An updated version of the tablet phone with improved characteristics and high autonomy

Smartphones manufactured by Acer are rarely visitors to our test laboratory. This is partly due to the fact that the manufacturer itself is rather slowly updating its model ranges. Towards the end of last year, during the autumn IFA exhibition in Berlin, the company presented several new mobile products at once; they are gradually appearing on sale in Russian official retail. Today, perhaps the most interesting model was chosen for testing, not from the top, but from the middle class, more affordable. The smartphone called Acer Liquid Z630S, as the name implies, is an advanced version of the regular Acer Liquid Z630 model, and besides, it is the most interesting of all the other new “Z” in terms of the combination of features and cost.

Main characteristics of Acer Liquid Z630S

• SoC MediaTek MT6753, 8 cores ARM Cortex-A53 @1.3 GHz
• GPU Mali-T720, 3 cores @450 MHz
• Operating system Android 5.1
• Touch display IPS 5.5″, 1280×720, 267 ppi
• Random access memory (RAM) 3 GB, internal memory 32 GB
• Micro-SIM support (2 pcs.)
• MicroSD support up to 64 GB
• GSM/GPRS/EDGE networks (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
• WCDMA/HSPA+ networks (900/1900/2100 MHz)
• FDD-LTE Cat.4 networks (800/1800/2100/2600 MHz)
• Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n
• Bluetooth 4.0 A2DP
• GPS, A-GPS, Glonass
• USB 2.0, OTG
• Camera 8 MP, autofocus, video 1080p
• Front camera 8 MP, fixed. focus, flash
• Proximity sensor, lighting sensor, accelerometer, magnetic compass
• 4000 mAh removable battery
• Dimensions 167x88x8.9 mm
• Weight 165 g

Appearance and ease of use

Acer Liquid Z630S looks almost no different from its relative, the “regular” Acer Liquid Z630. In fact, here we just added a “golden” color option, in which all metallized elements shine not with chrome, but with gold.

The body of the smartphone has a “classic” structure, like all smartphones a few years ago. The back cover is removable, underneath it are all the card slots and a replaceable battery. The speaker is also located on the rear side.

The device turned out to be quite large and heavy, but due to the strong curves at the corners, due to the sloping sides, as well as the pleasant-to-touch surface of the back cover, the smartphone is comfortably held in the hand. The surfaces are not easily soiled or slippery, there are no fingerprints left on them, and the lid sits securely on its latches.

There are no cracks, creaks or bends; the body of the Acer Liquid Z630S is quite practical, although its design can be called old-fashioned. There are no glass panels, flat bezels, beautiful grilles above the speakers at the ends, and similar components of the image of a modern fashion smartphone. Our hero does not show off - however, everyone has different tastes, and some like this design even more.

The SIM card slots are located under the cover; both slots are designed for Micro-SIM cards. Here you can also find a slot for memory cards, and, surprisingly, this device was one of the few tested that failed to work with our 128 GB microSD test card, limiting itself to only 64 GB.

When the lid is closed, only the main camera eye, framed by a metal rim, and a single, not too bright LED flash remain visible. A second microphone is also located here - for noise reduction. The camera module partially protrudes beyond the surface, but the smartphone still lies stable on the table and does not wobble when you touch the screen.

On the front panel, covered with a flat protective glass, there is an unusual-looking grille above the speaker, made in the form of a metal “strainer” concave inward. At the top of the screen there is also such a useful element as an LED event indicator, with a small luminous dot notifying you of the battery charging status and missed messages.

The Acer Liquid Z630S does not have touch buttons under the screen, only virtual buttons on the screen. And yet, there is a lot of empty space left at the bottom under the display, which makes the smartphone look rustic and rough.

The mechanical buttons are located on the right side of the case; they are quite large, protrude noticeably beyond the surface, they are easy to feel and comfortable to press. In general, there are no complaints about these controls.

At the ends there are standard connectors as usual. At the bottom you can find a universal Micro-USB connector, which is installed not in the center, but close to the edge of the end. The connector supports connecting external devices in USB OTG mode.

On top you can only find an audio output for headphones with a diameter of 3.5 mm. The smartphone case is not protected from water and dust, there are no plugs on the connectors, and there is no strap mount on the case. This time the manufacturer released two color options: black and gold.

Screen

Acer Liquid Z630S is equipped with an IPS touch display with Zero Air Gap technology. The physical dimensions of the screen are 68x121 mm, diagonal - 5.5 inches, resolution - 1280x720 pixels, pixel density is 267 ppi. The width of the frame around the screen is a considerable 4.5 millimeters on the sides, and in the lower part the indentation reaches 2 centimeters.

The display brightness can be adjusted manually or automatically adjusted based on the ambient light sensor. The AnTuTu test diagnoses support for five simultaneous multi-touch presses. When you bring the smartphone to your ear, the screen is locked using a proximity sensor. The screen can be set to BluelightShield mode, which reduces the intensity of blue light, giving the display a smoky greenish tint. You can activate the screen by drawing characters and letters: for example, call the camera by drawing the letter “C”.

A detailed examination using measuring instruments was carried out by the editor of the “Monitors” and “Projectors and TV” sections Alexey Kudryavtsev. Here is his expert opinion on the screen of the sample under study.

The front surface of the screen is made in the form of a glass plate with a mirror-smooth surface that is scratch-resistant. Judging by the reflection of objects, the anti-glare properties of the screen are no worse than those of the Google Nexus 7 (2013) screen (hereinafter simply Nexus 7). For clarity, here is a photograph in which a white surface is reflected when the screens are turned off (on the left is Nexus 7, on the right is Acer Liquid Z630S, then they can be distinguished by size):

The screen of the Acer Liquid Z630S is slightly darker (brightness according to photographs is 112 versus 114 for the Nexus 7). The ghosting of reflected objects in the Acer Liquid Z630S screen is very weak, this indicates that there is no air gap between the layers of the screen (more specifically, between the outer glass and the surface of the LCD matrix) (OGS - One Glass Solution type screen). Due to the smaller number of boundaries (glass/air type) with very different refractive indices, such screens look better in conditions of strong external illumination, but their repair in the case of cracked external glass is much more expensive, since the entire screen has to be replaced. The outer surface of the screen has a special oleophobic (grease-repellent) coating (about the same effectiveness as the Nexus 7), so fingerprints are removed more easily and appear at a slower rate than with regular glass.

When manually controlling the brightness and displaying the white field in full screen, the maximum brightness value was about 320 cd/m², the minimum was 17 cd/m². The maximum brightness is low, but given the good anti-glare properties, even on a sunny day outdoors you can see something on the screen. In complete darkness, the brightness can be reduced to a comfortable value. There is automatic brightness adjustment based on the light sensor (it is located to the right of the front speaker grille). In automatic mode, as external lighting conditions change, the screen brightness both increases and decreases. The operation of this function depends on the position of the brightness adjustment slider. If it is 100%, then in complete darkness the automatic brightness adjustment function reduces the brightness to 160 cd/m² (very high), in an office illuminated by artificial light (about 400 lux) the brightness rises to 270 cd/m² (also a lot), in in a very bright environment (corresponding to the lighting of a clear day outdoors, but without direct sunlight - 20,000 lux or slightly more) is set to 370 cd/m² (which is slightly higher than with manual adjustment). Brightness slider at 50% - the values ​​are as follows: 27, 115 and 320 cd/m² (good combination), at 0% - 17, 17 and 195 cd/m² (values ​​are underestimated, which is expected). It turns out that the auto-brightness function works adequately, and it is possible to adjust the nature of the brightness change to the user’s requirements. At any brightness level, there is no significant backlight modulation, so there is no screen flicker.

This smartphone uses an IPS matrix. The microphotographs show a typical IPS subpixel structure:

For comparison, you can see the gallery of microphotographs of screens used in mobile technology.

The screen has good viewing angles without a significant color shift even with large deviations of the view from perpendicular to the screen and without inverting (except for the very darkest when deviating along one diagonal) shades. For comparison, here are photographs in which the same images are displayed on the screens of the Acer Liquid Z630S and Nexus 7, while the screen brightness is initially set to approximately 200 cd/m², and the color balance on the camera is forcibly switched to 6500 K. There is a white field perpendicular to the screens:

Note the good uniformity of brightness and color tone of the white field. And a test picture:

The color balance is clearly different; the Acer Liquid Z630S has an overly greenish screen, but the color saturation is normal. Now at an angle of approximately 45 degrees to the plane and to the side of the screen:

It can be seen that the colors have not changed much on both screens, but on the Acer Liquid Z630S the contrast has decreased to a greater extent due to the strong brightening of blacks. And a white field:

The brightness at an angle of the screens has decreased (at least 5 times, based on the difference in shutter speed), but in the case of the Acer Liquid Z630S the brightness is still higher. When deviated diagonally, the black field brightens greatly and acquires a reddish tint or remains approximately neutral gray. The photographs below demonstrate this (the brightness of the white areas in the direction perpendicular to the plane of the screens is the same!):

And from another angle:

When viewed perpendicularly, the uniformity of the black field is poor:

The contrast (approximately in the center of the screen) is high - about 920:1. The response time for the black-white-black transition is 19 ms (9 ms on + 10 ms off). The transition between halftones of gray 25% and 75% (based on the numerical value of the color) and back takes a total of 31 ms. The gamma curve, constructed using 32 points with equal intervals based on the numerical value of the shade of gray, did not reveal any blockage in either the highlights or the shadows. The exponent of the approximating power function is 2.05, which is lower than the standard value of 2.2, while the real gamma curve deviates greatly from the power law:

Due to the presence of dynamic adjustment of the backlight brightness in accordance with the nature of the output image (in dark images, the brightness tends to decrease), the resulting dependence of brightness on hue (gamma curve) does not correspond to the gamma curve of a static image, since the measurements were carried out with sequential output of shades of gray almost the entire screen. For this reason, we carried out a number of tests - determining contrast and response time, comparing black illumination at angles - when displaying special templates with a constant average brightness, and not monochromatic fields in the entire screen. Let us show the dependence of brightness (vertical axis) on time when switching from a black field to a white field in half the screen alternately, while the average brightness of the image itself does not change and remains below the average brightness when the white field is displayed on the entire screen, therefore dynamic adjustment of the backlight brightness underestimates the overall brightness (schedule 50%/50% ). And the same dependence, but with alternate display of fields in full screen (graph 100% ), while the average brightness of the image is already changing and dynamic adjustment when displaying a white field increases (or rather, does not decrease) the brightness of the backlight:

In general, such non-disabled brightness correction does nothing but harm, since it reduces the visibility of gradations in the shadows in the case of dark images. In addition, this dynamic adjustment, when displaying any image other than a white field on the entire screen, significantly reduces the brightness (which is not excessive anyway), which impairs readability in bright light, and besides, constant brightness adjustment can be very annoying.

The color gamut is slightly different from sRGB:

The spectra show that the matrix filters moderately mix the components with each other:

As a result, the colors have more or less natural saturation. The balance of shades on the gray scale is average, since the color temperature is almost equal to the standard 6500 K, but the deviation from the blackbody spectrum (ΔE) is above 10, which is considered a bad indicator even for a consumer device. However, color temperature and ΔE change little from hue to hue - this has a positive effect on the visual assessment of color balance. (The darkest areas of the gray scale can be ignored, since color balance there is not very important, and the error in measuring color characteristics at low brightness is large.)

This device has a now fashionable setting that allows you to reduce the intensity of the blue component. It's called Bluelight Shield.

Let us remind you that there are reasonable assumptions that excessively bright light, especially in the blue region of the spectrum, can suppress the production of melatonin (a hormone that controls a person’s fatigue and need for sleep), which, in turn, can lead to disruption of the circadian rhythm and other unpleasant consequences. However, the illumination at eye level from such “harmful” light should be higher than a certain level, which is unlikely to be achieved when looking at the screen of a small mobile device, especially if it has already been set to a comfortable brightness level. Returning to the Bluelight Shield setting, if you turn it on and move the slider to the right, the intensity of the blue component actually decreases, and the brightness also decreases (from 320 to 70 cd/m² when the backlight brightness is set to maximum), but at the same time ΔE increases and the screen becomes even greener. Unfortunately, the developers did not take care to reduce the intensity of the green component accordingly to maintain balance.

Let's summarize: the screen has a low maximum brightness, but has excellent anti-glare properties, so the device can be used at least somehow outdoors even on a sunny summer day. For conditions of complete darkness, you can set a comfortable brightness level. The mode with automatic brightness adjustment works quite adequately. The advantages of the screen include a good oleophobic coating, the absence of an air gap in the layers of the screen and flicker, as well as a color gamut close to sRGB and an acceptable - when visually assessed - color balance. Significant disadvantages include low black stability due to gaze deviation from perpendicular to the screen plane, poor uniformity of the black field, as well as non-disabled dynamic adjustment of the backlight brightness. However, taking into account the importance of characteristics for this particular class of devices, we can assume that the screen quality is at least above average.

Sound

The smartphone sounds quite loud, and overall the sound can be described as satisfactory. The sound itself is quite clear, but the breadth of the frequency spectrum cannot be praised; there are mainly highs and almost no bass. In the DTS Studio Sound system settings, you can add bass, but the sound becomes duller. You can also select one of the preset equalizer values ​​separately for music and video. In conversational dynamics, the interlocutor's voice, timbre and intonation remain familiar and distinguishable.

The smartphone comes standard with an FM radio, and there is also a voice recorder. The radio can record from the air; it does not work without headphones connected as an external antenna. There is a noise reduction system; it copes with its tasks adequately.

Camera

Acer Liquid Z630S is equipped with two digital camera modules with the same resolution of 8 megapixels. The front module has f/2.4 aperture optics with a fixed focus and does not have its own flash. The shooting quality is quite decent, the device is suitable for taking selfies. Shooting can be done using the hardware volume key on the side of the device.

The main camera has an 8-megapixel sensor and an f/2.0 aperture lens. Autofocus is not too slow, and the flash is quite bright. The shooting control menu here has its own, it is simple in its capabilities, but everything you need is available. In manual settings mode, you can configure all the usual functions (contrast, ISO, white balance); there are also additional modes, for example, photographing food. You cannot transfer control of camera settings to third-party applications using the Camera2 API, and there is also no possibility of recording in RAW.

The camera can shoot video at a maximum resolution of only up to 1080p; there are no 4K or 60 fps modes. The stabilization function is present, but overall it does not help the camera much. The camera copes with video shooting averagely, the image is loose, blurry in places, but at least bright and smooth. At the same time, the camera records sound well: without distortion, quite clearly, and the noise reduction system copes with wind noise.

• Video No. 1 (33 MB, 1920×1080@30 fps, H.264, AAC)
• Video No. 2
• Video No. 3 (29 MB, 1920×1080@30 fps, H.264, AAC)

	The camera does well when shooting indoors.
	Sharpness is generally quite average.
	In medium plans the sharpness is quite good.
	The camera copes with macro photography.
	Good detail in close-ups.
	The text is well done.

Acer Liquid Z630s	Meizu Pro 6

The camera works well in the central part of the frame in close and medium plans, although it does not always succeed in this. Areas of blur appear at the edges of the frame, sometimes significant, and sharpness quickly drops towards distant plans. In a word, the camera can handle documentary shooting quite well, but you shouldn’t expect anything more from it.

Telephone and communications

The smartphone works as standard in modern 2G GSM and 3G WCDMA networks, and also has support for LTE Cat.4 networks in the 800/1800/2100/2600 MHz frequency range. That is, the device can operate in all the most common frequency ranges among domestic operators. In practice, with SIM cards from MTS and Megafon operators, the device confidently registered and worked in LTE networks in the Moscow region. In general, the quality of signal reception from cellular networks is not satisfactory; the device confidently maintains communication indoors and does not lose the signal in areas of poor reception. The noise reduction system copes with its tasks adequately.

The rest of the smartphone's network capabilities are modest: there is no NFC, only one Wi-Fi band is supported (2.4 GHz), there is Wi-Fi Direct, and you can organize a wireless access point via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth 4.0 channels. The Micro-USB 2.0 connector supports connecting external devices in USB OTG mode.

The navigation module works with both GPS (with A-GPS) and the domestic Glonass. There are no special complaints about the operation of the navigation module; the first satellites during a cold start are not detected instantly, but within the first minute. The smartphone is equipped with a magnetic field sensor, on the basis of which the digital compass of navigation programs operates.

The smartphone supports dual SIM cards. When making a call, you can immediately select the desired card in the pop-up context menu. You can also pre-assign one of the SIM cards as the main one for organizing voice calls or sending SMS messages. A SIM card in any slot can work with 3G/4G networks, but only one of the cards can function in this mode at a time. To change the assignment of slots, cards do not need to be swapped - this can be done directly from the phone menu. Work with two SIM cards is organized according to the usual Dual SIM Dual Standby standard, when both cards can be in active standby mode, but cannot work at the same time - there is only one radio module.

OS and software

The device uses the 32-bit Google Android software platform version 5.1 as a system. Acer's own Liquid UI shell is installed on top, and it quite significantly modifies the usual structure and design of Android. The navigation menu and the access bar to the most important settings look different, and the ability to control using gestures and movements has been added. You can wake up the screen and then go directly to the application by drawing characters and letters on the screen. You can select a standard or simplified screen display mode, and there is also a special Kids Center mode with parental controls for children to use the smartphone.

Basic functionality such as a browser, calendar or notes can be displayed in separate undockable windows as Float Apps, and the same can be said for displaying a phone application in a window during calls using the Float Caller feature. Special AcerExtend software allows you to establish a wireless connection with a PC to transfer data and view content in a window with smartphone emulation. There are a lot of additional programs, most of them are free or have trial versions, but at least they can be removed manually without any problems.

Performance

The hardware platform is based on an eight-core single-chip system (SoC) MediaTek MT6753. The SoC configuration includes eight Cortex-A53 processor cores operating at frequencies up to 1.3 GHz. The Mali-T720 video accelerator is responsible for graphics processing. The amount of RAM is 3 GB, which is not bad, the amount of flash memory is also increased to 32 GB, of which about 22 GB are initially available for the user’s needs in the device. It is possible to install microSD cards, and for this you do not have to remove any of the SIM cards. In practice, our 128GB Transcend Premium microSDXC UHS-1 review card was not recognized, which is extremely rare. But a 64 GB card was recognized by the device without any problems. The device immediately offers to mount it as internal memory, summing it up into general storage so that applications can be installed on the card. However, then you should remove it with great caution, since such programs will fail.

Nothing special can be said about the MT6753 SoC installed here. Its capabilities have been well studied, the platform is far from powerful, and, in general, it is already outliving its usefulness. In its place in the new season are platforms such as MT6755 (Helio P10) and Snapdragon 650/652, which are much more interesting in terms of all the capabilities of the new generation SoC. Now the performance level of the MT6753 is below average, the capabilities of this platform are approximately comparable to the equally weak Qualcomm Snapdragon 615.

In any case, the Acer Liquid Z630S cannot be called productive; its capabilities are still sufficient to satisfy basic needs and even for games, but there is no reserve for future updates. Modern Combat 5 slows down, but World of Tanks, of course, has no slowdowns.

Testing in the latest versions of comprehensive tests AnTuTu and GeekBench 3:

For convenience, we have compiled all the results we obtained when testing the smartphone in the latest versions of popular benchmarks into tables. The table usually adds several other devices from different segments, also tested on similar latest versions of benchmarks (this is done only for a visual assessment of the obtained dry figures). Unfortunately, within the framework of one comparison it is impossible to present the results from different versions of benchmarks, so many worthy and relevant models remain “behind the scenes” - due to the fact that they once passed the “obstacle course” on previous versions of test programs.

Testing the graphics subsystem in 3DMark game tests,GFXBenchmark, and Bonsai Benchmark:

When testing in 3DMark, the most powerful smartphones now have the ability to run the application in Unlimited mode, where the rendering resolution is fixed at 720p and VSync is disabled (which can cause the speed to rise above 60 fps).

Browser cross-platform tests:

As for benchmarks for assessing the speed of the javascript engine, you should always make allowance for the fact that their results significantly depend on the browser in which they are launched, so the comparison can only be truly correct on the same OS and browsers, and this is possible during testing not always. For Android OS, we always try to use Google Chrome.

Thermal photographs

Below is a thermal image rear surface obtained after 10 minutes of battery test in the GFXBenchmark program (closer to white - higher temperature):

It can be seen that the heating is clearly localized in the upper left part of the device, which apparently corresponds to the location of the SoC chip. According to the heat chamber, the maximum heating was 42 degrees (at an ambient temperature of 24 degrees). Such heating cannot be called insignificant.

Playing video

To test the omnivorous nature of video playback (including support for various codecs, containers and special features, such as subtitles), we used the most common formats, which make up the bulk of the content available on the Internet. Note that for mobile devices it is important to have support for hardware video decoding at the chip level, since it is most often impossible to process modern options using processor cores alone. Also, you shouldn’t expect a mobile device to decode everything, since the leadership in flexibility belongs to the PC, and no one is going to challenge it. All results are summarized in a table.

According to the testing results, the test subject was not equipped with all the necessary decoders that are needed to fully play most of the most common multimedia files on the network, in this case, audio files. To successfully play them, you will have to resort to the help of a third-party player - for example, MX Player. True, it is also necessary to change the settings and manually install additional custom codecs, because now this player does not officially support the AC3 sound format.

Further testing of video playback was performed Alexey Kudryavtsev.

We did not find the MHL interface, like Mobility DisplayPort, in this smartphone, so we had to limit ourselves to testing the output of video files on the screen of the device itself. To do this, we used a set of test files with an arrow and a rectangle moving one division per frame (see “Method for testing video playback and display devices. Version 1 (for mobile devices) Red marks indicate possible problems associated with the playback of the corresponding files.

According to the criterion of frame output, the quality of playback of video files on the screen of the smartphone itself is good, since frames (or groups of frames) can (but are not required) be output with more or less uniform alternation of intervals and without skipping frames. Note that the screen refresh rate is approximately 63 Hz, so in the case of video files with 60 fps, 3 frames per second are displayed longer than others. We don’t understand why developers suddenly stopped liking the typical frequency of 60 Hz, but frequencies either higher or lower (this is more common) began to be found en masse. When playing video files with a resolution of 1280 by 720 pixels (720p) on a smartphone screen, the image of the video file itself is displayed exactly along the border of the screen, one to one in pixels, that is, in the original resolution. The brightness range displayed on the screen corresponds to the standard range of 16-235 - all gradations of shades are displayed in shadows and highlights.

Battery life

The battery installed in the Acer Liquid Z630S has a capacity of 4000 mAh that is large even for a modern smartphone. Exactly the same was installed in the regular Acer Liquid Z630 model. Thanks to such a battery, the hero of the review demonstrates a very high level of autonomy, comparable to the most advanced competitors in this regard, although in this case there were no records.

Under standard operating conditions, the smartphone can last two days or more without recharging. The developers themselves promise up to 21 hours of talk time and 710 hours of standby time.

Testing was traditionally carried out at the usual level of power consumption, but the smartphone also has a standard power saving mode.

Continuous reading in the Moon+ Reader program (with a standard, light theme) at a minimum comfortable brightness level (brightness was set to 100 cd/m²) with auto-scrolling lasted about 20 hours until the battery was completely discharged, and when continuously watching videos in high quality (720p) with the same brightness level via a home Wi-Fi network, the device can work for 14 hours. In 3D gaming mode, the smartphone can withstand at least 5 hours, or even longer.

The smartphone takes a very long time to charge. From a standard charger, the battery is fully charged within 4 hours with a current of 1 A and a voltage of 5.2 V. Moreover, in the first hour the battery is charged only up to 30%, and the rest is charged in the remaining hours.

Bottom line

The current price for Acer Liquid Z630S in official Russian retail is approximately 15 thousand rubles. For this money, the buyer will receive a well-made smartphone with a large screen and a fairly long battery life. The screen itself is far from ideal in terms of quality and resolution, and Full HD resolution would definitely not hurt it. Nor can we say that the device is interesting in appearance: rather, its appearance is utilitarian, the design is secondary. Otherwise, this is a quite ordinary smartphone from a Chinese manufacturer in all respects, with an average screen, sound system and hardware platform. The Acer Liquid Z630S will be of interest primarily to those who do not like to take risks and make purchases in foreign online stores, since even for such not too much money you can find more interesting options with a Full HD screen and on more modern platforms (for example, those aka Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 or Meizu M3 Note).

Information about the make, model, and alternative names of the specific device, if available.

Design

Information about the dimensions and weight of the device, presented in different units of measurement. Materials used, colors offered, certificates.

SIM card

The SIM card is used in mobile devices to store data that certifies the authenticity of mobile service subscribers.

Mobile networks

A mobile network is a radio system that allows multiple mobile devices to communicate with each other.

Mobile communication technologies and data transfer speeds

Communication between devices on mobile networks is carried out using technologies that provide different data transfer rates.

Operating system

An operating system is a system software that manages and coordinates the operation of hardware components in a device.

SoC (System on Chip)

A system on a chip (SoC) includes all the most important hardware components of a mobile device on one chip.

Built-in memory

Each mobile device has built-in (non-removable) memory with a fixed capacity.

Memory cards

Memory cards are used in mobile devices to increase the storage capacity for storing data.

Screen

The screen of a mobile device is characterized by its technology, resolution, pixel density, diagonal length, color depth, etc.

Sensors

Different sensors perform different quantitative measurements and convert physical indicators into signals that a mobile device can recognize.

Main camera

The main camera of a mobile device is usually located on the back of the body and is used for taking photos and videos.

Additional camera

Additional cameras are usually mounted above the device screen and are used mainly for video conversations, gesture recognition, etc.

Audio

Information about the type of speakers and audio technologies supported by the device.

Radio

The radio of the mobile device is a built-in FM receiver.

Location determination

Information about the navigation and location technologies supported by your device.

WiFi

Wi-Fi is a technology that provides wireless communication for transmitting data over close distances between various devices.

Bluetooth

Bluetooth is a standard for secure wireless data transfer between various devices of different types over short distances.

USB

USB (Universal Serial Bus) is an industry standard that allows different electronic devices to exchange data.

Headphone jack

This is an audio connector, also called an audio jack. The most widely used standard in mobile devices is the 3.5mm headphone jack.

Connecting devices

Information about other important connection technologies supported by your device.

Browser

A web browser is a software application for accessing and viewing information on the Internet.

Video file formats/codecs

Mobile devices support different video file formats and codecs, which respectively store and encode/decode digital video data.

Battery

Mobile device batteries differ from each other in their capacity and technology. They provide the electrical charge necessary for their functioning.

Specific Absorption Rate (SAR)

The SAR level refers to the amount of electromagnetic radiation absorbed by the human body while using a mobile device.

• Class: intermediate
• Form factor: monoblock
• Case materials: textured plastic
• Operating system: Android 5.1
• Network: two SIM cards, one radio module, GSM/EDGE, WCDMA, LTE (microSIM) supported
• Platform: Mediatek MT6735
• Processor: quad-core, 1.3 GHz
• RAM: 2 GB
• Storage memory: 16 GB, microSD memory card slot (64 GB cards supported)
• Interfaces: Wi-Fi (a/b/g/n), Bluetooth 4.0 (A2DP, EDR), microUSB connector (USB 2.0) for charging/synchronization, 3.5 mm for headset,
• Screen: 5.5’’, capacitive, IPS matrix, 1280x720 pixels (HD), automatic backlight level adjustment, oleophobic coating present, no air gap
• Camera: 8 MP, video recording in 1080p (1920x1080 pixels), LED flash
• Front camera: 8 MP
• Navigation: GPS/GLONASS (A-GPS support)
• Sensors: accelerometer, spatial position sensor,
• gyroscope, light sensor
• Battery: removable, Li-Pol, capacity 4000 mAh
• Dimensions: 156.3 x 77.5 x 8.9 mm
• Weight: 156 grams
• Price: 14,000 rubles

Equipment

• Smartphone
• Charger
• PC cable (also part of the charger)
• Wired headset

Appearance, materials, control elements, assembly

Externally, the Liquid Z630 reminded me of devices from Acer from the Jade line. The same shape of rounded edges, the same round speaker, there’s even a display of similar quality to the original Jade (but more on that a little later).

Most of the front side is occupied by a 5.5-inch display, above it there is a front camera eye, a speaker, light and proximity sensors and an LED; it lights up red while charging, green when charged, and blinks blue when receiving notifications. The touch buttons under the display have been abandoned, and this is a big plus.

On the right side there is a volume rocker and a power button. In my opinion, their press is a little tight and short, which is not typical for Acer smartphones.

At the top there is a 3.5 mm headphone jack, and at the bottom there is a microUSB port and a groove for opening the back cover.

The back cover is made of matte plastic, but not like the one used in the Z520 and Z220, where it looked like something between cloth and paper. This is ordinary plastic, albeit with a pleasant textured pattern. Hidden under the cover are two microSIM slots, a memory card slot and a 4000 mAh battery!

On the cover you can see the peephole of the main camera, the flash and the hole for the external speaker. The latter has an average maximum volume level and, despite the DTS Sound label, sounds no worse or better than its competitors. By the way, when you turn on this very DTS Sound, the volume increases slightly, but the music starts to wheeze slightly, so I recommend turning off this option.

The back cover is removable, but it closes with many latches, thanks to which it fits tightly to the body, there are no backlashes or gaps.

Dimensions

As you can see in the table above, the Liquid Z630's dimensions are comparable to most of its competitors. The Meizu M2 Note stands out a little, but it is, in principle, more compact than the others.

Compared to iPhone 6

For a 5.5-inch diagonal, the device fits well in the hand; the smoothed corners do not dig into the palm, so you can easily hold the smartphone with one hand. However, let's not forget that this is a phablet; the large dimensions are due to the large diagonal of the display.

Screen

As I already said, the display in this model reminded me of the screen of the original Liquid Jade: it has the same resolution and there is no air gap between the screen and the glass. Due to this, information is read and viewed with greater comfort. Viewing angles are close to maximum; when deviated, the picture fades only a little.

In the sun, the display almost completely goes blind, but at night it is quite comfortable to read from the screen; the range of minimum brightness is sufficient.

There is a special reading mode in the settings. In fact, it warms up the color scheme by reducing the amount of blue. Interestingly, here this mode is not just activated, but also configured. Using the slider, you can independently choose how warm the colors will be.

The screen can be unlocked by swiping up, in which case you immediately skip the lockscreen and get to the desktops. It is important to note that the gesture must be long, that is, you must swipe almost from the very bottom to the very top of the display.

Of course, it is worth noting that the resolution used here is not FHD and for some this may be a disadvantage. In general, I am also a supporter of the fact that phablets should have FHD or higher, but Acer has configured its shell in such a way that there is practically no small print in it, where the difference between HD and FHD is best visible, so, If you don't read a lot of books with small fonts, the resolution in the Liquid Z630 won't cause much discomfort.

operating system

The device runs Android 5.1 with several improvements from Acer, let's talk about them in more detail.

Firstly, the manufacturer has changed the notification shade; the switches here look different. By the way, their location can be adjusted by clicking on the pencil icon in the upper right corner.

Secondly, Acer did not remove the excellent browser from Android 4.x, and this is very good, in my opinion, it is more convenient than Chrome.

Thirdly, here, just like in previous models, “floating” windows are used for built-in applications: a browser, a calculator and a couple of other applications. The same option is available for incoming calls: the caller’s photo is displayed not on the entire display, but in a small part of it.

There is also a built-in Acer EXTEND application, which allows you to broadcast an image from a smartphone to your Windows computer and control the device from it. Otherwise, we have before us a typical Android 5.x with all its advantages and disadvantages.

Performance

Let's start with daily work. Acer used a clever trick: they accelerated the animation on desktops and in other applications, as a result, it visually seems that the smartphone is faster than its opponents. In fact, the speed of work is the same, but outwardly it seems that everything is very fast. However, even without this improvement there are no complaints about the speed of the model.

Most games run quickly and without lag. As for the most productive ones like Asphalt 8, they run only on medium settings.

To work with third-party applications such as browser, Twitter, mail, etc. There are no comments: no hesitation, no slowdown.

Autonomous operation

When testing any smartphone, I try to immediately understand what its main feature is: some focus on the quality of the display, some on a cool camera, some care about the price-quality ratio, but specifically in the Liquid Z630 the main feature was Battery capacity. 4000 mAh does not cause such delight as a year ago, now such models are no longer uncommon, but I still cannot help but note that the capacity is very impressive. In our synthetic tests, the smartphone showed excellent results, and in everyday use it discharged slowly. With two to three hours of active use of the display (mail, Twitter, browser, chats) at maximum brightness, the smartphone can last one and a half to two days. These are very good results compared to one day of work for most models.

Camera

The resolution of the main and front cameras is the same - 8 MP. Below is Roman Belykh’s commentary on the quality of both cameras.

Apparently, this device model does not use the best camera module. The main drawback is the narrow dynamic range; photos come out either dark or too light, and shadow details are lost. White balance “jumps” from warm to cool tones. Detail is average, there is a lot of noise even in frames taken in the daytime.

The optics also leave much to be desired: blurring is clearly visible in the corners of photographs.

The front camera is not bad, the angle is wide, the BB is accurate, there is little noise.

The device records video in the outdated 3GP format. FullHD resolution at 30 frames per second. The quality is mediocre.

Wireless interfaces

Of the minuses, I’ll immediately note the lack of support for dual-band Wi-Fi and the Bluetooth 4.0 LE standard, and the pluses include a fairly fast cold start on a device with MediaTek, support for our LTE frequencies and work with USB-OTG.

Conclusion

There are no complaints about the quality of speech transmission: you and your interlocutor can hear each other perfectly.

In retail the device is sold for 14,000 rubles. For this money you get a smartphone with a good display, excellent operating speed and a capacious battery. Among the shortcomings, I would highlight the low resolution, after all, for this money I would already like to see FHD.

Now let's move on to the competitors.

Asus Zenfone 2 ZE500CL. The budget version of Zenfone 2 with HD resolution and 2 GB of RAM is now selling for about 10-11 thousand rubles. In my opinion, this is a direct competitor to the Liquid Z630, however, the ZenFone 2’s operating time is not as good as that of the Z630, but it also costs 3-4 thousand less.

Huawei Honor 4X. Inexpensive phablet from Huawei for 12,000 rubles. The characteristics are also similar to the Liquid Z630, but the battery capacity is 1000 mAh lower. And the price is 2,000 rubles lower.

Is there some more Meizu M2 Note, but we sell it for 16,000 rubles, and Xiaomi Redmi Note 2 not as easy to get. Of course, both models are more interesting than the Liquid Z630, but one is more expensive, and the second is not officially sold here.

As a result, Acer came out with a good mid-segment phablet with a capacious battery and LTE support, but the company should lower the price a little - to 12,000 rubles, for example. With the current price tag, buyers can look towards more expensive models, but with FHD resolution, but for 12,000 rubles, the Z630 will already compete with the same Honor 4X and ZE500CL, but with a visible advantage in the form of a more capacious battery.