Have been checking on Orange site as after one of these to upgrade to. However it says its been out of stock, yet there appears to be other online retailers which have the HTC Desire available on orange contract. Could it be just Orange themselves trying to stem demand, or are they really short in supply?

Have been checking on Orange site as after one of these to upgrade to. However it says its been out of stock, yet there appears to be other online retailers which have the HTC Desire available on orange contract. Could it be just Orange themselves trying to stem demand, or are they really short in supply?

What might be the case is that Orange have no supply of their branded (and undoubtedly locked) version of the handset. I know our independent supplier for work had stock of the Desire last week, however these are unbranded and unlocked devices.

I saw a discussion recently about the availability of Android 2.2 (Froyo) on the Desire which has been pushed out to unbranded and unlocked handsets by HTC. Those branded by carriers such as Orange haven't been updated yet as the carrier has to add their customisations. However some people, I believe on Orange, got the HTC update unexpectedly as Orange must have been sending out unbranded handsets trying to meet demand.

That said HTC have been struggling to source the AMOLED screens and have switched to "Super LCD" supplied by Sony (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTC_Desire#Hardware) .

Best regards

David

Edited 14 August, 201015 yr by cookdn

Just buy an unlocked one, you're then not tied to the network, you can swap sim cards should you go abroad or out of an orange service area for a time. There are more pros than cons to buying outright.

Just can't afford £300 outright now. Just want to keep on the same deal with orange as I am already on now, but with this phone.

IIRC, all the phone Carphone Warehouse sell are unlocked and unbranded, regardless of being either contract or pay as you go.

If thats of any help

Not sure if it is worth me visiting an Orange shop near me? Never been inside one of their stores before.

Get an unbranded, otherwise you'll have to wait months for new firmwares.

Carphone Warhouse as mentioned above, Orange shop will have a crappy orange firmware on it.

Is that the standard or exclusive black version? AFAIK the blacks are in short supply

It does say "black" actually. No mention of a standard one.

Might be worth waiting a few weeks Jase .

http://www.t3.com/news/htc-desire-hd-to-debut-in-september?=48067

You can get silver HTC Desire's but you seem to pay a hefty premium for them, why I don't know!

They have always had supply problems with the Desire as mentioned above to do with the availability of the AMOLED screens.

I was lucky when I got mine on a new contract from a 3 shop it was at the time that they too were having supply problems so they had a stock of unlocked/unbranded handsets which I got one of!

I was going to go with Orange at one point until I found I could get it under £30 a month with no up-front costs from Three.

I think the black version is exlusive to Orange and the standard "brown" version is the most common one.

Never seen a silver one yet though!

Phil