HTC To Ink Europe With Its Tattoo Android PhoneHTC To Ink Europe With Its Tattoo Android Phone

This morning HTC announced yet another new Android phone. This budget-friendly device, dubbed the Tattoo, might be diminutive in size, but it packs a lot into its little shell.HTC is pushing the end-user customization angle of its Android phones pretty hard. That's one reason why the Magic was renamed the myTouch 3G for the U.S. market. The opening paragraph in the press release for the Tattoo notes that the new phone from HTC "brings broad personalization to the masses...with its ability to personalize all aspects of the phone, from its hardware to its applications and content...people are able to express themselves and create their own individual mobile experience."

One could say that people who get themselves tattooed are, similarly, customizing their appearance and expressing their individuality. So the Tattoo name for this new Android phone makes sense in that respect.

Speaking of "sense", the Tattoo runs HTC's custom-built Sense User Interface, which is highly configurable by the end user.

One the hardware side of things, the Tattoo is very small and will easily fit into a pocket. It has no physical QWERTY keyboard, only the software QWERTY that is part of Android 1.5.

It also has a 3.2 megapixel camera with flash, FM radio, Bluetooth, GPS and Wi-Fi. Perhaps one disappointing aspect of the Tattoo is that it supports a 240 x 320 QVGA display that spans 2.8 inches. Many of today's devices are sporting much higher resolution displays. In fact, HTC's own Touch Pro2 comes with a whopping 800 x 480 display. The downgraded display, however, plays a large role in keeping the cost of the Tattoo in the mass-market range.

The Tattoo will support 3G networks in Europe and goes on sale there in October. HTC has not announced any plans to bring this device to the U.S. market.