Mobile Phone Reviews | Mobile Phone News Mobile Phone Reviews by mobileciti

HTC Tattoo Review

HTC Tattoo Review

The HTC Tattoo is the fourth Android device from the
Taiwanese company. That's quite a feat considering many
phone-makers committed to the platform have not even
released a single product. The Tattoo has one feature that
sets it apart as an entry-level smartphone — a resistive
2.8-inch QVGA display. Let's see how this smaller,
lower-resolution screen (compared with the 3-inch and larger
HVGA panels) performs coupled with Google's mobile operating
system.

Design

The Tattoo's 106x55.2x14mm dimensions and 113g weight
make it a compact and light device. The device is solidly
built and we like how the rounded edges give it a nice feel
in the hands.

Like most full-touchscreen devices, the front of the
Tattoo is taken up mainly by the screen. This is a 2.8-inch
QVGA LCD, similar to what you find in many older Windows
Mobile smartphones. During our use, we found it sufficiently
bright and sharp for reading text. Images also displayed
nicely. Unfortunately, those who have used devices like the or
HTC Magic, which come with HVGA (480x320) screens, may
find the halved resolution on the Tattoo lacking. This can
be felt mainly when browsing the internet and trying to type
with your fingertips. More on that later when we discuss
this smartphone's features.

You get the standard set of buttons for an Android phone.
Aside from the Call and End keys, there are dedicated Home,
Menu, Back and Search buttons under the display. A round
directional pad is also found there which we felt worked
well, thanks to its large circumference and prominent select
button. The sides of the Tattoo are bare aside from a volume
rocker on the left.

Connectors on this smartphone include a mini-USB for
charging and syncing on the base and a 3.5mm audio port on
the top. This means you can use your favourite pair of
headphones for music playback, a feature that will please
those particular about earphone audio fidelity. Memory
expansion is possible through a microSD card slot found on
the left side under the back battery cover.

With the Tattoo, HTC has provided a way for users to
personalise the chassis of the phone. Every single part of
the external plastic shell is replaceable. You do that first
by removing the battery cover, and from there, the front
face plate and back base plate can be pried off completely.
The company has partnered with gadget accessory company
Garskin to sell replacement shells. The patterns are quite
varied and you can even design your own from the
Garskin website. HTC is giving users a redemption card
in the standard sales package which entitles you to one free
phone cover. If you want to buy more, they cost US$24.90
each.

Features

Though the Tattoo is supposed to be a budget Android
handset, HTC has put a lot of features in this upcoming
mobile phone. It comes with HSDPA and Wi-Fi for high-speed
data, Bluetooth and GPS for navigation. Powering the phone
is a Qualcomm 528MHz processor found in many other high-end
HTC phones, too, so that's good news for this entry-level
handset.

One thing we really liked about the
Hero, HTC's last Android device, was the Sense UI
interface. This custom software comes with many useful
widgets and integration of social-networking services into
the contacts. The Tattoo will also sport Sense UI so many of
those features will appear on this handset. One widget we
did find missing was the Stock app — HTC probably assumed
that those using the Tattoo aren't interested in the stock
market.

Back to the matter of the 2.8-inch QVGA screen, it wasn't
perfect, but it was better than we expected. For starters,
HTC did a good job scaling down all its widgets to fit this
screen, so the seven scrollable displays on the Home page
can be well-utilised. For example, the People widget (which
shows your favourite contacts so you can access them
quickly) has contacts' photos that are noticeably lower in
resolution compared with the Hero's implementation, but we
could still make out the faces.

We did run into some problems with the browser. The small
screen meant reading text required zooming into the page.
This led to more scrolling just to read a news article or
wiki. There was also some frustration when trying to tap on
small links. In these cases, we ended up using our
fingernails to do the job. This was possible because the LCD
is resistive, not capacitive (which requires a fingertip
skin contact) like other Android phones.

Somewhat frustrating as well was the on-screen QWERTY
keyboard. Keys were really narrow, so typing with the tips
of our thumbs became near impossible unless one held the
device in landscape mode or had pointy fingernails.

Another consequence of the QVGA screen on the Tattoo is
that fewer apps appear on the Android Market. Only programs
which developers have tweaked to support multiple
resolutions (introduced in Android 1.6) will be available
for download. Though we didn't count exactly how many there
are, some of our favourite games were not available. The
excellent Twitter app Twidroid had not been ported over as
well, last we checked.

A 3.2-megapixel camera is found on the back of the
Tattoo. Remember, this is an entry-level handset so there's
no autofocus or LED flash. It produced decent pictures
though — just don't expect too much of it.

Performance

We were impressed with the battery performance of the
Tattoo. With background data and Gmail syncing turned on, we
got 2.5 days of use on a single charge. This included web
surfing on HSDPA and some phone usage and texting. GPS
navigation worked well with Google Maps but we don't
recommend trying to use it for in-car navigation because of
the small screen.

Voice quality was good and we didn't experience any
dropped calls during our period of use. One thing that did
poorly was the volume of the speakerphone. It was way too
soft to be useful unless you were in a quiet room.

Conclusion

For an entry-level smartphone, the Tattoo met our
expectations. It does everything you expect an Android
device to do, and has great battery life to boot. The screen
is a little small, but usable for the most part. Those with
large fingers should really try it out at a store before
deciding if they can live with the text input.

If you are someone who wants maximum mileage with your
Android device, we advise spending a bit more for either the
HTC Magic or Hero. This is mainly because developers have
designed their apps mostly for HVGA screens for the Android
Market.

But for those looking for a capable smartphone on a
budget, the Tattoo is a great choice. In fact, we liked it
more than the
Touch2 which goes for a similar price. The compromises
made in the Tattoo are acceptable considering the cost.