HTC Rhyme Review

The HTC Rhyme has a purse charm and comes in colors that no man can name. This handset going to appeal the ladies out there. The phone is specially designed for ladies which itself is not an easy job. For that reason accessories are there. The HTC Rhyme is the latest addition by the company to the Verizon wireless line-up that sets itself apart from the other phones in the family as it is specifically designed and targeted for women.

The handset is a profound, luscious plum color that provides this mid-range HTC smartphone something a little bit different to the blocks of black that are ruling the market. And, probably, not completely estranging men from their target market either with their second bronzey-silvery color that's available. This time with HTC Rhyme the company decided to crack down on the accessories thereby, heading its promotion campaign with a radiant purse appeal to avoid missing calls.

Although the phone is marketed as ladies phone yet you will not find anyone at HTC calling the HTC Rhyme the ladies smartphone. Furthermore the company is extra cautious in not referring the phone to Android and even they do not call this phone a smartphone in any of their advertisements. It looks like as they did not plan the HTC Rhyme as a girl phone and later they decided to market it as one.

The accessories it ships with make it different from other Android mobile phones. The HTC Rhyme comes with a leather pouch, a docking cradle, headphones and Charm cube that lights up upon an incoming call or message. All in one it is a feature-rich smartphone that ships with loads of surprising accessories. Let us have a close look!

The company offers an excellent retail package and comes in a box that is full of surprises. Here is the list of accessories you will get while unboxing the phone.

• One HTC Rhyme
• One Power Plug
• One MicroUSB Cable
• A Uniquely Designed In-Ear Headset With Music Controls
• 8GB MicroSD Card
• A White Leather Pouch the so-called Charm
• A Docking Station
• Charging Cradle

The HTC Rhyme is way more than just a phone. The phone measures 116.8 x 61 x 10.1 mm and weighs 130.7 g with a similar, but not identical layout to the Droid Incredible 2. Furthermore, the phone is undoubtedly different enough and a good-looking phone. The phone comes in a very nice color. Design wise, the HTC Rhyme has a unibody design with the anodized metal front frame extending around the back.

Advantages

• The HTC Rhyme measures 116.8 x 61 x 10.1 mm and weighs 130.7 g.
• The HTC Rhyme comes with two bits of soft-touch rubbery plastic completing the design of the rear panel. One of which accommodates the camera lens and LED flash, the other is the battery cover.
• The LCD screen measures 3.7” and offers a decent viewing experience.
• The four capacitive keys can be found underneath the screen and the usual Android controls are haptic enabled, well spaced and very responsive.
• An Audio Jack of 3.5mm is there at the top that also serves the unique Charm cube. Furthermore, for an active noise cancellation, you will also find a secondary microphone along with a Power or Lock key.
• The microSD slot is hot-swappable and the phone comes with an 8GB card pre-installed.
• The screen is the correct size, pleasantly responsive and satisfactory outdoors. It's let down by contrast although.
• For the design of the HTC Rhyme, the phone is part rubberized and part brushed metal casing which is rather smooth and take into account for a decent amount of hold with one hand. This will also minimize the chances of dropping the phone when trying to call, text or tweet on the go.

Disadvantages

• The battery is non-user-replaceable.
• Our biggest gripe in the design of the HTC Rhyme is the somewhat low contrast.
• Sorry to say, the HTC Rhyme has some Wi-Fi death grip issues akin to those on the Sensation and the Sensation XL. The phone is not capable to catch the Wi-Fi signals if it is holding flat on the palm or even if the area around the camera and loudspeaker is touched.

The HTC Rhyme with its single core 1GHz processor and Gingerbread does not really keep up to date with the hardware packed into the likes of the HTC Sensation or the HTC Evo 3D. The HTC Rhyme runs on Android 2.3.5 Gingerbread and HTC Sense, v3.5.

Advantages

• The HTC Rhyme runs on Android 2.3.5 Gingerbread and an improved version of the HTC Sense i.e. v3.5. With a 3.7-inch screen, 1GHz single core processor, and 768MB of Ram, the phone looks quite closer to the HTC Incredible. Although it is not only the hardware. You will also find a custom launcher which is unique to the HTC Rhyme.
• As for the design, the HTC Rhyme is quite minimalist in design with the application drawer and the dialer - the only things that are stuck with the screen while the everything else can be moved around.
• The lock screen of the HTC Rhyme is most customizable and most functional. The lock screen of the phone has got four shortcuts and a ring at the bottom. To unlock the phone, simply drag the ring towards the center of the screen. Alternatively, you can drag any of the shortcuts into the ring and launch the corresponding the app.
• There's no shaking and it is fast to scroll through the menu and the seven home screens, all of which, for sure, are completely customizable as well with widgets and shortcuts galore.
• The typical grid layout can be found for the main menu composed of vertical pages that are sorted alphabetically. However, you can also sort them according to the most recent ones.
• The HTC Rhyme comes with a well organized phonebook which is rich in features and fairly good at the social networking stuff. Furthermore, it successfully keeps all the contacts in order even if it’s hoodwinking everything from SMS to Facebook photo albums.
• The phone offers excellent telephony and there is no issue with the reception and in-call audio. The HTC Rhyme also offers some accelerometer-based tricks i.e. muting the ringer when turning the phone over and starting the loudspeaker automatically when placing the phone down.
• The phone also offers comfortable and hassle free messaging. It is capable of handling all types of text messaging such as SMS, MMS and email.
• The phone also offers an easy and swift social networking that is covered by more than a few apps and widgets. The phone also offers Gtalk that lets you connect with Google’s chat network as well as other compatible networks too.

Disadvantages

• Unluckily, there're no extra lock screen styles that you can download from the HTC Hub.

With an 8 GB MicroSD card, the HTC Rhyme is particularly media-ready. To put it briefly, the HTC Rhyme is media-enabled in the same way the most smartphones are. The music player HTC Rhyme comes with is rather functional than a beautiful beast. The music player offers choice to display the library list by Artist, Albums, Songs, Playlist or Genre. The phone comes with a 5 mega pixel LED flash camera offering an unlimited surplus of settings to choose from. For connectivity purpose, there is quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE and blazing fast tri-band 3G: 14.4Mbps downlink and 5.76Mbps uplink thanks to HSPA.

Advantages

• With a 5 mega pixel LED flash camera, the HTC Rhyme offers loads of choices including white balance, contrast, panorama, close up, lowlight, portrait, downright hipster to name a few.
• You can simply tap to auto focus and post process with effects and then can effortlessly post to your favorite social networking sites. With HTC Rhyme you will have all the settings at a touch of your finger that you may need.
• The camera can take photos of up to 2592x1944 pixels and can record 720p video @ 21fps. There’s a single-LED flash / video light as well.
• The camera interface is rather space efficient allowing you complete control from still/video toggle to front/back camera toggles and so on. Furthermore, auto focus, face detection and touch focus can also be enabled as well which is good to have on a phone with no hardware shutter key. In addition Geo-tagging option is also available.
• The picture quality is good enough with sufficient details, good contrast and lively colors. However it could have been much better. Further, the noise levels are low and no over sharpening or purple fringing is there.
• The music player is a real looker with an updated interface. The music player offers choice to display the library list by Artist, Albums, Songs, Playlist or Genre.
• The handset also comes with an FM radio that scans the area for the available stations automatically and then lets you mark them as your favorite. Furthermore, RDS is also supported and loudspeaker playback is also there.
• Overall the audio output of the HTC Rhyme is quite satisfactory. It produces really loud and nicely clear output.
• The phone is well equipped with the complete connectivity set. The HTC Rhyme comes with quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE and blazing fast tri-band 3G: 14.4Mbps downlink and 5.76Mbps uplink thanks to HSPA. To add in that, there is Wi-Fi b/g/n for local wireless connectivity.

Disadvantages

• The video output of the HTC Rhyme is not quite extraordinary. With 720p HD capability you may expect a little something more decent but it won’t disappoint you.
• The video quality comparison shows that it lacks in everything i.e. captured details, contrast, colors, noise reduction.
• There is no dedicated video player. However, video files can be accessed in the all videos subfolder in the Gallery.
• The HTC Rhyme has some Wi-Fi death grip issues akin to those on the Sensation and the Sensation XL. The phone is not capable to catch the Wi-Fi signals if it is holding flat on the palm or even if the area around the camera and loudspeaker is touched.

The HTC Rhyme is a fashionable and modish version of a phone, although this mid range smartphone does not really bring anything new to the table other than the handful of fancy accessories. The phone is likely to attract those users who are stylish and are looking for something very nice and unique. Although the phone is not really the superphone yet it is great in its own way. It is well equipped with the great accessories that make this new phone a hot deal in the market. The phone is ideal for those who want a decent mobile phone with all the accessories that they have dreamed of.

The attractive incentive of loads of appealing goodies would definitely sway away most of the mobile users, mostly females from the other platforms quite quickly. More than ever bearing in mind that how good the charging speaker dock is. Although it is a bit pricey phone considering that it is a single-core phone however all the additional stuff that the phone is shipped with certainly counts. On the whole, it is the paintjobs and the set of accessories that make it stand out. Plus, the overall user experience is quite pleasant.