Everybody is going to enjoy Christmas with Santa Claus, Christmas parties and gifts for sure. There is one important question connected with Christmas – “What to put under the Christmas tree for your loved ones?”. Mmm, that’s really a serious problem, as you should pick a Christmas gift with great care.

If you remember, in our previous posts we talked about Christmas gifts such as a pink case for HTC Vivid and the HTC Rhyme. And today, as a contender for the Christmas Surprise, we shall review the first women’s Android-smartphone, HTC Rhyme. This is not a stridently pink phone, strewn with crystals and Vans (in the style of Hello Kitty), so the list of potential owners includes organized business ladies.

Shining HTC Rhyme

If you are familiar with the products of HTC you already know this manufacturer did not practiced gender division when producing smartphones. All members of the Taiwanese series were “to face” to both women and men. For about a year ago rumors started talking about the announcement of a feminine smartphone by HTC which meant to be called “Glamor”. The Net was full of the pics of the rumored smartphone. Actually we talked about it, if you remember?

The manufacturer did not laze about creating an Android device for its feminine customers. Finally, the expectations were met – the most of the world saw the HTC Rhyme. Although in the official website there is no word whether the smartphone has designed only for women. But what do you think, what do the words like “elegant”, “charm” and “sophistication” talk about?

And from the usual HTC-unisex devices the HTC Rhyme is distinguish by its color: bright plum (as in our review), light blue, light gray (sand). The device also comes with a set of accessories. The accessory list includes USB-cable, AC adapter for charging, headphones in tone to the unit, docking station, LED keychain in the shape of a cube, a microSD memory card to 8 GB and skin cover.

The docking station is a convenient adjusting, and it is much easier to pack the Rhyme in this cradle for charging.
When the device is in the station, Rhyme can serve as a music player, photo frame, table clock, a calendar, “Weather Center”, etc. The only fault of the creators is when the smartphone is connected to a PC through the station, the device cannot record anything: fold music, photos, movies, load the program and etc. There is one more drawback – taking the phone from the station is inconvenient; you need to do it with the help of your fingernail or turn the station or ‘shake’ it up.

Another interesting accessory of the device is its LED Charm, which notifies you of an incoming call or SMS. It connects to the audio jack, when receiving an incoming call the cube begins to flash – it is very charming, fascinating spectacle. If you are keeping your device deep in your bag this keychain is pulled out to wink neon-violet light, it will mean that at the other someone is waiting for you to answer.
When pulling the cord, the phone is easily pulled out of the bag, and therefore you will not need to look for your device in your bag.

They say the charm is useful in noisy places for noticing the calls. In noisy places such as underground, buses, trains you would better to use the headphones and listen to your favorite music.

Feeling the Rhyme

The design of the HTC Rhyme seems to be traditional, except its color versions. On the whole the appearance of the HTC Rhyme is almost the same as the other HTC smartphones. Somehow you will see similarity with the HTC Desire S; their sizes’ are almost identical.

You can hold the device in your hand easily due to its convenient form. Comfort emphasizes a combination of a metal frame and soft-touch plastic inserts. The dimensions of the device are – 119 x 60,8 x 10,85 mm, as for me – the golden mean: not compact, and not as bulky as the other flagshipx of HTC. It’s perfect for the girls .
The device comes with a 3.7-inch S-LCD touchscreen with a resolution of 800×480 pixels. Color reproduction is good; colors are deep, rich, pleasing angles. The protective coating – Gorilla Glass, will not allow your device to get scratched.
But the glass of the device can be easily soiled, some users say when after using you want to clean the prints of fingers from the screen, it seems like the device is damaged.

The Poetry of Mechanics

You will notice a few control buttons on the body of the Rhyme. On the right hands side are located volume buttons and on the left is the microSD card slot. On the top you can find the switch on/off button and an audio jack, as for the microphone it is situated on bottom. The device sports a 5MP facing camera on the back with LED flash and a 0.3 MP front facing camera for making video calls. Below the camera lens you can note three pins to connect the device to the dock.

Photos and videos taken by the HTC Rhyme

There are 4 sensor buttons below the screen that lighten up when touching them: “Home”, “Menu”, “Back” and “Search”.

Rhyme’s Heart

The heart of the HTC Rhyme is the 1GHz Scorpion single core processor with 768 MP RAM.  It runs Android 2.3.5 Gingerbread OS bundled with popular programs: Twitter, Dropbox, Facebook, Endo-mondo and etc. The characteristics of the device are modest, but the performance of the Rhyme is enough for not-that-popular tasks. Besides, I do not think the owner of the HTC Rhyme will think about the “power” of this phone.

The HTC Rhyme features the latest version of HTC Sense. It’s changed and now you can find only two icons instead of a panel that allows you access the phone and the app menu. You can also download new themes and range of widgets from HTC Hub. All tastefully done, juicy, bright and modern HTC Rhyme seems to be a perfect gadget for women.

Conclusion — The Useful Part

Using this smartphone is simple, intuitive, everything is easy, and there are no puzzles. You will enjoy the notes (comfortable to type with the keyboard and use the voice input – but you need to speak clearly and not fast). It seems like the HTC Rhyme has something like “Siri” in iPhone 4S, however, pamper up yourself with this glamor gadget, check the weather forecast, read books, listen to music – all the functions are done rapidly and easily.
Rhyme has a 1600mAh battery -for a smartphone with a single-core, it seems to be sufficient. If not too actively exploit “Rhyme,” a single charge can last for a half day.

HTC Rhyme brief specifications:

•      Display – Super LCD, 3,7 “, 480 × 800 pixels;
•      Processor – Qualcomm MSM8255, 1 GHz + graphics co-processor Adreno 205;
•      Memory – ROM 1 GB, RAM 768 MB;
•      Operating System – Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) with the interface HTC Sense 3.5;
•      Camera – 5 MP, with the ability to capture video in 720p 30fps / sec.;
•      Battery – Li-Ion, 1600 mAh;
•      Dimensions / weight – 116,8 x 61 x 10,1 mm, 130 g.