Hands on: ZTE Racer review
Posted by | Posted in Smartphones News | Posted on 15-07-2010
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The ZTE Racer was officially launched on Three today, and TechRadar was there to check it out and see if it’s worth the £99.99 price tag.
While we’ve all been going gaga for the high end smartphones, like the top 20 best mobile phone-topping HTC Desire, iPhone 4 and Samsung Galaxy S, there’s still a huge clamour for all the smartphone power at a lower price point.
That’s where the ZTE Racer comes in – but like so many before it, smartphones and low price tags aren’t always the best of bedfellows (T-Mobile Pulse Mini, we’re looking at you).
The ZTE Racer is a light handset and has a slight look of a budget phone about it. The plastic casing and lightweight feel don’t make it feel any more premium, and any mobile with a resistive screen is always cause for concern.
However, while ZTE is keen for the Racer to be seen as a package and not based on specs, it holds its own in that department too: a 3.5mm headphone jack and 3.2MP camera are both welcome additions at this price point.
ZTE Racer: Design
But it’s when you pick up the ZTE Racer for the first time you realise it’s actually not a bad device at all – certainly not as slow as other budget Android phones.
ZTE won’t tell us what processor it’s packing, but whichever one it is, it makes things swish and swoop around the screen with very little slowdown.
The interface is vanilla Android 2.1, much like that seen on the Google Nexus One – we were pleased to see a slight 3D effect on the menu screen for instance.
The camera wasn’t too bad either, as you can see in the picture we took using the device – sure, we don’t think Nikon is quaking in its boots, but for a bit of light photography it’s good enough.
The shutter speed was quite laggy – but we’ve come to expect that kind of thing at a phone at this price point, and there do have to be sacrifices somewhere along the way.
ZTE Racer: Screen
The resistive screen is such a place where the cost savings are apparent, and although for the most part it performs well with only a little bit more pressure needed to use it, things like messaging suffer.
We found ourselves making a lot of mistakes trying to type a simple message, and often it would hit another letter altogether. It’s a system you very much have to get used to, but it might be a hurdle for some looking to pick up ‘my first touchscreen’.
We didn’t get a chance to fully put the ZTE Racer through it’s paces when we had a few minutes to play with it, so we’re not sure how that screen performs on the internet or how good the media player is.
But with a 2GB microSD card and a half-decent camera, if this is your first port of call in the Android seas then it seems you probably could do a lot worse.
Available for £99.99 on pay as you go and from £15 per month on contract, trot on over to Three to see if this is the handset for you.
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