Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I have owned this phone for about a week now. I like the device a lot, but it does have some limitations of which the buyer should be aware. Basically, these can be summed up as fairly small ROM / RAM size, POSSIBLE problems with high density MicroSD cards, possible WiFi connection issues, and the GPS application being on a separate storage card.
In the box:
The phone.
Battery.
Storage case (NOT a belt pouch).
Wired headset (also used as the FM antenna).
2 Gb MicroSD card that contains the Igo navigation software. It is pre-loaded with maps of all North America. The software is IGo 2006+.
Map CD for the navigation software, including a small "quick start" guide for the IGo software.
Manuals and CDs.
Windshield car mount.
Mains electric charger.
Mini USB cable to connect to the computer.
Description:
The screen is a bit small at 2.6 inches, but it is 65K colors and 320 X 240, which is QVA resolution. It has good clarity and is very bright.
A small mesh grill hides the speaker and the multi-function light that indicates Charging, GSM, Wi-Fi, GPS, and BT activity.
The SIM card is mounted behind the 1300 ma battery.
The camera lens is on the rear of the phone, behind a clear cover.
Control buttons: The phone has built in buttons that perform the following tasks:
Left Side:
- A jog wheel on the left side that moves up/down, and can select with a push.
- A "back" button below the jog wheel, which backs out of the current application.
Right side:
- A slider switch that locks the device and dims the screen. I really prefer this to the standard PDA phone method of having a single button bring the phone out of standby. The slider switch is a great idea.
- A small hole to perform a soft reset.
- A button to activate the 2 Mega pixel camera.
- The slot for the microSD storage card, which is spring mounted and has no cover.
Top:
- A power button.
Bottom.
- A 2.5mm wired headset jack.
- A mini-USB port on the bottom.
- The stylus pulls out from the bottom right of the unit, which is a bit non standard.
- The microphone.
- Two mysterious holes. I have no idea what they are for, and the user manual has no mention of them.
Buttons on the front (surrounding the keypad)
Left side:
- A button that runs the ASUS Location Courier.
- A button that brings up the ASUS Travelog.
- A button that activates the FM radio.
- A button that activates an ASUS button which either switches between running tasks, or has a list of 4 programs that you can run.
Right side:
- A "C" button that clears the last entry when you are putting information into a dialog.
- A Bluetooth Off/On toggle button.
- A button that activates windows Messaging.
- A button that activates Voice Commander.
Over the keypad:
- The normal buttons for a WM 6 phone: Phone answer and End.
- Two rocker-style buttons that have dual functions: one has the left soft key and the WINDOWS button; the other has the right soft key and the "OK" button.
- A nifty joystick that has left, right, up, down, and enter functions.
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Pros:
- Size and weight. The phone is very small for a device that has a GSM phone, GPS, WiFi, BT, and Windows Mobile 2006 built in.
- Power is supplied by standard mini-USB plug, which means that it will be easy to find a car charger or spare wall charger.
- Design: The phone is VERY attractive. It is made of plastic, but looks like aluminum. It is reasonably sturdy, though the battery cover does "creak" sometimes.
- Keypad: It is very nice to have the hardware keys as opposed to having to use the soft keys when the phone is active. For those used to text messaging from a standard cell phone, the keypad will be very useful. Personally I use the software keyboard built into WM6.
- The joystick is an interesting feature in a PDA phone. I find that I don't actually use this a lot, maybe because I'm more used to a jog wheel and the stylus.
- The dedicated function keys are very nice, especially the button to turn on/off the Bluetooth radio.
- Reasonable battery life, due to minimum RAM and ROM for WM 6. I have found that there are freeware utilities that will put the phone in standby, which has resulted in longer battery life. From what I can tell the phone will work for about 2 - 3 days with occasional GPRS and WiFi usage. If you have heavy WiFi and BT, expect it to require recharging every night.
- Excellent voice quality for phone conversations. BT hands free quality is good.
- Built in support for EDGE over GPRS.
- Quad band, so it can be used in the US or worldwide.
- Built in software for Voice Commander. This can be used either over wired or BT headsets, or from the phone microphone. It can control both dialing and many other programs, though I have only used it with BT to dial hands free. The voice recognition software is very good.
- Having a dedicated hardware key for backspace is actually quite useful when using the "soft" keyboard, since if the SHIFT key is pressed there is no back arrow on the keyboard.
- Built in software that allows one to use the "X" key to actually close programs, to minimize programs, or to have a "long tap" to close, normal tap to minimize. The WM 6 default behavior is to minimize programs, which means that one can have a whole bunch of programs running at once. The WM standard way to manage memory is to bring up the memory application and manually close each program; the ASUS built-in capability is very nice, though one can find this enhancement in after-market utilities.
- Built in software to show the system status. This is an icon that stays in the icon tray; when clicked it shows USB status, screen status, memory status, storage card status, and battery status, all in a nice bar chart format. Clicking a status brings up either the application or the file commander for that function.
- The USB can be set to either Turbo activesync, normal activesync, or "Mass Storage Device" (which is supposed to make the phone act like a standard USB card reader). I had to update my Windows Vista drivers to get this "card reader" to work, but XP recognized the drive immediately. I have no idea what "turbo activesync" is; either activesync setting appear to work fine with my desktop computer and MS Outlook.
- Built in "Location Courier" software to automatically send an SMS to people based on your GPS location. I haven't tried this one yet. I'm not sure I see the point. I don't know why one would want to SMS people to let them know your Lat/Long, unless you were trekking in the wilderness - but then where would you get GSM phone reception in the wilderness? Anyway, it is an interesting application.
- Built in "Travel Log" software that allows you to annotate a route you have taken. You can set routes and points of interest. This data can then be exported and displayed on a Google map. I have not tried out this software other than to see that it loaded and connects to the GPS.
- Included navigation software for the GPS. Maps for all North America are included. The software has voice prompts and seems to work well.
- Built in "GPS Catcher" software. This goes out to the Internet every three days and updates the position files so that the GPS acquires the satellites faster. In practice the satellites acquire within 30 seconds or so here in Los Angeles.
- Built in application launcher software. This is started when the system is booted, and has icons on the screen that divide the software into categories like "GPS", "OFFICE", "FILES", "GAMES", etc. You can add programs to the various folders, and re-arrange the order of the programs. Closing this application brings up the normal WM6 "Today" screen.
- Built in application to backup data to the storage card.
- Support for synchronization with Exchange Server.
- Built in custom software to block incoming callers by phone number. I haven't used this one either.
- Built in news reader software (I haven't used this one yet).
- Built in "ASUS Switcher" program. This program will either switch between active programs, or bring up a small dialog listing four programs to run. You can put up to four of your favorite applications on this button; the available programs are apparently tied to the Asus Launcher "Applications" folder. Thus if you setup the Launcher to have your custom programs in "Applications", you will be able to select them on the "Switcher" program. This is apparently not documented at all. You can also select from various pre-configured programs to assign.
- Special "Today" screen plug-in modules for Wireless settings, Windows Live, and profiles.
- Microsoft Compact Net Framework is pre-loaded into the memory. So the user should be aware that there is no need to install the CF NET - applications that require this support software will run. This saves a couple of Mb of room on the storage drive. I'm not sure if this is a WM 6 norm or specific to the P527, but it is a good feature.
- The device has profiles built in; these will change the volume and ring levels based on "normal", "meeting", "silent", and "automatic". The automatic setting reads the outlook calendar and sets the "silent" profile based on the appointments. However, one cannot add profiles, and the profiles cannot be cusomized other than to set the...Read more›
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