Want to Be a Hero? Buy Someone a Hero

If you want to be a hero to someone this holiday season, here's a suggestion: Buy them a Hero cell phone.

The HTC Hero is available for $99 with a two-year contract from Sprint.

(Courtesy HTC)

Running on the Android operating system, the Sprint HTC Hero is a real competitor in the cell phone marketplace.

With the help of HTC's Sense system, the phone lets you personalize the phone with the information that is most important to you.

Whether it's weather, sports scores, your e-mail or whatever else, you can choose from a variety of widgets that will display immediately on the home screen, so that you don't need to waste time searching for them.

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The 3.2-inch touch screen supports iPhone-like pinch-to-zoom capability, which is great for watching Sprint TV. A 5-megapixel camera shoots pictures and records video. Wi-Fi and integrated GPS are also part of the package.

While there aren't as many applications available for Android-powered phones as there are for Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch, the Android marketplace currently boasts about 10,000 apps, which should be enough to get you started.

The price for the HTC Hero is $180, with a two-year contract from Sprint.