I've used the HTC Desire for awhile now, so I have a good idea what HTC can do well. I want to look at the HTC entry level Android phone the HTC Wildfire. It's smaller and lighter (cuter?) than the Desire but the screen size is still good at 3.2 inches. It fits in your hand very nicely, the screen is bright, clear easy to read.
The biggest drawback of the Wildfire is it's processor at 528 MHz, so although the interface and some apps run well, you do find yourself faced with lag, most of the time the phone is fine but if you want to use the power apps like Google Navigation, it works ok but you'll find the maps lagging behind from time to where as with the Desire's 1GHz processor nothing slows down.
Surprisingly both phones sport 5 megapixel cameras, only the Desire has 720HD video recording. The Wildfire falls short with video at 320 x 288 video recording. I thought the cameras would have been the same, but my camera seems to work better on the Desire with quicker focusing and better image quality than the Wildfire.
Web browsing seems ok on the wildfire but with the processor slower you'll not find it not quite as smooth as other more powerful HTC phones.
My Wife likes the Wildfire well enough, but she says the the interface is slowing down. It's a relatively inexpensive, well built Android phone. HTC Wilfire forum.com says the Wildfire will not get Gingerbread but the phone came with the latest Froyo, and with limitations of the processor speed it sometimes feels too much like an entry level Android phone. If you're not a power user, or worried out the latest version of Android running on your phone, and want a lovely, well built phone for a good price, then the Wildfire is a good choice.
For me the HTC Desire would be minimum spec for a phone, 1 GHz processor at least. I've had my Desire for awhile, check out my long term test of the HTC Desire;
http://www.tekimage.net/2011/06/htc-desire-30000-mile-road-test.html
http://www.tekimage.net/2011/06/htc-desire-30000-mile-road-test-part-ii.html
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