ACER DX650 debuts with Windows Mobile 6.1 in the Philippines (P24,990)

ACER has officially entered the Philippine Windows Mobile market with the launch of the DX650. if you want to be updated with more news about mobile phones and gadgets in the Philippines, you may subscribe to this blog.

The unit that was sent to me comes running with Windows Mobile 6.1 and like its Glofiish predecessors also comes with the SPB Shell GUI. There doesn’t seem to be any difference with this version compared to the previous one found in the DX900 and X610.

Full feature after the break.

Just so we are all on the same page, ACER now owns the Glofiish name and from what I’ve been told, will be very aggressive in the Windows Mobile market locally. It makes perfect sense, as their only huge competitor is HTC for Windows Mobile products.

Although deep inside I still see the DX650 as a Glofiish device, all eyes are on ACER as this is the device that they will unveil to the Philippine market to mark its venturing into phones. So first impressions are important.

Double sided DX650
The most obvious thing you can point out with the DX650 is its dual sided real estate. You have a full touch screen with two hardware buttons on one face, and a numerical keypad with a small black and white screen on the other. It is common knowledge that Windows Mobile has been left behind in terms of texting user friendliness so the DX650 aims to remove that factor by introducing a “low end phone” on its other side. Contacts, SMS and call history functions are shared by both sides. That means if you receive an SMS, you can view it on either side.

The simple menu contains your Inbox, Contacts, Settings (ringtones, phone volume, keypad volume, etc) and Call History. In theory the system works although possible complaints would be that the screen is too small for reading SMS and composing messages can lag a bit – just a weee bit. The default option for SMS is predictive text with the spacebar found on the # key. It was easy to get the hang of the keypad.

Thankfully, the DX650 comes with a jog dial on the side to make navigation easier. The dial allows you to navigate vertically (up and down) but not horizontally. That thing should definitely be fixed with a firmware update.

Based on the shot above, the DX650 also makes for a pretty good mirror.

The DX650 comes equipped with a 2.0MP camera, GPS, HSDPA connectivity, WiFi, and Bluetooth. It also comes with microSD expansion and charging / syncing is done via miniUSB. I was able to successfully sync the device to my Mac using a free 3rd party sync tool called SyncMate.

The thing with Windows Mobile …
Truth is, I’d encourage people who have a stigma with Windows Mobile to hold your horses. The upcoming version of Windows Mobile 6.5 rocks, and I’d be more excited to try out any Wm-based hardware running on the upcoming operating system.

Windows Mobile 6.5 Running on HTC from Jesus Diaz on Vimeo.

Here’s a video that shows off the new and improved Windows Mobile 6.5 which is basically Microsoft’s way of ridiing the sexy iPhone GUI.

The ACER DX650 will debut with an SRP of P24,990.00

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