives a sleek finish to decent looking device.

The Windows Phone 8S sits happily in the hand and at 113g it's nicely weighted without feeling like a low-priced toy.

The 4-inch, WVGA (800 x 480) display dominates the bulk of a relatively minimalist front, which also features the Windows, back and search soft keys on the colour bar under and the matching earpiece above.

There's a power/lock key and 3.5mm headphone jack sitting on top of the 8S, while a volume rocker control and camera button reside on the right hand side of the handset.

The buttons are easy to hit, and thanks to the small build of the HTC 8S you don't need to elongate your fingers to far to reach any part of the handset.A microUSB port is found on the base of the Windows Phone 8S, and you can slide the rear of the coloured section off to reveal a microSIM slot and a microSD slot – allowing you to build on the 4GB of internal memory.

There's no access to the 1,700mAh battery though, which may infuriate some of you who like to stick larger power packs in your phones, but it should keep you going for a whole day with a decent level of usage.

We'd suppose the 1GHz dual-core S4 processor and 512MB RAM to run Windows Phone 8 without too much of a fuss, yet as we were only able to access the lock and home screens on the HTC 8S, you'll have to stay for our updated hands on review to find out how it gets on.

That said, the display was still clear, and although not as pin-sharp or vibrant as on its bigger brother the Windows Phone 8X, it's still a perfectible acceptable for what we expect to be an reasonable Handset.