The HTC 8XT went on sales with US operator Sprint yesterday at an on-contract price of $149.99 ($99 after a $50 mail-in rebate). The HTC 8XT is Sprint's first Windows Phone 8 device; it will be followed later in the summer by the Samsung ATIV S Neo. The arrival of these two handsets means, for the first time, that multiple Windows Phone 8 devices are available on all four of the major US operators.

Both the HTC 8XT and Samsung ATIV S Neo will ship with a number of Sprint specific apps including a Windows Phone version of the Sprint Music+ service and the TeleNav powered Sprint Navigation app.

The HTC 8XT is an all new design, but draws on element on both the HTC 8X and HTC 8S. It has the same 8 megapixel camera and a similar internal specification as the HTC 8X, but has the lower resolution screen (WVGA) and attractive colour-dip design of the HTC 8S. It also uses the same soft touch texture material (polycarbonate base) as found on the HTC 8X and 8S. As you would expect, it is customised with support for Sprint's LTE and CDMA networks.

Hardware specification points of note for the HTC 8XT include a 4.3 inch display, 8 megapixel camera, Snapdragon 400 processor with 1.4GHz dual-core processors, 1 GB of RAM, 8GB of internal memory, microSD card slot, and 1,800 mAH battery.

However, the most notable specification point is the inclusion, for the first time on Windows Phone, of HTC's BoomSound technology. The same dual front-facing stereo speakers have been widely praised on the Android powered HTC One and HTC One Mini. The HTC 8XT also retains the support for Beats Audio and dual built in microphones from earlier HTC Windows Phone devices.