Gadgets & Technology

Acer beTouch E110

One of the world’s leading computer makers, Acer unveiled a new line of Windows Mobile and Android smartphones at the recently concluded 2010 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. One of them is the Android-run Acer beTouch E110 slated to reach world markets in March in choice of black and dark blue body color.

Acer is putting into high gear its dual product strategy of coming out with identical hardware models of each OS that started with its neoTouch line on Windows and the beTouch stable on Android. Aiming to reach 3 million handsets sold for 2010, up from the half million units sold on its first year in the mobile phone business that started only last year, Acer is pinning its hopes their new smartphones released at the MWC will start the year right for its plans.

Unfortunately, it needs more than just coming out with identical twin handsets on both OS to win markets. With some rather lackluster products that eschews par-for-the-course features in its showcased MWC products, it needs to cross its fingers that they can compete and rise above the other better spec’d smartphones.

Compromised Features

The first feature compromise starts with a 2.8-inch TFT LCD resistive touchscreen that gets a mere QVGA resolution and 256k colors when the competition with a similar 2.8-in displays have higher half or wide VGA resolution at the same or higher color depth. Gravity accelerometer is not provided.

The next compromise gets into its multimedia with a basic fixed focus imaging ability at 3.2 megapixels of resolution without flash or other features and has unspecified video recording details. It still gets the Roll Tech Nemo Player for the popular audio and video file formats and a stereo FM radio with speakerphones. Its Bluetooth A2DP allows wireless stereo listening while its 3.5mm headphone jack allows using wired regular headsets.

Another compromise comes with having no WiFi for hotspot surfing. While being a 3G phone on the dual band UMTS you get a lower speed HSDPA at 3.6 Mbps and HSUPA at 364 Kbps for broadband data connectivity. It is still a capable quad band GSM with class 10 class 10 GPRS/EDGE on the 2G network and you get local data connectivity support with Bluetooth 2.9 with A2DP and USB 2.0. SatNav is provided by a built-in GPS receiver with A-GPS support

Powered by a modest ST Ericsson PNX6715 processor clocked at 416 MHz, the E110 comes with 256 MB RAM and 256 MB ROM with the usual microSD and runs an older Android 1.5 Cupcake platform customized by an Acer UI with its own multimedia menu and web widgets. It gets housed in a typical Acer-designed touchscreen body that stands out with a 5-way navigation key that’s unique among its latest beTouch and neoTouch handsets that sport no such keys. It measures 103.5 x 54 x 13.5mm and weighs just 105g to make it comfortable in the pocket.

On the software front, the Acer beTouch E110 comes preloaded with a document viewer for PDF and MS Office files, the Android email and browser apps. It’s also a socially aware smartphone with social networking integration for Facebook with Twidroid PRO as well as Ur-Fonz apps for avatar creation.