Is a budget Windows Phone 8 handset that goes up against Nokia s Lumia 620. They re both around 215 pound SIM-free and free on a 15- 18 pound contract, but the 85 pound costs more prepay, at 210 on 02 rather than 150. The phone looks and feels like the more expensive HTC Windows Phone 8X. Its rubber rear extends round the sides of the phone, so it s easy to grip and should survive the odd tumble. It doesn t feel as well engineered as Nokia s Windows Phone 8 handsets, but it s a far cry from the creaky plastic you get on some cheaper Android phones.
SPEC SAVERS Like the Lumia 620, the HTC 85 has a slightly cut-down specification compared with the high-end Nokia Lurnia 820 and 920 and the HTC Windows Phone 8X. You get 512MB of RAM instead of 1GB and a 1GHz dual-core processor instead of a 1.5GHz model. We did notice the speed deficit, which manifested itself as an occasional slight stutter when opening applications. It s nothing major, but as Windows Phone is usually so silky smooth, the slowdown is more noticeable. The phone s slower performance is also borne out in our SunSpider JavaScript benchmark, as it and the Lumia completed the test in around 1,400ms, while the 1.5GHz models hovered around the 900ms mark.
We had few complaints about the 85 s screen. Its 800x480 resolution is fine for a 4in model, and while blacks weren t as deep as on AMOLED screens, icons, web pages and pictures looked good. However, when we put it next to the Lurnia 620 we could see the Nokia s screen is superior, with more saturated colours and higher brightness. Windows Phone 8 offers everything you d expect from a modern smartphone operating system. It s fast, good-looking, has a competent browser and excellent email client. It also makes it simple to create and edit Office documents. Documents and photos sync automatically with SkyDrive, too. This isn t as simple to use as sync services such as Dropbox, but it works well with Windows Phone 8 s SkyDrive app and is useful for editing Office documents in a web browser.
There s one key thing missing from Windows Phone 8, and that s app support. While the number of apps is increasing all the time, we re still missing some important ones. There s no official Dropbox client, for example, no Sky+, no Sonos, no Rightmove, no Spotify and no iPlayer. While apps aren t everything, and the operating system s core features work well, if you rely on any of these services the lack of support will be a dealbreaker. The phone doesn t have a huge amount of room for apps, anyway, as there s just 4GB of storage built in, compared with 8GB on the Lurnia 620. There is a micro5D card slot for further expansion, however. Unlike on Nokia s handsets, you don t get Nokia s superb free app suite, with its useful free offline navigation and music apps. Instead, you get the HTC collection of apps, which gives you weather, stocks and news, a convertor app, a flashlight and a photo enhancer app, which adds effects to your photos. It s not a patch on Nokia s offering, unfortunately.
