Following the UK launch on Wednesday evening of the ZTE Tania, Chris Davies writes about his week with one of smartphones (albeit without the final build of the software). His experiences are what you would expect from one of the first 'budget' Windows Phones, but this is a smartphone built to a price, and paired up with some smart software, it does deliver.

We can’t say ZTE’s styling has exactly blown us away... Still, it’s functional, and the 128.6 x 67.8 x 10.7 mm body feels sturdy in the hand. Inside there’s a 1GHz single-core Qualcomm MSM8255 processor paired with 512MB of RAM, triband GSM/EDGE and dualband UMTS/HSDPA 14.4Mbps connectivity, along with WiFi b/g/n and Bluetooth 2.1. A-GPS, a digital compass, accelerometer, ambient light sensor and a proximity sensor are pretty much par for the course, however there’s only a mere 4GB of storage – just 2.51GB was showing up as user-accessible on our unit – and, since you don’t get a microSD card slot, there’s no way to add to it.

The Tania will be an exercise in component buying and assembly, as ZTE will have been working hard to bring down the bill of materials and construction cost to a point where they can offer it at an attractive price. Which it is, £249 direct from ZTE for an unlocked handset, which will probably translate to a free handset with a £15 line rental on a typical UK network.

We'll be having our own detailed look at the ZTE Tania in the near future.