With the fourth-generation iPhone making the display even bigger and more pixel dense, it looks increasingly unlikely that Apple has any plans for the much rumored iPhone Nano… but that’s not stopping just the scuttlebutt of a potential Apple product from inspiring competing phone manufacturers to release their own iPhone Nano clones.
The HTC HD Mini is just such a clone. It takes the 4.3 inch touchscreen on HTC’s HD 2 handset and squishes it down to a compact 3.2 inches, while also packing a 600MHz processor. It’s being touted as a budget version of the HD 2, and it could find its way to AT&T or even sold unlocked.
I definitely see the market for a tinier touchscreen phone, and the HD Mini is a cute little smartphone, but here’s where the bile rises: the Mini’s running the crapusculent Windows Mobile 6.5.1 operating system. Not even Android! I think I’d rather hold on to the fever dream of an iPhone Nano someday creeping out of Apple’s labs than ever sully my finger swiping it across a Windows Mobile homescreen again.