ACER beTouch E110 Review

Performance:

In-call voice quality is adequate, voices come out tinny, but fairly audible and clear through the beTouch E110's earpiece. On the other side things come out with better loudness, but also somewhat distorted .

We ran the speaker a couple of instances when playing radio and during calls and it turned out to be nothing impressive, but good enough for its purposes, and slight distortion could be heard only at the highest volume level.


Conclusion:

There are a number of conflicting explanations why there are no Android Market, Google Maps, YouTube , etc. preinstalled on some phones that are otherwise running the Android OS. The most plausible is that while Android is free and open source, Google's applications, including the Android Market are proprietary. So far even manufacturers/carriers that are part of the Open Handset Alliance can sometimes opt not to include them in their Android phone distros for various business reasons – no official Market access in the countries or regions where they will be sold (reportedly mainly Middle East and some of Asia), hassle of legal permissions from Google to integrate Android Market and other Google services, and so on.

So be alert whether that Acer beTouch E100 you are eyeing at the store is a full-featured Android smartphone or not. If not, as in our case, it will only serve you as a standard featurephone, without the joys of installing lots of additional apps. Unless, of course, you are planning to become a power user and go to great lengths to customize the entry level touchscreen phone with aftermarket solutions.

In that case if you are thinking to get a budget Android phone and the Acer beTouch E110 in your area is lacking access to Android Market, the HTC Tattoo is a way better option, which is very similar in design and specs, but can offer you the full Android love. If you are browsing for a cheaper phone than the HTC Tattoo and not planning to toy around with it much, the Acer beTouch E110 could do the trick.