Design, ergonomics

The design of ASUS P750 is remarkably successful. The casing is made out of plastic with a soft-touch cover, the side edges having glossy inserts. The front panel features a surface engraving in the likeness of the same E-TEN glofiish X800, but here it falls better into the overall stylization pattern. The design also pleases with the black color of materials employed everywhere and the metallic inserts (a strip of keys, a speaker, etc.). It looks really very solid and impressive, especially taking into consideration a high quality of implementation. P750 does not creak at squeezing, the back panel doesn’t play. The coating also left the most positive impression - it absolutely doesn’t tend to accumulate grease and fingerprints, at that it’s wear-resistant. The novelty design in general reminds of P526 most of all, that once again speaks well for the succession of models.

«ASUS P750 looks stylish and sports a high quality of implementation. »

P750 enjoys average dimensions and weight, the smartphone sits in the hand rather comfortably. Owing to the soft-touch layer, the danger of it slipping out of your hands to the ground is minimal even in frosty weather. The tip of the navigation button is rubberized as well - unlike with P526 the ASUS guys nevertheless provided the model with it and that is an indisputable advantage. The element is well marked out and really very handy. The scroll wheel on the left edge is in its place. The right edge hosts the blocking slider. As for the stylus, it’s the most usual, of a telescopic design. Its pocket is located on the bottom edge of the casing - alas, it’s a forced step due to the extensive amount of details already placed at the top. It does not cause much discomfort and the majority of modern smartphones have such "geography".

«ASUS P750 sports an alphanumeric keypad, very handy for its class. »

The keypad is pleasant; it reminds of a similar element in P526. The keys are big enough and with a good stroke. The backlighting is even, moderately bright and quite comfortable. Above the screen there is a status indicator changing from color to color - red (an event, charging), blue (Bt, GPS), green (GSM, charge ending). It is moderately informative, a reminder or a notice are frequent to miss. There is no lack of controls with P750, besides the foresaid the phone hosts some more elements - the ‘ear’ used to fasten the wrist band, the interface slot (ExtUSB), the stylus holder and the headset 2.5 mm output on the bottom edge. The memory expansion slot, a soft-reset socket, the power and blocking slide button as well as the GPS aerial connector are available on the right edge. At last the microphone button and the scroll wheel are located on the left edge and as for the upper part, it is empty.

The traditional XT9 support is in its place. It gradually comes to take place of the archaic T9. Among the adjustments are mistakes correction, attachment and replacement as well as words ending option. Everything is to the fancy, as usual.

As it should be with an autofocusing camera device, it makes use of a two-position shoot button. No problems with it, the location is quite reasonable. The shooting aspect is horizontal. The memory card slot is of the microSD standard; it keeps with the hot swapping support. The 2.5 mm audio output is typical for the majority of smartphones, but its location on the bottom edge is less favourable, the reason is the same – a developed communicativeness of P750 and corresponding units on the upper part.

Let's compare with i-mate Ultimate 6150:

Communications

ASUS P750 is designed to be used in GSM 850/900/1800/1900 and UMTS 850/1900/2100 networks; they support GPRS and EDGE, as well as HSDPA. Wire communication is achieved through USB1.1 (old platform costs) that makes use of the common microUSB slot. The data transfer speed is not high since 2.0 version isn’t supported. The Mass Storage is supported as usual with the ASUS smartphones – it can be selected from the corresponding menu.

The wireless communication of P750 is represented by the Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR (Enhanced Data Rate) module and Wi-Fi. Both work quite well and give raise to no reprimands. AD2P enjoys a perfect support - the sound volume is higher than average, its quality is almost ideal, the communication is never interrupted. It's a pity though that should the connection be lost, the sound doesn't stop automatically, the built-in speaker is instantly activated – the same disadvantage is with Symbian-smartphones. In addition to AD2P, the following profiles are supported:

• File Transfer
• Generic Access
• Generic Object Exchange
• Handsfree
• Headset
• HID
• Object Push
• Personal Area Networking
• Serial Port
• Audio/Video Remote Control
• SAP (SIM card access profile)

Document printing is also possible. There's also the Bluetooth synchronization, you just need to:

1. Install the Windows Mobile Media Control Centre or ActiveSync software to your PC.
2. On the PDA side, run - Start > Programs > ActiveSync.
3. Activate Bluetooth both on the PC and the PDA, than engage the visible mode.
4. On the PDA side, run - Menu > Connection > Bluetooth.
5. On the first run, start the Bluetooth Configuration Wizard.

No support for such features is provided in the Wi-Fi mode due to security reasons, though it was possible in earlier versions of AKU (as early as WM5).

Wireless Manager is rather standard, the five items are available. The first one deactivates all the communication modules and the next ones handles accordingly Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Phone and Data. The solution is typical except for the built in Task Manager which deactivates Phone, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi on the schedule. The Phone module activation is also possible at a definite time.

«The navigating aspect of ASUS P750 is based off the SiRFstarIII chipset; the GPS module gives a good account of itself. »

The GPS support is well done for P750, this aspect of the PDA phone is based off the SiRFstarIII chipset, that proves itself slightly better than Qualcomm 7200 with HTC, for example. The device was able to detect some seven-eight satellites on a clear day, which is quite in keeping with Mio. The latter, let’s remind, ranks among the leading suppliers of the navigation equipment in the world. As for the preinstalled software, it is remarkable for a number of GPS-utilities:

• Location Courier for an emergency message with your current coordinates to be sent to numbers (up to 5) specified in advance so that they could locate you.
• GPS Catcher for GPS-data updating once in three days that serves for launching the navigation process on-the-fly. The update protection via ActiveSync is available.
• Travelog for your route management. The application allows for getting standard data like speed, height above sea-level, etc. Basic processing of route points (notes, photos) and a compass are available.

Memory

Many people felt disappointment at only 64 Mb of RAM with P750, really it‘s not pleasant. On a par with USB1.1 the given circumstance is sequent of the old hardware platform. The new factory in Shanghai should solve this problem to a certain extent, giving production capabilities for modernization.

The ROM size is quite sufficient for basic functionality - 256 Mb. The memory card slot is the microSD standard, the most universal variant for the time being, the officially announced card capacity maximum is 4 Gb. Unfortunately, no memory card comes bundled, so it has to be purchased separately. As we have already mentioned, it keeps with the full hot swapping support.

Display

One more disappointment concerning P750 is an average diagonal of the screen (2.6”). Besides, it sports only a QVGA resolution of 320x240 despite of the high price status. The screen is powered by the TFT technology. The color depth is 65K colors. The image quality is high, yet the maximum brightness is not as high as one might want (but certainly higher than that with P525). The image dearness is better in comparison with P525, the view angles are much better. The screen info stays quite legible in the sunlight; however the sun-resistance is not ideal.

User interface

The interface design is typical of Windows Mobile phones. Here there is no such firm innovation as TouchFLO with HTC, but at the same time ASUS Launcher is available, let’s dwell on it further. The upper line is used for displaying service indicators like the battery life meter or signal quality as well as the wireless protocols availability, Bluetooth, GPRS/EDGE, 3G, Wi-Fi, the list of launched applications. The lower line contains info about context button functions.

The main part of the desktop can be varied to your liking. By default it shows current day, the service provider info, the owner personal data, messaging stats, the tasklist and schedule, and the indicator area (battery charge, display angle, wireless module manager and backlighting level). The user can customize the order in which these fields follow or remove some of them from the screen completely. Today Desktop can feature a custom picture or a photo.

There are two kinds of menus in this phone: the quick access menu and the main menu. The former is activated on pressing the Start button and essentially is a vertical list that contains 7 items, info about the 5 recently launched applications as well as grants access to the main menu and settings. The main menu is a list of applications very much similar to a regular Windows-styled window with icons and application names below them. A maximum of 12 icons per screen is allowed.

Besides there is a firmware shell ASUS Launcher employed for starting applications. It has been available already with P526 that is why it is not a novelty, but this launcher is really functional and not just nice like many others. As a matter of fact, it is called upon to replace the habitual WM interface with a more PDA-suitable one, in many respects it reminds of Nokia smartphones. The extended functionality and customization are offered, the navigation comes in handy. It’s a doubtlessly pleasant point with P750.

Habitually for ASUS, the model makes use of a status monitoring of the primary parameters through the icon on the Today screen which offers short stats. It’s a useful thing too.

There is also a simple task manager that allows to switch between the running applications.

Preinstalled software package

The following applications are either preinstalled on ASUS P750 or come bundled on a disk...

The Office Mobile software packet includes:

• Excel Mobile for creating, viewing and editing Excel files
• PowerPoint Mobile for playing PowerPoint files
• Word Mobile for creating, viewing and editing Word files

The Personal Manager Utilities include:

• A calendar for scheduling events.
• A list of current tasks.
• A contacts application that helps you to store the contact info of your colleagues and friends.
• A notebook for storing hand-written or typed reminders, pictures and voice records.
• Ur Time for advanced management of time
• Backup for making archived backups of your data
• World Card Mobile for handling visit cards
• Newstation for viewing RSS-tape news
• Meeting Time Planner for planning meetings
• Remote Presenter for managing presentations via Bluetooth

The Multimedia Utility package includes:

• An application for photo and video files management
• A voice recorder/player that also lets your records be sent by e-mail, MMS and misc protocols (Bluetooth etc.)
• A voice dialing application that lets you record voice tags for quick dialing and program launching.
• Windows Live, Messenger
• Windows Media Player Mobile for playing audio and video files.
• A streaming multimedia player for watching streaming video in real-time mode or on demand.
• Two preinstalled games: Bubble Breaker and Solitaire.
• A camera application for taking pictures and shooting video clips.

The internet utilities include:

• Internet Explorer Mobile is the Web and WAP browser that also allows downloading files from the Internet.
• An internet connection manager for connecting to the Web.

The communication applications include:

• Wireless Manager for handling GPRS/EDGE, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connections, switching the phone on and off
• ActiveSync for Phone/PC or Phone/Exchange server synchronization.
• A Bluetooth network browser that enables searching for other Bluetooth devices that allow file exchange. Also this application grants access to Bluetooth-shared folders.
• SAP adjustment for remote access via Bluetooth to SIM card.

The GPS software package includes:

• Location Courier for sending an emergency message with your current coordinates.
• GPS Catcher for launching the navigation process on-the-fly.
• Travelog for managing your route and getting standard GPS data.

The phone service software package includes:

• Phone communicator - calls, switching between active calls and desktop conference capabilities.
• Messaging manager for sending and receiving e-mail, MMS and SMS messages.
• SIM card manager for managing contacts stored on the USIM/SIM card.
• Call Filter for blocking undesirable contacts.
• Profile for managing sound profiles.

Miscellaneous applications include:

• WorldCard Mobile for handling visit cards and export of corresponding data to the contacts book.
• Calculator for handling the basic math functions.
• Explorer is a file manager.
• Java runtime package for launching Java applications
• ASUS Launcher - a firmware shell for launching programs
• Mode Switcher for managing applications
• ASUS Status monitoring
• Auto Cleaner for unloading applications from the PDA memory depending on the duration of the X keystroke

As we see, quite a few PIM-applications have been added to the traditional Windows Mobile software packet with P750, that’s why the slogan of this model “Guide your business with GPS navigation” sounds quite right.

Settings

The Personal Tab
Buttons, Voice Speed Dial, Input, Lock, Menus, Owner Information, Phone, Profile, Ring tones, Sounds and Notifications, Today, Video Call Setting, Wakeup source

The System Tab
About, ASUS status, Audio, Auto Cleaner, Backlight, Brightness, Certificates, Clock & Alarms, CPU mode, Backup, Memory, Encryption, Switch mode, Power, Regional settings, Remove programs, Scren, System information, Windows update

Connections Tab
Beam, Bluetooth, Connections, GSM/3G networks, Network setting, USB setting, Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi manager, Wireless Manager

Call service

Conversations are in charge of the Phone application, which can be activated either by pressing the Call Button or by activating the corresponding menu item in the Start menu. The main screen of the Phone application hosts three tabs - Calls, Quick Dial and Contacts.

ASUS P750 stores contacts within the Contacts application. The SIM-card stored contacts share the same list with the user-memory stored contacts. A SIM-stored contact can be transferred to user memory and vice versa. The PDA phone supports three types of contacts:

MS Outlook contacts can either be created directly on the PDA phone or synchronized with a PC or an Exchange Server contacts database. Each contact stores a few phone numbers, e-mail addresses, instant messaging contacts, home and work addresses and misc info like post, date of birth, etc. Each Outlook contact can be associated with a unique picture and ringtone.

USIM/SIM card contacts. Any of those can only store a name and a phone number.

Windows Live Contacts are used by the Windows Live Messenger (MSN). Likewise the Outlook contacts, Windows Live contacts can contain detailed data about the person.

Only one telephone number is allowed per USIM/SIM-card stored contact. If you copy a user memory contact to SIM/USIM, the SIM Card Manager program splits any multiple phone numbers associated with a single contact into separate contact records for the USIM/SIM card memory. A special suffix is added automatically to the names of such duplicate contacts to tell between them (by default "/M" stands for Mobile, "/W" for Work and "/H" for Home).

To make a phone call, you can equally use the Phone application, the Contacts book, the Quick Dial or the Calls menu as well as the SIM card manager. Traditionally there's support for Smart Dialing which makes dialing easier than before. Once you input the initial symbols of the phone number or the person's name, the phone filters all the contacts automatically to fit the search criteria. This sorting works automatically for contacts stored both in user memory and on the SIM card and is applicable to the contacts book and the call log. This saves a bit of time while searching for some person's name in the phonebook. By default, the call log displays information about all calls but it's customizable to filter missed, outgoing and incoming calls only, sorting by name is also present. Besides the name and the number each record in the log stores the time, the date and one call or all calls length.

The only limit to the size of the contact book is the volume of free user memory. Up to 12 phone numbers of different types of phone numbers, 3 e-mail addresses, home and work address, web page address and a plenty of other details like Assistant's Phone Number can be associated with every contact. It goes without saying that each contact can enjoy its own ringtone and picture as well as belong to one of the customizable user groups.

The profile management item (not always included in WM) is available in the settings. There is the ringtone management as well. Let’s note the most useful addition to the traditional Windows Mobile software packet – the Call Filter application. As we have already mentioned, it allows blocking undesired contacts. The feature is a basic one; however its availability is pleasant.

Messaging

Traditionally the Messaging application is used for composing, viewing and sending SMS and MMS messages as well as e-mail messages. Once you get a new message, the Today screen displays a special reminder symbol. You can sort your messages in a number of ways, for example you can sort your e-mail messages by topic.

An incoming message is indicated by a pop-up window regardless of the menu the user is currently browsing through. The message can be instantly opened, deleted or ignored. That stands to reason that all the messages are stored within the same folder, at the same time shown in a tree-like structure allowing for easier navigation. We viewed the text input with the help of keyboard above, there is no problem when using MioKeyboard, everything is highly convenient.

E-mail can be set to be delivered automatically (you specify the interval before each message is received or sent automatically). Sorting by date is possible. You can activate simultaneous sending and receiving of mail, set a mailing schedule when roaming abroad and sort incoming messages by size prior to downloading them to the phone.

If you use a Microsoft Exchange 2007 server the message will be delivered instantly and not on the next synchronization. Full HTML support is present. If the message contains several attachments, all of them are downloaded, but you can activate delayed downloading mode. You can use hot key combinations for quick access to the messaging functions like Reply, Forward, etc.

An able security system is in its place. For example, in ActiveSync any outgoing message can be digitally signed and encrypted automatically prior to sending, an IRM (Information Rights Management) capability allows you to limit access to messages in the way you like.

PIM

The Calendar application is used for planning events and meetings, this day's schedule can be displayed on the Today screen. If your PC has a copy of Outlook installed on it, you can synchronize the schedules. Reminders can be set in the form of sound signals or screen flickers. There is also the firmware application serving the same purposes.

The Calendar can also be used for arranging meetings via e-mail with the users of Outlook or Outlook Mobile. If the recipient accepts the proposition, the meeting is automatically added to their schedule. When the person affirms to participate, your schedule is automatically updated with an acknowledgement. The Windows Mobile platform has long been known for its strong points in the corporate sphere.

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The standard vCalendar file format is supported for exchanging information about scheduled events; the corresponding files can be exported to the PC version of Outlook.

The Tasks application is used for scheduling events which can either be set to be one-time or recurring. You can set up reminders and sort them by categories. There's a tasklist which automatically highlights in red expired tasks. You can set a reminder that will be automatically activated on every occasion when open your schedule to add a new event.

The Notebook helps you to store quick notes. You can input the text from the keyboard, put it down in handwriting or use voice-to-text processing as well as convert handwritten notes into text files or send your notes to other people. If a letter crosses more than three marking lines, it's processed as an image, otherwise - as text. To select an image for further removal or copying just hold you stylus pressed to the screen where the image is for a few moments.

Office Mobile comprises three applications used to view and edit Microsoft Office documents - Word Mobile (viewing and editing of *.doc, *.rtf, *.txt and *.dot files), Excel Mobile (viewing and editing of *.xls files), PowerPoint Mobile (playing *.ppt and *.pps files).

Explorer is a basic file manager that serves for browsing media folders. Also a .zip archiver is included as well. A back-up functionality is provided by the Sprite Backup software.

Of a list of the ASUS firmware packet we’d like to especially mark the Ur Time application. As a matter of fact, it’s the habitual world time feature, but a praiseworthy one taking into account that it’s a preinstalled application. The status indicators can be carried out to the Today screen, the developed system of reminders is also pleasant. Unfortunately, the latter is not bound to the common WM one, which is not always convenient.

Newstation is another useful PIM-application. It’s a simple RSS-reader that will come in handy for businessmen. It’s not necessary to keep track of your own channels, the phone will download a ready database on its own.

A back-up functionality is provided by the Backup software and Remote Presenter is employed for managing presentations via Bluetooth as well as Meeting Time Planner for planning meetings. These applications are simple enough; that’s why we won’t dwell on them.

MySecrets is used for safe data storage and Remote Presenter allows for managing presentations via Bluetooth.

Multimedia

ASUS P750 is compatible with the following graphic file formats: *.bmp, *.jpg, *.gif, *.png. A simple Photo and Video Manager is preinstalled to help the user make simple changes to the files, like rotation or trimming.

It does better at handling audio and video files:

Windows Media Video	.wmv, .asf	Windows Media Audio	.wma
MPEG4 простой профиль	.mp4	MP3	.mp3
H.263	.3gp, .3g2	MIDI	.mid
H.264	.mp4, .3gp, .3g2, .m4v	AMR, narrowband	.amr
Motion JPEG	.avi	AMR, wideband	.awb
		AAC	.m4a, .aac

The selected media file can be sent by e-mail, transferred to another devices, played as a slide show, sent to a person through the Windows Live MySpace network and so on.

The preinstalled Windows Media Player Mobile allows for executing video and audio records, both local and networks playback is possible. The three main display windows are:

Playback control keys (Play, Pause, Next, Previous and Volume) and the video window.

The playlist.

The media library that stores playlists as well.

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Streaming Multimedia allows for 3GP and MP4 files to be played. It also handles SDP (or Session Description Protocol) files. In addition to that, Internet Explorer can be used to open web-pages that employ RTSP-links (or Real Time Streaming Protocol) and host streaming media content.The voice recorder serves, quite expectedly, for talk recording. The records can be further sent via MMS or e-mail, or transferred through a wireless connection. Recorded fragments can also be used as ringtones. The records are stored in the AMR-NB (Adaptive Multi-Rate Narrowband) format. The Voice Commander feature is in its place.

Camera

P750 doesn't have a protective cover for the camera, so it's highly advised to use the camera as carefully as possible - the grease that sticks to the lens is able to cause serious photo quality degradation. No flashlight is present as well as there's no mirror for self shooting. The shooting aspect is horizontal; a large touchscreen is used for controls and settings. The button is two-positioned; the exponometer settings are very flexible. The phone is able of taking pictures at resolutions up to 2048x1536 and shoot video clips at resolutions up to 176х144. A 4x digital zoom is available. The view-finder works rather quickly, the inertness is moderate.

The focusing doesn’t give rise to unfavourable criticism either, though the macro mode could be worked over better. The image saving speed is low, that’s why it often turns out, that the seemingly acquired material is smeared. The quality of ready material is above the average (it concerns taking photos since the quality of video with P750 is evidently weak to today's measure), but it is far from the ideal.