Huawei Ascend G330 review

The SMS system in the Huawei Ascend G330 is the same slightly underwhelming layout as found in Google's Ice Cream Sandwich code, giving you simple threaded messages and plenty of attachment options.

Photos you've previously taken are automatically resized for sending through the limited SMS system, although there's no such feature when it comes to video clips.

The only way to send a video is to take one, live, but then you're only allowed to take a two-second clip. Probably best not bothering.

Huawei's put a custom keyboard of its own on the G330, replacing the TouchPal option found in the G300.

Huawei calls this the utilitarian "Huawei Input Method" and it's a pretty bland, awkward system to use. Alternate characters are hidden away in sub pages, and we found it very unintuitive when trying to switch between different fields.

It does attempt to auto-predict words as you're typing, though, putting them up in an orange bar above the keyboard, and none of the dictionary issues present in the Ascend G300's Android 4.0 update are present here. It's a bit fiddly, but it works.

Fortunately, the standard Android 4.0 keyboard is also in here, offering a much simpler and more user-friendly way of sticking words into your telephone.

This one also has a line of numbers on the top row of the keyboard, accessed through a long press, plus there's a useful punctuation bar that appears each time you enter a word and a "..." icon beneath suggested words that pulls up loads of extra suggestions. It's much better than Huawei's own effort.

The email app is the same as found in Google's code. It supports multiple accounts and lets you select options for checking frequency, plus there's even an area for managing a selection of stock phrases, making it simple to spam out easy quick replies by choosing "Insert Quick Response" from the menu button when replying to someone.