Samsung Ace Cell Phone Review - Messaging
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Alfredo Padilla Published on April 29, 2008 Comment on this |
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Summary
The Ace is a capable messaging device but we found the email client was a little slow to load. We also don't like that MMS support has been removed from the device. Those working in an Exchange Server environment will enjoy the Ace's excellent integration with that platform. |
Supported Email Services (8.0)
As a Windows Mobile Standard devices the Samsung Ace supports most email protocols including POP3 and IMAP4. The built in email client will also help you set up accounts from popular services like Gmail, AOL and Yahoo without dealing with messy stuff like server addresses. One bonus of a Windows Mobile device is that the platform also has native support for Hotmail email addresses.
Push Email (3.0)
The Samsung Ace supports push email via Microsoft's Exchange server using ActiveSync. This is native support for Microsoft's email standard and allows you to receive your email in real time, just like a BlackBerry. Unfortunately if you are using a BlackBerry server at your company the Ace won't be able to support it out of the box, but you should be able to find a client that you can install to add this support.
Multiple Email Accounts (10.0)
The Samsung Ace supports up to six different email accounts, we max out our points at five so the Ace will get maximum points here. This is a great feature for those who need to manage multiple accounts on their device. It should be noted, however, that only one of those can be an Exchange account.
HTML and Attachments (11.0)
One of the upgrades that came along with Windows Mobile 6 is support for HTML email, allowing you to view rich email messages on devices like the Samsung Ace. The support for attachments, however, was a disappointment. We were amazed to discover that unlike every other Windows Mobile 6 device we've seen the Ace does not include Microsoft's mobile Office suite. Samsung and Sprint have included a file viewer that will allow you to look at Word, Excel, Powerpoint and PDF documents, but you won't be able to edit them. We'll rant about this more in the software section, but you can bet we're not happy about this.
Email Customizations (2.0)
Like other Windows Mobile devices we've seen the email customization options are not particularly impressive. You can't change the font size, type or color for either display or composition. You also can't change the height of emails shown in the inbox. About the only thing you can do is add a signature to outgoing emails, albeit this implementation is very good with the ability to have different signatures for each account and the ability to control whether it is added to replies and forwards.
Time to a New Email Message (2.60)
The Samsung Ace is not very impressive when it comes to email speed. It took us an average of 7.68 seconds to get a new email dialogue on the screen.
As you can see below this is way below average and significantly slower than any of our comparison phones. Even when we did the trial with the email software already running in the background it still took four seconds, not a particularly impressive time. This should give anyone who wants to use the Ace as their primary email device some pause, you're going to have to put up with some slowness, especially compared to a BlackBerry. For more information on how we conduct this test see this article.
Email Usability (7.0)
We've been fans of the Windows Mobile email interface as the Blackjack II does nothing to change our minds. When you first launch the messaging program you are show a list of available accounts, including SMS. Once in an account you are taken to the inbox where you see the list of messages. You can easily move up and down the list with the D-Pad or the Scroll Wheel. Switching to another account is as easy as going left/right on the D-Pad, one of our favorite features. The right soft key opens a menu to access a variety of functions while the left soft key is assigned to delete messages.
When composing a new message you are shown the To and Subject lines with space for the body below. We like that Cc and Bcc fields are cleverly placed above the To field, so you just have to scroll up to access them. We also like the support for auto completion, so matching email addresses and contacts pop up as you enter an address or name in any field. There are a couple of problems, however. Deleting multiple emails is a chore as you can't select more than one and the folder structure is a pain to get to. Other than that the interface is solid.
Instant Messaging (0.0)
The Samsung Ace lacks any instant messaging software out of the box, not even the standard Windows Live messenger that is included on most Windows Mobile devices. You can, of course, go out and download a wide variety of different IM clients for your device, we recommend you avoid Sprint's client however as they will charge you a text message for every instant message sent or received.
MMS Support (0.0)
In what seems to be an unfortunate trend for Sprint's Windows Mobile devices the Samsung Ace lacks support for MMS, just like the HTC Touch. Windows Mobile devices are certainly capable of MMS messaging so there's no reason we can see why this feature should be removed. We've railed against the iPhone's lack of this feature and we don't understand why Sprint would follow suit and disable this feature on their smart devices. There are workarounds for sending photos and short videos to other phones using your email client, but these are kludgy and you have to know what carrier your recipient is on.
SMS Smiley Face Interpretation (0.0)
The Samsung Ace does not display smiley faces graphically and there's no easy way to insert smiley faces either.
SMS/MMS Ease of Use (7.0)
The SMS interface on the Samsung Ace is very similar to the email interface, not surprising as SMS is built into the email client. This means we generally like it with some reservations like the difficulty to access folder structures and delete multiple messages. When creating a new SMS there is a handy counter so you can see how many characters you've used and how many messages will need to be sent. We also wish that the Ace supported threaded SMS, although this may come with an update to Windows Mobile 6.1 in the near future we can't be sure.
Time to a New SMS Message (1.58)
As with email we were not impressed at how long it took to get a new text message dialogue on the screen with the Ace. 6.32 seconds is way longer than average for cell phones and the worst time by a long shot amongst our comparison phones. Once again you can cut down the time by leaving the messaging application running in the background, something you would probably do anyways, and this makes it a much more reasonable 3.4 seconds, still not great but not horrendous either. You can also get to a new SMS dialogue by pressing and holding on the messaging button found in the lower left of the QWERTY keyboard, but this actually takes half a second longer than navigating through the menus. For more information on how we conduct this test see this article.
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