First AT&T LTE Phone, HTC Holiday, on Its Way (ContributorNetwork)

Heads up, current and future AT&T subscribers: Darren Murph of Engadget has just posted pictures of what could be your next smartphone. Currently called the HTC Holiday, it may be sold as the Waikiki at launch. And the big thing that sets it apart? It'll be compatible with AT&T's 4G LTE network, currently under construction.

What is LTE?

LTE, or Long-Term Evolution, is one of three competing technologies for next-generation wireless networks (the others are WiMAX and HSPA+). All three are broadly referred to as 4G, and allow faster connection speeds than the previous 3G standards.

Verizon has been running an LTE network for awhile now, while Sprint's chosen WiMAX. AT&T's working towards building an actual LTE network, but it isn't quite there yet, so its 4G smartphones like the Motorola Atrix have been using an interim HSPA+ network.

If that all is some kind of acronym soup for you, look at it this way: AT&T's current "4G" network is more like "3.5G." The actual 4G network is on its way, and will be here soon. The HTC Holiday (or Waikiki, or whatever it will be called) will be able to use the real 4G network when it launches, in the cities in which it's available. Or if it launches before 4G LTE is available, it'll use the "3.5G" HSPA+ in the meantime, just like the Momentum and Elevate do.

So is the HTC Holiday any good?

That depends. The iPhone 4 is available on AT&T's network, and it sets a pretty high standard, especially for a smartphone that launched last year. And the iPhone 5 will be coming out pretty soon, raising the bar even higher and bringing the iPhone's performance up to par with its usability.

As far as Android smartphones go, however, the HTC Holiday looks pretty solid. Its specs are all through the roof, with a whole 1 GB of RAM and a 1.2 GHz dual-core processor. It's packing an 8 megapixel camera with a flash, plus a front-facing camera for video calls, and its screen size? 4.5 inches across. That's almost putting it in tablet territory, to the point where it may be uncomfortable for people with smaller hands to use.

The Upshot

The HTC Holiday's not just another Android superphone. Besides the 4G LTE connectivity, it'll also be packing the latest version of HTC Sense, HTC's integrated (and classy) design that makes it easy to perform common tasks and see what your friends are up to online.

Judging by the prices for AT&T's two already-announced 4G laptop dongles, though, you'll be paying a premium for those 4G speeds. And with a handset the size of a small tablet, you may have trouble fitting it in your pocket ... or your hands.

Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tech/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20110829/us_ac/9036843_first_att_lte_phone_htc_holiday_on_its_way

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