I picked up the HTC Desire a few weeks back and I have never been happier with a phone, I would sincerely recommend it. It runs Android 2.1 out of the box.
I have to say, though, it actually looks better in real than it does on the pictures, if looks is anything you care about. Not sure how HTC botched the pictures, can't really put my finger on it.
The Nexus One is the same way. It looks kind of plastic and cheap in pictures, but is damn good looking in person. A couple of the iPhone users at work have commented that it's the first non-iPhone phone that they've been tempted by.
isn't the problem with those HTC Android phones that you'll get such updates at least half a year later than most other people, which is time needed for HTC to upgrade it's Sense UI?
That is a risk. But if you don't mind rooting the phone, you can run Cyanogen and other's mods on it with plain Android. That way you will get the latest version really fast, if you feel you need it and is willing to sacrifice Sense.
Also Google is working on making future versions of Android modular, so users can download minor updates through Android Market. Big OS number changes will then hopfully come much more seldom and be reserved for major kernel updates and so on. Hopefully this will make it easier for HTC and others to release updates faster.
http://www.htc.com/www/product/desire/overview.html
I have to say, though, it actually looks better in real than it does on the pictures, if looks is anything you care about. Not sure how HTC botched the pictures, can't really put my finger on it.