The Motorola A1200 is a smartphone of enormous proportions. Not only does the device offer a design that is nice to look at, it offers alot of different types of functionality, An ultra fast Linux Operating system, and the ability to navigate in many different ways.



Design



The Front of the A1200 is sheltered by the devices flip panel, however unlike normal protective covers, the A1200 uses a see through design that can be accessed by turning the screen on using the devices side buttons.



Flipping the casing up reveals only three buttons, on the left side of the device is the Green send button, follow by a Dpad with a joystick type control that can also be pushed in to select the program the user would like to open. Finally on the right side of the Dpad there is an end button. Why the simple configuration? Simply put, the phone relies on a touch screen that measures 2.4 inchs and takes up a good amount of realty space on the front of the device.



The left side of the phone features Volume/Navigation Up and down keys, and between them a Select/Ok key. While the bottom left side features a 2.5mm headset jack for wired headset audio.



The right side of the Motorola A1200 on the other hand features a Camera Button at the top right, followed directly below by a Voice Recorder/Voice Activation key. While the bottom right features a Mini USB port for Data sync purposes and for charging the device.



The Bottom of the device is bare, with the sim card loading behind the battery, follow by an empty top side (The power is turned off by holding down the red end key on the front of the phone (That's something you don't really see alot anymore).



Finally the backside of the A1200 houses the devices 2.0 megapixel camera, no flash is present on this particular device. Behind the battery a MicroSD card slot can also be found, I just wish like most new devices however that this feature would have had a dedicated slot on the outside of the phone to make removing the card easier.

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Features



The main feature aside from the see through flip component is the Operating system, the Linux based system on the Motorola A1200 moves along extremely fast for a processor that is pushing out just over 300mhz. The menus are extremely easy to navigate on the OS, I personally preferred using the many shortcuts found on the main screen (11 shortcuts all together if you include the "Meetings" screen).



The phone also features a strong voice commander, making easy calls when choosing to voice dial rather than use the onboard dialpad, which I will admit was still easy to use, thanks in large part to the precise responsiveness of the devices touchscreen, it by far has one of the best touch functions I have used to date.



Messaging



The Motorola A1200 allows for MMS and SMS messaging, and send text and pictures with no problem whatsoever. If Email is more up your area, the phone also supports POP3, IMAP4, and SMTP, and offers support with those functions for PDF, Word, Excel and Powerpoint applications, almost as well as Windows Mobile 6.0 does.



Camera



The 2.0 Mega pixel camera on the device is nothing to write home about, the pictures were grainy, and the lack of a flash made nighttime picture look even worse. The one nice part of the camera on this device however is the ability to alter/edit pictures thanks to an onboard touch screen that allows users to change the picture resolution between 480 x 640 (Small), 320 x 240 (Medium), and 352 x 268 (Large), plus more touch buttons for Color selection (Black/White, Sepia, etc), and the ability to change over to Video mode from the camera mode, and the option to choose Direct Sun mode, Incandescent, and much more. You can also tweak your brightness before taking a picture and choose the mode you shoot in, such as Panoroma, I'm not an expert camera man with cell phones, and some shots did come out better than others, so tweaking those features may come in handy and produce stronger pictures than I was able to capture, but a flash still would have been nice



Audio



The phones audio supports the following formats: MP3, WAV, AMR, WMA, AAC+ which have become pretty standard on mobile devices, I found the audio to work well with no real background interference, and while video may not have the best playback on the device, the audio from videos was also easy to hear, I tested the device with the included headset and a Motorola S9 and both worked well. I didn't test the device with a non-Motorola A2DP headset, so that may be something you want to consider since a Motorola Device should be expected to work well with a Motorola accessory. Overall the Audio was crisp, easy to access, and worked in an excellent manner



Internet



The browser on the A1200 supports WAP 2.0, WML, xHTML, HTML, and to be honest it was a hassle to get working, but after going over my settings a few times I was able to connect, and I found the Edge/GPRS network on Cingular and T-Mobile to be well handled by the device, Internet pages opened fairly quickly and the phones display made viewing pages easy, other than that, there really isn't alot to say about my internet experience with the device.



Connectivity



The device offers Bluetooth 2.0 with Enhanced Data Rate (EDR) which allows for faster data sync capabilities, throw in A2DP and the device proves why it works well as a Music capable device. Users can also transfer information through the phones Data sync cable (Provided with the phone) and their PC for quick connection. With Bluetooth 2.0 users can connect up to 6 devices at one time.



The device offers Quad-Band connectivity (850/900/1800/1900) which means it will work in the United States on AT&T/Cingular and T-Mobile, and in Canada on Fido and Rogers.



Conclusion



The phone I currently use for personal use is the Motorola A1200, I think that speaks volumes for the device, in terms of Unlocked GSM devices its priced moderately, offers a nice alternative to a Windows Mobile device, and comes in a unique design that made many of my friends want one. If you are looking for a compact device that offers full functionability I would highly recommend the Motorola A1200, if you want to add to that package, use the Model I reviewed the Motorola A1200 with Red color, it just simply looks nicer than the Grey version of the same phone.

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