| A look at the Acer Line of mobile products since it | | | | half-VGA resistive touchscreen with 256k colors and |
| came out with its first smartphone last April, it seems | | | | the usual gravity accelerometer. Imaging gets an |
| that one of the world's leading mobile computer | | | | average 3.2 megapixel autofocus camera with digital |
| makers is headed for a showdown with compatriot | | | | zoom and geo tagging courtesy of its SatNav |
| HTC, the world's largest smartphone maker outside of | | | | functionality using A-GPS support as well as |
| the Symbian OS. | | | | e-compass location finder. |
| The recent Mobile World Congress showcased the | | | | Acer is silent about its video recording features. |
| latest smartphones that included the Acer beTouch | | | | Multimedia gets a Roll Tech Nemo Player for common |
| E400, the fifth and most powerful in the beTouch | | | | media file codecs, a stereo FM receiver, free music |
| family Acer launched in October. It's also the first | | | | streaming with music Spinlets, YouTube video |
| beTouch smartphone, together with the inferior E110, to | | | | streaming, and stereo listening via A2DP or a 3.5mm |
| abandon the underwhelming Windows Mobile OS to | | | | AV jack. You get 5 hours of talk time and 400 hours |
| run the new Android 2.1 Éclair with the E10 running | | | | in standby from a 1090 mAh Lithium Polymer battery. |
| the older 1.5 Cupcake. | | | | It has social networking integration and access to the |
| Features at a Glance | | | | Android Market. Its other pre-bundled apps include a |
| The 600 MHz Qualcomm QSX 7227 processor | | | | document viewer for PDF and MS Office files, Google |
| powers the E400 making it the most powerful | | | | Search and Google Maps with Traffic, Latitude and |
| smartphone in the beTouch family. Its internal | | | | Street View used with its SatNav features, PC Sync |
| memory is 256 RAM and 512 MB ROM with | | | | and Google cloud sync, an Android web browser and |
| practically unlimited phonebook entries. There's the | | | | the usual email client, Gmail and GTalk for IM support. |
| usual external memory expandability for up to 32 GB | | | | Availability |
| with its microSD slot. It's a 3G phone on the dual band | | | | The start of the 2nd quarter will see the Acer |
| UMTS (900/2100) with 3.6 Mbps HSDPA and 384 | | | | beTouch E400 appearing in Europe and elsewhere |
| Kbps HSUPA for the European and Asian markets. | | | | with a choice of three body colors, ceramic white |
| The North American markets can expect a tri band | | | | with soft-touch black accents and white with pearl red |
| (850/900/2100) model. It's also a quad band GSM | | | | accents and comes with interchangeable battery |
| GPRS/EDGE class 10 on 2G. Local connectivity | | | | covers in the alternate color. The US markets should |
| support gets WiFi 802.11b/g, Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP | | | | get it at about the same with the right UMTS |
| and microUSB 2.0. | | | | frequency bands. No price information a this time but if |
| It sports the same elegant simple lines of its | | | | the midrange beTouch E100 predecessor's SIM-free |
| touchscreen E100 predecessor but weighing 7 grams | | | | price of around €340 is any indication, we can |
| heavier at 125 grams. It measures 115 x 59.3 x 12 mm | | | | expect the E400 to command about the same price. |
| which is large enough to take in a 3.2-inch TFT | | | | |