The HTC HD2 has been officially unleashed in Europe today. The much-anticipated Windows Mobile 6.5 handset is the first to use a capacitive touch interface (similar to the iPhone’s) on its spacious 4.3in display, but it seems that retailers were still in the dark about its release date…

The impressive spec continues with a 5-megapixel camera, while the HD2 uses HTC’s Sense interface and comes packing a beefy 1GHz Snapdragon processor.

The news was delivered this morning by HTC bigwig Peter Chou and Microsoft chief exec Steve Ballmer at his side – illustrating just how important the software giant sees the HD2 to WinMo’s future.

At this stage it’s just lucky punters in Europe and Taiwan who will be able to get their mitts on one at the moment, with a US launch not planned until 2010.

At the time of writing, however, online retailers here in the UK were still seemingly in the dark about the SIM-free HD2 models. Amazon had the HD2 retailing at £549 from 20 November, Play.com had it £50 cheaper nine days earlier…

In the meantime, read our full review of the HTC HD2 right here…