Want an Android phone, don't need a touchscreen slab? You may want to give the Motorola Charm an audition.
Clad in a slim QWERTY candybar form factor, it's easy to mistake it for a Blackberry clone. It's not the sleekest messaging-style handset we've seen, but it does have its own...uhm...charm. The squared-off 2.8-inch touchscreen (320 x 240 resolution) feels too small for viewing most webpages, but it does work fine for most other uses. It's capacitive too, making for excellent touch controls. Motorola also added a navigation pad on the back of the phone that surprisingly works better than we expected. Keypad is roomy and has a good tactile feel.
As a phone, the Motorola Charm makes for good calls, with voices just sounding with a little bit of echo. Audio is clear, though. Speakerphone isn't that good and will probably be unusable in crowded environments. Battery is rated at 5 hours of talk time, making for over a day of use before recharges.
The phone runs Motoblur, which adds a number of useful stuff, such as a universal inbox, a socially-connected contacts list and a bunch of widgets. While we do like the extra functionality, the UI layer does leave the screen a bit cluttered. An underpowered 600MHz processor controls the action, which does wilt a little once you start to have a whole host of apps running.
It comes with the usual smartphone capabilities (threaded chat view, Bluetooth, aGPS, WiFi), along with the host of features that go with Android 2.1 (multiple home screens, robust messaging with Exchange support, speech-to-text and more). Running on T-Mobile's network, it gives fast 3G speeds, with YouTube clips running smoothly after some short buffering. Both the media player and HTML browser are stock, so don't expect much excitement there. The 3-megapixel camera takes rather disappointing pictures.
Overall, we love the design of the Motorola Charm. While I'm not swayed by its looks, it does offer an alternative for users who want a slim Android phone with a QWERTY keyboard. Plus, it's priced pretty sweet at $74.99 on a two-year contract with T-Mobile.
