Acer Liquid Z2

So the Acer Liquid Z2 is not going to set the mobile world alight, but we quite like it all the same.

It's designed primarily as a first baby step into the smartphone world and comes with some helpful features to make the transition as painless as possible.

It's a fairly dinky little thing to look at and comes with a 3.5-inch 480 x 320 display, 1GHz single-core processor, and a 3MP camera.

As a resolutely budget device, it does not feel like a premium smartphone, but it's small and light and certainly isn't horrible to look at and fondle in the hand. There are uglier phones out there that cost twice as much. That said, it is quite a fat device for something so small, but at least it's not heavy.

The great thing about this little phone is that even your mum's silly friend who dresses too young for her age and pretends not to understand the TV remote will be able to use it. It comes with an app called 'Quick Mode' which is essentially an app launcher designed for people who don't know what Android is and don't want to know.

Open it up and it gives you all of the main settings, functions and apps in one menu. Things like Bluetooth on/off, camera, browser etc. All of the things a technophobe needs to make use of a smartphone without trying, basically.

This all runs on top of a mostly vanilla-flavoured build of Android Jelly Bean 4.1, and even though it has low-end specs, it still manages to be nippy and responsive to the touch. There was no sluggishness, and the camera - which "launches in just one second" - was able to fire off snap after snap without any focus or save lag.

Early Verdict

OK, so it's not going to win any awards but we like the Acer Liquid Z2 and look forward to putting it through its paces in a full review. We give it a tentative thumbs up for the time being and encourage you to check it out if you have a technophobic friend or relative who quakes at the thought of touching anything with silicon inside it. Just don't tell them it has silicon inside it.

Full Spesification's For Acer Liquid Z2

GENERAL	2G Network	GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900
	3G Network	HSDPA 900 / 2100
	SIM	Optional Dual SIM (Mini-SIM)
	Announced	2013, February
	Status	Coming soon. Exp. release 2013, March

BODY	Dimensions	110 x 62.5 x 12.3 mm (4.33 x 2.46 x 0.48 in)
	Weight	110 g (4.59 oz)

DISPLAY	Type	Capacitive touchscreen
	Size	320 x 480 pixels, 3.5 inches (~165 ppi pixel density)
	Multitouch	Yes

SOUND	Alert types	Vibration, MP3, WAV ringtones
	Loudspeaker	Yes
	3.5mm jack	Yes
		- SRS sound enhancement

MEMORY	Card slot	microSD, up to 32 GB
	Internal	4 GB, 512 MB RAM

DATA	GPRS	Yes
	EDGE	Yes
	Speed	HSDPA, HSUPA
	WLAN	Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotspot
	Bluetooth	Yes, v3.0 with A2DP
	USB	Yes, microUSB v2.0

CAMERA	Primary	3 MP/ 5 MP
	Features	Geo-tagging
	Video	Yes
	Secondary

FEATURES	OS	Android OS, v4.1.1 (Jelly Bean)
	Chipset	Qualcomm MSM7227A Snapdragon
	CPU	1 GHz
	Sensors	Accelerometer, proximity
	Messaging	SMS (threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Email
	Browser	HTML
	Radio	FM radio
	GPS	Yes, with A-GPS support
	Java	Yes, via Java MIDP emulator
	Colors	Black, Black/White
		- SNS integration - Google Search, Maps, Gmail - YouTube, Google Talk, Picasa - MP3/WAV/WMA/eAAC+ player - MP4/H.264/H.263 player - Organizer - Document viewer - Voice memo/dial - Predictive text input (Swype)

BATTERY		Li-Ion 1300 mAh battery
	Stand-by	Up to 450 h
	Talk time	Up to 4 h