HTC has been quietly brilliant with its smartphones lately. One of its latest innovations is the new ChaCha, which is a single GSM SIM, touch and type smartphone. As you may know, HTC was the first smartphone company to use the Android mobile platform in the market. The company has taken it to the next level yet again with the ChaCha. The HTC ChaCha is basically an Android phone for social media and networking. The gadget also promotes HTC’s proprietary user interface – the HTC Sense.
What is it?
The HTC ChaCha is a bar form phone with a 2.6 inch capacitive touchscreen along with a full QWERTY keypad. All the applications can be accessed through either touch or by keypad. The full QWERTY keypad will also heavily benefit those who text heavily. The keypad buttons are big and well spaced for easy typing. The hatch part is slightly bent which provides a better grip while typing. The screen is scratch resistant.
The 2.6 TFT touchscreen, offers a 480 x 320 pixels resolution, ideal for watching videos, website streaming, etc. A row of standard Android function buttons like menu, home, search and back is provided in the space between the screen and the keypad. The power/lock button and a headphone jack is located the on the top edge of the phone. The volume button and a micro USB port is located on the left side of the phone. The ChaCha has all the usual sensors including accelerometer, proximity sensor, digital compass and ambient light sensor. The ChaCha weighs about 124 g and the dimensions are 64.6 x 114.4 x 10.7 mm.
Key features
The ChaCha operating frequency is GSM – 850, 900, 1800, 1900 and UMTS – 2100. It runs in Android version 2.3 (Gingerbread) and a 800 MHz snapdragon processor. It also has 512 MB RAM to give your system adept speed to perform all your tasks smoothly. The ROM is also 512 MB. The ChaCha also has dual camera with the powerful primary camera being 5MP and there is a secondary camera of 0.3 MP, to enable video calling. The camera also features a LED Flash and allows HD video recording at 30 frames per second. Other camera features include Auto Focus, Geo-tagging, Face Detection, etc.
It has all the multimedia functions from Music player which supports MP3, WAV and MIDI to video playback in 3GP, 3G2, MP4 and WMV. Also enables FM radio with recording. The additional features include Clock, Organizer, Widgets, Voice Recorder, Voice Dialing, Voice Input, etc.
The internet connectivity is really good in the ChaCha. Not only is it 3G enabled, it is also GPRS, EDGE, WiFi enabled. It also has micro USB connectivity and has GPS support with Google maps. The special business features include Document Viewer, Document Editor and Pushmail.
The phone’s compatible with microSD 2.0 cards and offers an expandable memory of up to 32 GB. The standard 1250 mAh lithium-ion battery serves a talk time of 4 hours and standby time of 120 hours.
What’s innovative
ChaCha enables you to share videos, photos, music, your location and status updates in just one touch with a specially dedicated Facebook access button. If you want to share the places you visit and your location, status, etc., just hold down the Facebook button and it will start the Facebook Places function. This dedicated social media phone is also loaded with a variety of Facebook widgets. The clock on this handset works as a Facebook update ticker. The Calendar widget on the phone ensures you remember to wish your friends on their birthdays.
Price and availability
The HTC ChaCha is available in the market and for buying online. It comes for $251 if purchased online from eBay. The retail prices may vary from store to store. Some of the stores which are selling the ChaCha across the US are Alltel, AT&T, HTC Online Store, Qwest, Sprint, T-Mobile, US Cellular and Verizon.
The up side
The HTC ChaCha is a dedicated social media phone with practically everything you need. It has a full QWERTY keypad with big,raised and well spaced buttons for precision typing in speed. Has great multimedia features and connectivity through 3G, GPRS, GPS with Google Maps, micro USB ports and much more. It has a easy access one touch Facebook button for easy access to Facebook. Further more, it is priced just right at under $275.
The down side
The only bad thing about the entire phone is probably its weak battery. The standard 1250 mAh lithium-ion battery gives a maximum talktime of 4 hours only in 2G, which would definitely get even worse in 3G! Surfing in 3G would not allow more than 2 hours of streaming. So the battery is definitely the biggest shortcoming.
The bottomline
The HTC ChaCha is an awesome smartphone with packed features and dedicated social media apps, but its weak battery is a concern.
