The Great HTC Gratia - The Perfect Compact Smartphone

With the release of the HTC  Gratia, the brand has stepped away from the high end models like the Desire HD, in favour of a phone that gives users the features and functionality they expect from a modern smartphone, but in a model altogether more compact and less expensive then its larger counterparts.HTC have fitted their own user to the Android platform on many previous models, and the Gratia is no different.  Named "Sense" this interface simplifies the way in which you use the phone, and makes some processes more logical then they would otherwise be.  An excellent example of this is the Friends function, which collaborates information from all of your different social networking accounts.  Thus rather than logging into Facebook for updates, and then log into Twitter, this function puts everything in the one place, making the whole process simple and straightforward.   Sense makes use of this information in other areas to, when scrolling through your phone book to find a contact, their latest update is featured, perhaps not vitally important but ideas such as this could have there uses.  The Gratia features the usual multiple homescreen layout found on other Android devices such as the Samsung Galaxy S, but Sense even improves this by offering a Leap view that shows all the pages at once on one screen, leaving you to simply choose the one you require.  Connectivity wise, the phone sports all of the options you would expect from a modern smartphone, thus you have access to the 3G network whilst out and about.  3G gives you super fast data speeds, giving you an excellent web browsing experience.  WiFi improves upon this further but only when you are connected to an acceptable network.Looking at the HTC Gratia for the first time, the first thing that strikes you is that it is a more miniature frame then many of its large screen rivals.  Measuring 104 x 58 x 12mm, the phone will sit comfortably in a pocket or handbag, and weighing just 115 grammes, you will hardly notice that it is there.  Obviously in order to achieve this desirable size, some millimetres have been shaved of the display, but at 3.2 inches it still feels large enough to offer a pleasing experience whether surfing the web or viewing photographs.  The screen does offer a good quality resolution of 320 x 480, and is also a capacitive touch panel, giving a very responsive user experience.  The Gratia doubles as a good quality audio unit thanks to the excellent player and the 3.5mm headphone socket, whilst photo fans will like the 5 mega pixel digital camera feature.The Gratia From HTC is available SIM free, and blends a neat and stylish appearance with an impressive range of features.The HTC Gratia and the Commtiva N700are available now.