Eten V900 Review

Introduction:

Watching TV on a phone is nothing new, but lately, we’ve been witnessing a development in this aspect and the market now offers devices, capable of receiving free digital TV (DVB-T) and radio (DAB). Eten V900 is one of those, but the interesting thing here is that it is the first such phone from the Taiwanese company and the second in the World running on Windows Mobile Professional after GSmart t600.

The package includes:

• Eten V900
• Leather pouch
• USB cable
• TV-out cable
• Charger
• Stereo headphones/handsfree
• 2 additional sets of earplugs
• Spare stylus
• User’s Manual
• Software CD

The leather pouch that traditionally comes with all Eten phones is slightly different this time. Now, you don’t need to pull the phone out of it in order to make/reject a call and it is actually used as a holder when watching TV. To save time in putting it together however, we recommend reading the guide of the pouch.



Design:

Similarly to the latest phones of the manufacturer, V900 has a new modern appearance, which makes it attractive to a wider audience. Its shiny front and finger-friendly glass kind of reminds us of HTC Touch. Holding the V900 in your hand will make you feel good but its 147 grams will remind you of its presence at all times.




You can compare the Eten V900 with many other phones using our Size Visualization Tool.

One of the key elements for watching digital TV is the good display. Here you have a 2.8” TFT touch screen with VGA resolution and 65k colors. It has a good image and saturation but everything fades away in direct sunlight and is very annoying if you have to look at the screen for a longer period of time.

Besides the touch screen, you have SEND, END keys and a joystick, which let you take control of the phone. The last one is very soft to press and sometimes you won’t even be sure if you’ve activated it successfully. It will take some time, but you’ll get used to it.



On the left, you’ll find the volume controls and the voice command keys and the opposite side houses the power one, the reset button and the camera shutter. The microSD slot is also here, but it’s hidden under a lid. We had no trouble with the side keys although some of them are not protruding enough.

The bottom accommodates the 2.5 mm jack and miniUSB slot, accompanied by the stylus and the antenna at both ends. In contrast to GSmart t600 where you had to remove the stylus in order to install the antenna, the solution in V900 is much better and you only have to be careful not to pull it out when stretching it.

Software:

V900 runs on the Windows Mobile Professional 6.1 OS, which in previous models of the manufacturer (e.g. X600, X800) was personalized with the SBP Shell software. In our case, it’s the fullest and latest version which brings essential changes.

The device has the same old Windows Mobile homescreen, but from the settings menu you can set the modified SPB Shell one as default. Unfortunately when you hit the end call button on the keypad you are brought back to the well known WM.

The new interface definitely looks good and features large buttons making it easy to use with fingers. On top of the screen is a small status bar, showing the battery indicator, carrier name, network reception indicator and other connectivity icons (Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and EDGE). Below it are a weather icon (shows the meteorological conditions in you region), e-mail with number of unread ones bellow it, messages, missed calls and last is the volume icon, which acts as a shortcut for accessing the phone’s profiles.



The homescreen’s second element is the Clock with displayed date and day of the week. When click on it you are greeted with another personalized screen which shows a countdown to the next alarm and current time in three cities. There is also a big calendar that takes half of the display’s real estate, but if you have upcoming appointments for the next seven days or alarms it is reduced in size and displays them below the clock and alarms.

On the bottom of the screen are four shortcuts. The first one is a homescreen button, the second one brings you to a personalized main menu. In the top there’s a bar with the last 12 applications used, which you can “pin” and create a mini shortcut menu. Below is your software combined in six categories (Organizer, Internet, Multimedia, Tools, Programs and Settings). The cool part about the menu is that the personalization is also present deeper in thesubmenus. For example, when you click on organizer and then choose notes, instead of opening the classic WM notes application it opens a menu with the available options (new note, show notes). The third tab shows fifteen of your favorite people and gives you access to the phonebook and the last is just an exit button which brings you out of the SPB Shell and back to the plain WM environment.



All of the various animated transitions in the SPB shell menu are good looking and run smoothly without any delays. You can also switch between the tabs by swiping you finger horizontally on the screen and looks like changing a page on a book, which can be changed from the settings menu in SPB Shell.

The only other customization is found in the phonebook. It allows for easier usage with fingers and contains a big sized numeric keypad. When you click on its buttons it automatically searches for matches in the contacts list. For browsing the web the manufacturer has provided the outdated Internet Explorer, which cannot handle most modern pages, as we’ve mentioned in previous reviews. This is unfortunate and we recommend installing Opera or Skyfire instead, so you can take full advantage of the global 3G support.

Multimedia:

The 3.2-megapixel camera with LED flash and a tiny mirror are located on the back of the phone. The interface takes about 4 seconds to start, two more for focusing and extra 3 seconds for storing. These speeds are actually, good for a WM phone. Unfortunately, the interface disappointed us because the icons on the screen are too small and we can’t complain only about the settings menu here.


The pictures made outdoors are dark and the colors are not saturated enough. The detail level is average and there’s noise when the images are viewed on a large screen. It’s almost the same story indoors, and the flash is too weak and not very handy. The videos are disappointing as well with large artifacts and 6-9 fps, which makes them choppy.



The standard for this OS Windows Media Player is what the manufacturer provides for media playback. The sound from both the loudspeaker and the headphones is loud and with decent quality and there’s good noise insulation for the latter.

Eten V900 is equipped with an FM Radio, which can operate without plugging in the handsfree. This is possible thanks to the built in antenna. This could be a big plus if you are not used to wearing your headset or if you’ve simply forgotten it.

Playing H263 and H264 videos is not a problem. What is interesting though is that we managed to open DivX files. We were slightly disappointed to see that the VGA videos were choppy and the sound didn’t correspond to the picture.


On top of that, the V900 has an integrated FM transmitter, which enables you to broadcast music from your phone to your car stereo for example. However, it is more complicated than it sounds. You first have to play a track and then start broadcasting. The transmitter is deactivated every time you change the song, which basically makes it useless.

Digital TV:

As we’ve mentioned, V900 is the first Eten with DVB-T (Digital Video Broadcasting – Terrestrial) support and the second such WM smartphone in the world after GSmart t600. In contrast to DVB-H, DVB-T is not especially designed for mobile devices, but is the official broadcasting method for digital TV across Europe. This allows you to watch all free channels like you would with a regular TV set. We took a trip to Germany in order to test the feature.


Starting the MobileTV player takes about 6-7 seconds, and then, you need to extend the antenna and search for the channels available. There are multiple preset regions, and if you are not in one of them, you’ll have to search manually. Switching to a channel takes 6-7 seconds as well. The picture quality was good but we felt like it was slightly choppy. This could have been due to the low bitrate (about 20 fps) and didn’t bother us. Even in a moving car you won’t have any trouble with the reception if the speed is up to 50 mph. Above that the image gets really choppy.

The battery brought the next nice surprise. In contrast to GSmart t600, which only provided an hour of TV, Eten V900 gave us 3 whole hours of entertainment. That’s a very good result, and it will enable the user to watch an entire movie and not only part of it.

GPS:

The built-in GPS has a SirfStar III chipset, which is one of the best on the market. The phone is equipped with the standard for the brand Satellite Data Update, which helps achieve faster localization, by downloading information about the last satellite position. There is no navigation software preloaded and you’ll have to either buy such or use a free one like Google Maps.

A cold start on a cloudy day took 4 minutes to get our position. If the weather is nice the process is no longer than 1 minute. At 4 seconds, the hot start is almost instantaneous. These are normal values for the chipset and we have no complaints like with M810.

Performance:

The 533 MHz Samsung processor, 128 RAM and 256 ROM, enable Eten V900 to work quite fast for a Windows Mobile phone, despite the results we got with SPB Benchmark.

We have to express our discontent with the sound quality during a talk. You will hear a loud and real voice, sharp at times but still understandable. At the other end of the line the sound is still loud but very sharp and accompanied by an unpleasant echo. These are serious drawbacks, because V900 is a phone after all and we are very disappointed.

As we’ve already mentioned, the battery is good for up to 3 hours of TV, which deserves a praise. Without using this feature and an hour of talking plus 1 hour of WiFi daily, you’ll have to recharge the phone in every 2-3 days.

Conclusion:

The fresh design of Eten V900 definitely makes it an object of desire for quite a large audience and in combination with the new UI and the DVB-T support, its chances for survival on the market are quite high. Its biggest drawback is the low quality during a talk, but if you are in the market for a fast WM smartphone with good multimedia functionality and digital TV capabilities, V900 is what you are looking for. GSmart t600 is probably the only alternative on the market so far, but the poor battery life it offers makes it a less attractive buy.