Acer neoTouch S200 review

Acer neoTouch S200 (Acer F1) review:

Acer are back with a few new devices, this one being the flagship and one of the first out of the blocks with the all new, recently announced windows mobile 6.5, this is my first play with 6.5 and also with the new breed of ‘large’ screened phones, not to mention the first device with no less than 3 names, is it worth all of the hype?

The Acer neoTouch S200 (Acer F1)

What’s in the Box?

• Acer S200 Smartphone
• Stylus
• Battery
• Quick Start Guide
• Companion CD
• USB cable
• AC adapter
• Headset
• Screen protective film

Chec out Matt’s Acer neoTouch S200 unboxing video for a tour of the handset.

Acer neoTouch S200 (Acer F1) specification:

• Windows Mobile 6.5
• Qualcomm 8250 1 GHz CPU
• RAM – 256MB
• ROM – 512MB
• 3.8 inch WVGA 480×800 touchscreen display
• Quad-band GSM/EDGE 850, 900, 1800, 1900
• HSPA 900, 1900, 2100 (download 7.2 Mbps / upload 5.76 Mbps)
• WiFi 802.11 b/g
• Bluetooth 2.1 EDR
• miniUSB
• A-GPS
• 3.5mm audio jack
• MicroSD card (support up to 32GB)
• 5 megapixel Autofocus camera with LED Flash
• Talk Time – 5 Hours (manufactures approximation)  
• Standby Time – 400 Hours (manufactures approximation)  
• Rechargeable Lithium-ion 1350 mAh battery
• Dimensions – 118.6 x 63 x 12mm
• Weight – 130 grams with battery
• Ambient Light Sensor
• Motion Accelerometer
• Proximity Sensor

General

On the top of the F1 is the 3.5mm jack for the headset and you can just make out the stylus on the left.

Acer neoTouch top view

On the left hand side there is only the power button.

Acer neoTouch left side

The bottom houses the miniUSB slot and microphone and slot for removing the cover

Acer neoTouch bottom view

The right side of the device is a dedicated camera button, a small reset hole and the volume up/down rocker

Acer neoTouch right side

On the very shiny and plastic back of the F1 is the 5 megapixel autofocus camera, and very small LED flash, no mirror but the case is shiny enough to see a reflection. There is also a speaker grill and a tiny LED flash.

Acer neoTouch back view

The business end of the device from top to bottom is a tiny LED indication light, next is the phone speaker, proximity/light sensor and an IR LED. Below these is the large 3.8 inch WVGA 480×800 touchscreen display, underneath that is the minimal, touch sensitive Call, Home, Back and End buttons.

Acer neoTouch front view

Highlights

• Screen
• Speedy processor

Lowlights

• Size
• Flaky software and hardware
• Battery

Review

First off this is definitely one of the biggest devices that I have played with coming in at 118.6 x 63 x 12mm, the device itself looks very sleek and professional, the minimal looks and shiny black with chrome accents works well for me, but rest assured you will be polishing this forever as it is a proper fingerprint magnet. You do have to be fairly brutal with the back cover to prise it off, and being plastic that doesn’t inspire confidence and it is yet to be seen if this will prove easy to mark and scratch.

On booting up the Acer for the first time screen really does stand out as being bright and very vibrant. Windows mobile 6.5 fires up and the speed of the device is evident with the on board Qualcomm 8250 1GHz processor working very well and ensuring that the processes work with ease. The main cost to this is that when running at full pelt the battery on Day 1 lasted a total of 4 hours, but that was GPS, video, web browsing, calls etc. With lesser use a day is what I came to expect from the 1350 mAh battery, which I suppose could have benefitted from a beefier model.

The WM 6.5 is completely new to me but it soon became familiar as there is a lot of the usual programs and toys to play with along with a few new additions, it appears that Acer have pretty much left the OS to its own devices and their only addition is an Acer home screen shown below. There are various screens to choose from that I can see, the old familiar Home, WM6.5 home and a similar looking Acer version amongst them.

The first screen is the Acer variant, which gives 6 icons seen on the 2 middle rows that you can customise to your most used, I found that pressing the back button always seemed to land you back here so make sure they are your favourite icons that are included. Clicking on the grid in the middle at the bottom brings up the WM6.5 icon home as shown. It is really great how quickly you can zip around these options.

That cannot be said for all the software, I found that whether by design or fault wifi would repeatedly switch itself off for no reason, I don’t know if this is done on purpose to save battery life, but annoying all the same. On top of this trying to connect to my Parrot handsfree car kit proved to be a challenge and once connected the headset icon appeared and then stayed on whether I was connected or not.

The screen resolution was great for viewing You Tube and the like, when coupled with the supplied headphones made the overall experience a pleasure, although there where times when this worked against it, such as when viewing the phone book which wasn’t the best as they appear far too big and unusable, especially when compared to the standard contacts version.

Phones calls on the Acer neoTouch proved to be clear if not the loudest handset I have used. Texting on the pin sharp screen was also easy, with the standard windows mobile keyboards available, both portrait and landscape versions are large and easy to use, I found that although there is a small telescopic stylus included the only time I resorted to using it was to reset the device.

The next issue with the Acer is the camera, which despite being 5 megapixel unfortunately is not the best, I am not sure if it was this device or a problem overall, but I could not get it to zoom, this should be achievable by pressing the volume up/down button, on this device nothing happened, time will tell if this is an isolated problem or not. Another thing I noticed is that when holding the phone camera styley the power button on the now bottom left hand corner is right where my thumb goes and therefore on more than one occasion the device powered off, very helpful for catching that one off moment in picture!

With a quick GPS and processor Google maps worked really well and the screen comes into its own in this area as well as with web browsing etc. I did manage to get N Drive to work on this device as well but unfortunately the resolution didn’t suit.

I have to say that I really don’t like the minimal keys shown in the picture, these proved to be difficult to use, and although they do light up, a dot and a dash for identification are not ideal, I would have preferred a more conventional button layout and style.

Conclusion

Overall the neoTouch, F1, S200 has a lot of impressive features, the processor and the screen are brilliant, as I have not played with the HTC competitors in this area I think Matt will need to stack them all together and give an overall comparison, but I am confident this will be up there with the best available.

Sitting at around the £320 to £350 mark, this is an awful lot of kit for your money and definitely worth a look if you are in the market for this type of device.

For me, I am not convinced with these oversized devices, small, sleek and pocketable units are more preferable to me. That said for those gamers and video watchers of you I am sure you will love it.

Review by: Steve