Breaking GSM Standards; Acer BeTouch E101
The average GSM mobile phone is a simple device that can access GPRS networks, can work as a music player, takes images and of course, sends and receives calls and messages. The Acer BeTouch E101 is a GSM mobile phone, but it does so much more.
Acer designed the BeTouch series as their dedicated Windows Mobile series. Granted that the Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional operating system is not all that impressive, it offers plenty of functionality not common in GSM phones.
This touch screen smart phone packs enough features to get you through the day at home or at work thanks to Pocket Office and Windows Media Player. You will not be limited to GPRS networks either, the E101 is fully equipped to support EDGE; no HSDPA though since this is not a 3G device.
WinMo 6.5 Pro's Little Quirks
The reason why we find it so hard to be impressed with Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional is because compared to the previous 6.1 OS, there is hardly anything different. The only thing in the new OS is a new skin, faster load times and the Marketplace function for buying applications (think of the AppStore). Aside from these, the rest of the adjustments are mostly superficial.
What makes the E101 stand out is that it is running WinMo as a GSM phone. Usually, 3G phones use WinMo and other major operating systems. For fans of Windows Mobile, this may yet be the most disappointing update to the OS yet. If you're looking to upgrade your GSM device, then it's a good thing that the E101 is here. But if the only reason you are planning to get the E101 or any of the BeTouch phones is for the new Windows OS, do not even bother. While Windows 7 may still be far away from being released, 6.5 does not bring you any closer to 7.
The controls are still clumsy and unintuitive. The menu is difficult to arrange, the icons are too big and some context menus are just too full of text; like a badly redesigned Zune HD interface.
Still a Good Mobile Phone
Despite the Windows OS, the Acer BeTouch E101 is still a great mobile phone. The 3.2 inch resistive touch screen display is just the right size. It has a resolution of 240 x 400 pixels and can show a full 65K worth of colours. The 1140 mAh battery will keep your device powered for 400 hours on standby and over four hours of talk time. The 256MB of internal RAM is fully usable as a dedicated 512MB of ROM is used for applications. It also supports microSD cards if the memory is insufficient for your needs.
Great Features, Excellent Package
The best thing about the BeTouch E101 is that you will never feel limited with the amount of things the phone can do. It takes images with the 2 mega pixel camera, works as a media player (it even has a 3.5mm audio jack) and it can serve as a mobile workstation thanks to Pocket Office.
