Though it canceled quite a number of products earlier this year, Asus went on to show that it's not out of the handset market by announcing the P552w soon after. Commercially available in Asia Pacific starting this month, the P552w will retail for S$669.

Design

At 102 x 60.5 x 14.5mm, the P552w is a compact handheld. Compared to the HTC Touch, it is larger in all dimensions. But to be fair, the Asus is a much more feature-packed device compared to the Touch. A fairer comparison is the upcoming Touch 3G, and comparatively, the HTC is narrower and lighter though all other dimensions are similar. While it is not as small as its competitor's device, the P552w is sufficiently light (105g) and handy and shouldn't cause much of a bulge in pockets or handbags. Overall, its dimensions make it look a little pudgy and it's unlikely to turn many heads due to looks.

The P552w (left) is wider than the HTC Touch 3G.
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Like the HTC Touch, the screen of this handheld is flush with the chassis. This makes it easier to execute commands on the display using finger swipes and taps. There's quite a wide black border around the LCD and we are left wondering if Asus could have actually made the P552w more compact. Just a few buttons and a directional pad are found below the screen. These include the regular Call and Hang up keys, a shortcut to the device's custom AnyTime launcher and an OK key. The front facade, already small to begin with, means there isn't too much space for buttons. So we're glad Asus has kept it to a minimum. The keypad is large enough to be useful and the keys are easy to access.

Along the left side are volume controls and a port for connecting an external GPS antenna. The right side has a shutter for activating the camera and taking a shot. On that same side is a Hold key similar to what you find on MP3 players. Activating it disables all buttons and turns off the screen, while switching it the other way turns it back on. It's a convenient solution which lets you turn off the device and keylock in one step. We've seen this in the Asus P320 as well and it's something we won't mind having in more handsets.

As in many of HTC's devices, there's only one port on the Asus P552w, a mini-USB one for charging, syncing and connecting a wired headset. The stylus slot is found in the top right corner and the provided plastic pointer is light but long and thick enough to be comfortable in the hand.

Features

Connectivity options are plentiful on the P552w. It comes with HSDPA for fast data transfers over the cellular network, Wi-Fi for use at hotspots and Bluetooth for your own personal area network. Having a complete suite of wireless connections is pretty commonplace these days and it's a good thing that Asus has delivered in this aspect.

	The AnyTime launcher.

Satellite navigation is also covered with the inclusion of a SiRFstar III chip in the P552w. Along with the hardware built-in, Asus has also included the MapKing 2007 software and maps with this device. This gives both positioning information and turn-by-turn driving instructions, adding extra value to the package.

One of the things the Taiwan-based company has been touting is the inclusion of its Glide software in the P552w. This is its answer to HTC's TouchFLO and includes a customized Home screen as well as other little conveniences to make the Windows Mobile 6.1 experience more palatable. The Home screen has a little dock with the default view showing a large clock. Scrolling across the dock will let you toggle between views like weather info, RSS and music playback. There's also a Google search bar perched right on top for quick access to the search engine--a worthwhile inclusion. While nowhere as slick as HTC's TouchFLO 3D, this modified Home screen is functional and we have no doubt that some users will find it useful. There are three variations of it and you can toggle between them via a 3D rotating switcher. Aside from being aesthetically distinct, we don't see any one of these three views being very different functionally from the other two, so most users will probably just pick one and stick with that.

The AnyTime launcher is another one of Asus' little touches. This can be brought up with the shortcut key on the front face and gets you to commonly used contacts, settings and applications quickly. A carousel of seven main menu items makes it a little too clunky for our liking. In some cases, using the default Windows Mobile Programs and Settings menus is actually faster than scrolling through this AnyTime launcher. Nonetheless, it can be useful sometimes when an application fills the entire screen and you can't tap the Start button on the screen quickly.

Text input is an important consideration for PDA-phones without keypads and the P552w fails in this aspect. The text entry options are limited to the default Windows Mobile ones, which mean you definitely need a stylus for input. While this can be solved by installing a third-party finger-friendly option, we felt that Asus should have at least provided a basic numeric keypad for one-handed operation.

Camera performance was decent with vibrant colors though there was slight distortion at the edges.
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There's no lack of other additional software, though, as Asus has included applications like a Flickr/YouTube uploader and a backup app. There's also the convenience of its Gester application which essentially lets you use your finger to "push" pages and lists like a page. We already see this function in HTC's TouchFLO-enabled devices and the iPhone, but it's a good thing to copy and Asus has done its implementation quite well.

The camera on this handheld is a rudimentary 2-megapixel one with no autofocus or LED for dark situations. Storage expansion is available through a microSD card slot. What we didn't like about this slot is that it's under the battery, which means you definitely have to turn off the device to swap cards.

Performance

Though it doesn't have a particularly high-resolution or large-sized screen, the P552w's battery life wasn't that great. We got under two days of use on a single charge of its 1,100mAh battery. Heavy phone users will surely have to charge daily.

The 624MHz Marvell processor chugged along just fine. We hardly felt any slowdowns in our operation of the handheld and things ran smoothly without any hitches. The fact that it has 128MB of RAM with about 60MB free when nothing is running also helps.

Call quality was decent and the speakerphone volume was good enough for quiet situations. With no front camera, this Asus doesn't support outgoing video calls or accept incoming video calls.

GPS performance was good using its SiRFstar III chip. Even without the aid of the accompanying GPS Catcher software (Asus' name for its A-GPS function), it took less than 2 minutes to get an initial position lock. With the software, finding satellites and getting a lock were almost immediate.

Conclusion

We are more than glad that Asus is still in the handset game. The P552w shows that the company is still trying with lots of enhancements to keep up with the competition. These additions aren't the most polished but definitely add value to the user experience. It isn't outstanding by any standard, but the P552w gets the job done. It's a steal at S$669, but will have to deal with the competition afforded by the HTC Touch 3G when that becomes available later this month.