Not quite as fluid as we’d hoped
Acer’s Liquid created quite hype at its arrival in the consumer mobile market. Unfortunately, its living proof of the byword first opinions is not necessarily the last. Let that be the solitary spoiler. The handset is well packaged along with the accessories whilst adequately encompassing has mediocre build quality.
The device is very well built with the attractive curving tops and the base of the phone portrays a basic design. The dual tone color scheme of black and white is just the quotient for it, its colorful design where a pure white color is used to cover the major part of the phone except at the top and the bottom. The front portion of the device showcases a black translucent finish that blends the bezel and the screen into a single plane. The only irritating on the phone is its logo which says “ACER” placed right above the function symbols marked on the phone’s surface where the earpiece is located. Moving upwards we could find a 3.5” inch, capacitive touchscreen display.
Moving on the detailing of the phone, for the data connectivity a USB port is provided at the bottom, covered with a decent rubber flap to protect it from dust. Also, a 3.5mm audio jack is placed at the top of the phone for ease of use and to avoid wire kinks. The device runs on a 1350 mAH batter that provide decent amount of hours as backup while using browsers to surf internet and three hours of call time. The user interface of the phone is not that heavy and is pretty snappy, although we noticed a lag while using the camera.
Acer Liquid is powered by a 768 MHz Snapdragon processor which provides juice to the phone to perform well in heavy instances, where many applications are running in the background. The user interface does not always depend upon the integrated processor and is majorly independent of it. Being an android phone it does exhibits certain drawbacks, such like turning it to the silence mode while during an incoming call which is really annoying, especially when you are in a meeting. The device lacks in the responsiveness of the inbuilt QWERTY keypad.
The loudspeaker clarity is disappointing and during a call the phone literally vibrates with the loudspeaker is turned on producing a jarring voice. In-call volume being at the maximum level exhibited pretty low voice, the caller at the other end was needed to speak up to be audible, or you’ll keep guessing as what was being said. The headsets sounds much better and where noticeably clear compared to the clarity with the loudspeaker/earpiece. Audio media playback quality is likely acceptable, nothing more, though possibly better earphones should yield better results.
The phone comprises of a nice display which exhibits crisp, great text visibility and good colors. Although it as a 262,000-colour screen we could notice no shortcomings of any sort, videos and web browsing was a pleasurable experience – although we wish for slightly more precision to the touch-based user interaction. The camera feels like an old technology, feels as if the quality was only so-so and also the hardware button which is to access the camera is also pretty useless – after multiple inputs only it evokes a single click while when half pressed it should auto focus.
Focusing on the hardware, we’d wish for a better camera with a flash, which can produce some decent images; we’d also wish for better earphones, better loudspeaker and a better signal receptor for improved call quality.
Software front, the Android is replete with connectivity options, it messes up big time with the basics – a smartphone, irrespective of the ringtones should be a good phone and the Android OS has issues like a mile wide when it comes to meeting the other end.
Close
Build Quality
