Acer M900

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The first batch of Acer smartphones was unveiled earlier this year at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. These included the M900, a Windows Mobile device with a huge 3.8-inch WVGA display and a slide-out QWERTY keypad. This product was probably developed by device manufacturer E-Ten some time before it was bought over by Acer, given how soon after it was announced after the acquisition. After using the M900 for a few days, we are left with the opinion that Acer should have left it on the drawing board and concentrated on designing a new and better product.

Design

With dimensions of 119 x 62 x 17.1mm and weighing 188g, the M900 is a very hefty device. This is somewhat justified given that mobile phones with slide-out QWERTY keyboards are generally heavier. For comparison's sake, the HTC Touch Pro2 has similar dimensions and weighs about 10g lighter at 178.5g. Those very concerned with the size and weight of a mobile will probably give this model a miss as it will weigh down handbags and cause a bulge in pants pockets.

Even after getting used to the size, we were still unimpressed by the build quality. For one, the screen felt soft to the touch and depressed slightly when tapped. After sliding the screen out to expose the keyboard, we noticed a slight wobble. Comparing this again with HTC's Touch Pro2, even though the latter has a more complex construction due to the fact that the screen tilts upward, it feels much more solid.

In its open position, you can make use of a physical QWERTY keyboard on the M900. The layout is similar to what you find on a desktop keyboard, so we had no issues with finding letters. That's about the only positive point of this keypad. All punctuation keys would require first pressing the Fn key, even the all-important full-stop and comma. This slowed down messaging and made typing a chore for us. Though the keys are well-spaced apart, each of their top surfaces slopes downward, making them very shallow and thus hard to feel individually when your eyes are focused on the screen. Given the amount of space Acer has had to work with, the QWERTY keyboard implementation on the M900 is disappointing.

One of the reasons this smartphone is so large is because of the 3.8-inch touchscreen display. This is the same size and resolution (800 x 480 pixels) as what's found on the HTC Touch HD. The screen quality is good. Text appear sharp and colors are bright.

Below the screen are four buttons and a fingerprint sensor. The buttons include Call and Hang up keys as well as a Home and dedicated GPS shortcut. The fingerprint sensor is a horizontal strip which requires a finger to be swiped downward to read it. This takes the place of where a directional pad is usually found on a smartphone but also performs that task as you can simply swipe up or down to scroll lists. We will discuss its ability to read fingerprints later in the Features section.

Shortcuts are lined along the right side of the device including a camera shutter, reset, voice command key and the main power button. Turning the device on is convenient because the power button is large and easy to press. The flipside is we tended to accidentally turn it on in the pocket, which can lead to battery drain, or worse, accidental calls.

On the left is a jog dial, mini-USB port and microSD card slot. We are glad the memory expansion slot is found here and not behind the battery cover because the M900's battery lid is really hard to remove. This will be an issue for heavy users who carry and use spare batteries on a regular basis. The mini-USB is for charging, syncing and connecting a wired headset. There's no dedicated audio connector, so music lovers who want to use their own headphones with 3.5mm jacks will have to purchase an adapter.

Tags: Smart Phone, HTC Touch, Keyboard, fingerprint sensor, High Tech Computer Corp.

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