By The HTC Tattoo has shown up a lot in the news lately, and that news has been a bit of a mixed bag. On the positive size, we have an affordable, reasonably attractive, fully featured Android phone. On the other hand, we have somewhat cheap materials and, cringe, a resistive touch screen.
For those not familiar with resistive screens, it is normally the type we see on WinMo phones. Resistives can be more accurate, but they aren’t nearly as nice to use and usually work best with a stylus rather than fingers.
So why has HTC blessed us with a resistive screen? Cost no doubt played into it, but according to them it was size of the device. The company Tweeted earlier yesterday that “Capacitive screens at small sizes are hard to be accurate with. Resistive ends up registering fewer miss-clicks.” This may be true, and I’m sure we can trust that the company has done its research. But still, its a shame to be missing something that makes the Android experience so enjoyable.
What do you think? Would the normal consumer notice the difference?
[Via AndroidCentral]
Pssst, Elias, drop the second ‘why’ in the title.
Oh and the “n’t” on “doesn’t”
Wow, failboat extreme. Lesson to all: sleep deprivation is not the solution…to anything. Thanks Dan.
The new Palm Pixi has as small a screen as the Tattoo, smaller I think, and it uses a capacitive screen. I like htc and I don’t like the idea that they’re feeding us lines, but this tweet doesn’t ring true. That said, I think that the resistive won’t be noticed by the non-poweruser demographic the Tattoo aims at. Their Touch Pro 2 phone has a resistive and implements it quite well. It’s a bummer, but it should still be a fine device so long as they don’t gimp our favorite robot.
In a world where the Palm Centro was the only competition, I’d say the tattoo stands a chance. Unfortunately EVERY smart phone gets compared to the iPhone. I see a lot of people getting laughed at with a stylus in hand.
Well, maybe not a lot. Just one for each Tattoo sold.
I’m no expert, just guessing here, but wouldn’t this mean that the device would work very well with a stylus? I know it’s still supposed to be a “touchscreen” (finger) device, but there are something real advantages in writing character based languages with a stylus. But unless they included a stylus silo, which they don’t, it’s not reasonable to think anyone is going to carry one separately for that purpose alone.
I prefer real usability against fancy stuff.
There will be two low cost smartphones – Pulse and Tatto.
Tatto has More memory(+), radio(+), a little better processor(+), and smaller(-) resistive (-) screen.
My bet goes for Tatto.
The only big problem I have with that, is that Pulse will arrive to us in 10 days, while Tatto… maybe will arrive at the begin of december.
Too much time. Considering that my mobile has been stolen and i am going with a 6 year old one… Man it will be hard.
Why does every Android phone have to have a capacitive touch screen. HTC already makes several of these. Doesn’t it make sense to give people choices? If people want a less expensive phone with a touch screen they like, give them the choice. There are many people who cannot use capacitive touch screens due to disabilities. Why not just quit making all other phones since we have the iPhone? Who needs choice?
I think capcitive screens are inferior to resistive screens period!!! I have been using touch phones for over 6 years now and have tried everything from SE P800 to sony ipad and everything in between. Capicitive screens are only good for people who are “click” users. i.e the interface provides them options on where to touch using enlarged buttons and fields. But as soon as you go into “select & edit” user mode, capacitive screens fail miserably with incorrect or missed selections even on large ipad screens. And its not the screen’s fault, our finger tips are just not made for accurate selections and edits. Resistive screens become such a pleasure to work on especially when browsing or editing text. On phones hand writing recognition on resistive screens help me to write much faster and accurate than touch keypads. I have tried to convert to capcitive screens many times but unfortunately they just dont work for me as i browse, select and edit a lot on the go. I am hoping someone comes up with the idea of dual type screens that accept both resistive as well as capicitive input. Or maybe they can start providing capcitive screen stylus … that would be useful for both type of users.