Smartbuy issue dated April 20, 2011

Smartbuy Business Line

G A D G E T S

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Wednesday, April 20, 2011

A U T O |

L U X U R Y

Faster, lighter, sexier The smartphone quartet Page 3

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WHAT’S HOT

this week

Tougher than the rest

Team Smartbuy Editorial

TAG Heuer Meridiist Carbon

Anushya Mamtora anushya@thehindu.co.in

Ketaki Bhojnagarwala ketaki@thehindu.co.in

Mahananda Bohidar

This limited edition MERIDIIST handset features carbon fibre on the battery cover as well as the top and bottom bars that flank the sapphire crystal screen. It also sports an engraved steel seal at the base of the battery cover, a side motif, and integrated GMT software that allows seamless travel between time zones.

Sporty yet subtle, the carbon fibre is coupled with stainless steel with a smoky grey alligator base.

Rs 4.16 lakh

mahananda@thehindu.co.in

S. Muralidhar muraliswami@thehindu.co.in

Design Bryan Gaughan aqua@thehindu.co.in

Balakrishnan designkbala@thehindu.co.in

Advertising Contact R. Diwakar ramdiwakar@thehindu.co.in

Web Advertising Contact N. Amarnath amarnath@thehindu.co.in

www.blsmartbuy.com Become a fan of our Facebook page: BL Smartbuy Follow us on Twitter

Cover photo: S.S. Kumar

Playback time Amkette Flash TV HD The multimedia player delivers incredible sound effect in DTS/ Dolby format and stunning 1080p high definition videos.

Amkette’s Flash TV HD can play back all popular audio, video and image formats. It also upscales non-HD content for high definition viewing. You can create playlists and resume feature for power cuts on the media player which comes with a one-year warranty.

Rs 3,995

You’re surrounded! Logitech Z506 The new 5.1 sound system from Logitech gives you 75 watts (RMS) of surround sound. The powerful subwoofer will bring your music, movies, and games to life. You can also connect your PC, PS3, Xbox 360, Wii, iPod, DVD player, and more to the Z506.

Rs 7,145

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Whether our collective Mensa scores reflect our supposed evolution into smarter beings or not, the current bevy of smartphones do.

And with at least two of ‘em hitting the markets every week or so, choosing the right one can be as tricky a task as picking a Miss World (we’re talking beauty and brains). We pick four of the most current smartphones for a long-term comparison. Here are the new boys in black and white.

SMARTPHONE reviews

The sassy new secretary?

Nokia E7

Photo: S.S. Kumar

Mahananda Bohidar emember the time when the Nokia 9000 Communicator would stand out in the crowd as the hefty titan of the mobile handset world...when the rest of ‘em were riding the miniaturisation wave?

That was in the late nineties and if you wanted to show that you’d arrived as a business magnate, you just had to flash the ‘brick-sized’ communicator and punch out a message on its massive keypad, as greedy eyes gawked at your every move. It is another matter that a shoulder massage would have been needed by the end of day!

A decade and a half later, the Finnish manufacturer has revamped the business smartphone and unveiled a newage avatar that carries traces of its lineage and at the same time promises to deliver the goods to the modern-day executive.

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Continuing the tradition The second handset to feature Symbianˆ3 OS, the Nokia E7 has quite a few similarities with Nokia’s previous flagship device, the N8. You can be sure heads will turn when you pull out the rather hefty-looking E7 from your pocket .

Nokia, which went the anodised aluminium way with the N8, continues the trend with the E7. The handset manages to impress you with its solid, chunky feel that at the same time appears well-designed and classy.

Finger friendly?

Keeping the tradition of the Communicators alive, the E7 has a physical QWERTY keyboard that is revealed when you slide the screen out. In case you want to dash off a quick message just pop the screen up and type out an SMS .

When in the landscape mode with the keyboard out, the screen lies tilted at an angle convenient enough to keep it on a desk and continue typing . The keyboard looks wellcontoured within the space where the display slides back to nestle in. The hinge was a tad bit too stiff for our liking

On the Symbianˆ3, you get three homescreens to organise your stuff . You could have your email client, calendar and a translation app ready on one for that business meeting with your Korean clients and a homescreen with the Communities (integrated-SNS app), Paramount Pictures and Hangman for times when your boss isn’t watching.

The Nokia E7 also happened to be the only one with an AMOLED display on our smartphone comparison test bench. It was also the biggest with a 4-inch capacitive touchscreen that supports multi-touch gestures. This makes the Web experience quite pleasant, however, the pinch-to-zoom options on this handset aren’t as smooth as it was in the other handsets we tried out. Websites loaded pretty quickly with the 4-inch screen reproducing graphics and media with great clarity. Probably owing to the ClearBlack display that has been integrated in the E7, we could read SMSes and access menu options under bright sunlight without having to squint too hard.

shopping mall via OVI Maps with a long press on the map that pops up the aforementioned option along with displaying how far you are from the nearest popular landmarks.

You also have a voice recognition software Vlingo that you can use to Google SMS or call your contacts and even update your Facebook status with voice commands. With the Mobile Office app you have a cluster of productivity apps – Quickoffice, Adobe PDF and F-Secure.

The 8-meg camera that the E7 is endowed with gave us interesting results. Indoor shots came out sharp and the colours were close to original. High-definition video-recording too was quite impressive.

The handset has a non-user-replaceable battery which does away with the necessity of an accessible back panel...may be irksome for some users. The SIM card slot is a small hide-away tray located on the side panel. You also don’t have the option of expanding storage memory. All you get is the 16GB in-built memory on the handset to store all your data.

And again, like with the N8, you have a OTG (On The Go) USB cable that you can use to access or stream media directly on the E7 while it’s connected to a storage device.

Nokia also includes an HDMI cable in the box so you can hook it up to stream your hi-def videos directly to the HD telly in your living room.

Mapping and snapping!

Our verdict

‘Maps’ on the E7 include a couple of interesting apps apart from OVI maps. You can access the Lonely Planet and TripAdvisor apps within the same menu which can be quite handy if you are looking for a place to shop at, grab a bite or shake a leg at the nearest pub while you are travelling.

Navigating along with OVI Maps itself is quite a pleasant experience on the Nokia E7. The app comes with voice guidance and has a couple of ‘Views’ options including a ‘3D’ one. You can also ‘Check In’ at a posh restaurant or a

The E7 definitely has the design and the hardware to become a worthy modern-day avatar of the Communicator, a business-optimised handset that anyone would love pulling out and showing off.

However, it feels like a case of good hardware hamstrung by the inadequacies of the embedded software, one that doesn’t live up to the hassle-free, peppy and intuitive interfaces created by Android or iOS.

but we guess it contributes to the sturdiness in the long run. Nokia has tried to keep it neat and minimal with a one-button Menu access which lies in the fascia and has a built-in LED indicator. The volume rocker button is interestingly a slider and Camera, Power and Lock remain the only other subtle, physical buttons on the bezel.

User interface

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Rs 29,999

mahananda@thehindu.co.in

Ketaki Bhojnagarwala or a company that’s mostly known for its quality budget laptops, Acer made quite an impression when it announced the Acer Liquid Ferrari some time ago. The latest in the Liquid series is the Acer Liquid Metal. In classic Acer style, the smartphone is bursting with features, but is pinned with an affordable price tag. Is this good enough to threaten the titans of the smartphone industry?

Gmail easily and got push notifications for any new email. The phone comes pre-loaded with Acer Social Jogger – an app that integrates your Facebook and Twitter accounts with the phone.

For your media files, there are the direct Android apps for Music and Gallery. Alternatively, you can use the Nemo Player that puts all your media together in one place.

The phone supports the Xvid video format, and we were able to try out various short videos and our test media standard Frost/Nixon. The phone scores on sharpness and clarity, however there was a bit of stagger when we hit the play button after pausing the movie. Although the phone has Dolby Mobile integration, sound levels weren’t outstanding, so we’d advise using headphones if you plan to listen to music or watch a movie. That said, there are a bunch of music and video equaliser presets to choose from – and that really improves the sound quality.

The camera is a 5-megapixel unit with an integrated flash, and is capable of 720p HD video recording. The camera produces good results in daylight conditions, but despite an overly powerful flash, it produces really bad results in low lighting. We almost ended up blinding people with the flash, and the resultant over-exposure made faces look white-washed. You can adjust sharpness and saturation, and tweak the white balance and ISO, but there aren’t any scene modes to choose from.

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First Impressions As the name seems to suggest, the Acer Liquid Metal feels hefty to hold, but balances it out with curves in all the right places and clean lines that give it a sense of symmetry. The shiny black bezel encases a 3.6-inch WVGA capacitive touch screen, with four touch sensitive buttons at the bottom. Although this is a Android phone, which runs Froyo (version 2.2), Acer has done quite a bit when it comes to customisation. Although the buttons carry the same functions, they are depicted by Acer’s own symbols. So you have Home, Search, Back and Menu, in that order.

The edges of the phone are chrome plated, with the bottom sporting the Mini USB port (for transfers as well as charging), and the right side equipped with a toggle switch and dedicated camera button. The top has the standard power button and 3.5 mm headphone jack. The top panel also has LED indicators, for charging, missed call and message. The dark brown, etched steel back panel is smooth to touch, and houses the 5-megger camera with flash, and a speaker at the bottom.

Performance

User Interface Unless you go to your settings and manually change them, you’ll be greeted with the Acer Breeze interface when you turn on the Acer Liquid Metal. Chances are you’ll love or hate it. The Breeze interface works on two layers. When you first unlock the phone by pressing the power button, you’re greeted with the first layer – which consists of five home screens, which you can customise with widgets of your choice.

We found it a bit cumbersome to use despite the options offered. The bottom left of the first layer has a fold, which you turn over like a page.

This opens up the second layer of the interface. Swiping to the right reveals a ‘media’ home screen, which provides shortcuts to your photos, music and videos.

Swiping to the left brings up a history of recently used apps, for quick one touch access. There is a shortcut bar at the bottom of the home screen. The top is a notification panel that Android users will be familiar with. There’s also a double row of customisable shortcuts. Swiping this bar to the top reveals the entire menu screen, and you can browse your apps by swiping to the

Photo: S.S. Kumar

Acer Liquid Metal: Chinks in the armour left.

Despite having a capacitive touch screen, the phone wasn’t always responsive – especially when it came to the keyboard. The phone has a standard Android keyboard, with a provision for the T9 dictionary. There’s also a handwriting input method, which didn’t recognise most words we traced out. Although the key-

board wasn’t really cramped, in portrait mode, a lot of typing errors kept recurring – with the only saving grace being the T9 dictionary which substituted the right word most of the time.

Media With regard to social networking, the phone was pretty standard. We set up our

The phone runs a 800 Mhz processor, a small step down from the Acer Stream’s 1Ghz processor. The phone frequently froze when we were running a heavy app, such as the camera and barcode scanner, but at other times worked perfectly. It’s a bit of a hit and miss, and we think the phone could use a firmware update.

What we did have major problems with was the proximity sensor – even though the screen is supposed to switch off when you’re on a call, it frequently turned on and put the person on hold, activated the loudspeaker, and on a few occasions even dialled another number!

Battery life was good – you get about a day’s worth of juice with a couple of hours of cumulative talktime and SNS also being enabled. Adding Bluetooth and Wi-Fi might drain the charge a little more.

Our Verdict The Acer Liquid Metal has a lot to offer, no doubt, and for its price it’s quite a good deal. However there are some software issues that have been compromised on.

Once Acer evens out the chinks, it could be a serious contender in the high-end smartphone segment.

Rs 20,500 ketaki@thehindu.co.in

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Photo: S.S. Kumar

Re‘DEFY’ning smartness: Motorola Defy Mahananda Bohidar nazzy and super-fast – two qualities you’d expect most smartphones to be endowed with. What if you expect a little bit of strength and durability too? This is what Motorola Inc. claims to offer with the Motorola DEFY, its new Android-based smartphone.

With an unusual international launch late last year - at the 25th season premiere of The Oprah Winfrey Show where each of the wildly cheering and air-thumping audience got to carry a handset back home – the Motorola Defy has only recently hit town. Whether it’s reason enough for you to rejoice as well, we find out here.

Checking out the handset for the first time, you realise Motorola is serious about having built the Defy to withstand some rugged use with its air-tight compartments that house the 3.5mm jack and mini-USB connector on the handset.

The back panel is a soft rubberised one providing a sturdy grip along with a small latch that you tug on to release the back panel and access the SIM card slot and the battery. Tiny screws along the periphery of the bezel hold the unit in place.

Despite having been designed for some tough use, the handset is surprisingly light, even when compared to some ‘regular’ ones in the market.

Most part of the fascia on the Motorola Defy is the 3.8-inch touchscreen display which, again, is one of the very few ones in the market that stay as true as is possible for a smartphone, to the smudge-free tag (due credit to

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Corning Gorilla Glass) .

The seven homescreens can be adorned with a couple of interesting Motorola or Android widgets. The smartphone has almost no physical buttons except the Volume Rocker on the left. To navigate around the handset, you have four touch buttons at the bottom of the screen. On any of the homescreens you have the ‘Dialler’ and ‘Contact’ options at the bottom between which you have the icon to pop up the main menu.

We used the default browser to surf the internet and most pages that we opened – Facebook, The Guardian – loaded up quickly (Much quicker than most smartphones we have used). The display was easy to zoom in to with just a pinch. Pictures, even slideshows, barely took any time to load up on the handset.

Another thumbs up to the Defy for sound quality it offers. Motorola has built in two microphones that filter out background noise and amplify your voice so you don’t have to shout over the traffic or the TV at home and the technology works well. Also, at places where a couple of budget phones couldn’t detect network signals, Defy rose to the occasion.

With the GPRS on and with intermittent GPS activity (Google Maps), the battery drains rapidly. But with a decent number of voice calls and the occasional Gmail or Google Talk log-ins, the Motorola Defy just about lasted us 24 hours.

The 5-megger on the Motorola Defy did not live up to the standard that some of its competitors have established.

The quality of pictures wasn’t grainy but we had problems

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with the flash being too bright or the photograph being out of focus in more than a couple of cases. We tried out the Camcorder too when we were luckily at the mountains and it started raining. The result was a pretty average footage with bits and parts of the video being slightly underexposed.

You also have the DLNA app (Digital Living Network Alliance) on the handset. This means you can stream, store and share whatever content you have on the handset with other compatible devices such as HDTVs, game consoles and PCs through the Defy.

Transferring media on to the device requires an internet connection on the PC or the laptop that you hook it up with. The syncing is done on a Motorola Mobile web portal where you can drag and drop media from your computer on to the phone’s external storage.

Our verdict “DEFY is designed to handle everything that life throws your way,” is what Motorola claims of this smartphone.

Well, break-ups and soddy B-grade movies might be obvious exceptions but Defy does seem capable of handling all that a smartphone is capable of quite well. It gives you a decent screen, a great user interface, tough yet not-toougly design, great clarity and a fast browser. An average camera and an older version of the Android do not seem to be reasons enough for those of you looking for a sturdy smartphone that performs and doesn’t come with a ‘sell-akidney’ price tag.

Rs 21,990

Ticks all ‘Z’ boxes HTC Desire Z

Photo: S.S Kumar

Ketaki Bhojnagarwala he HTC Desire set a benchmark after the Taiwanese manufacturer’s entry into the heavy-duty smartphone arena. One year later, HTC has launched a vamped-up version of the original with the new Desire Z. Could this be one of the bigger Android contenders in the market?

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First impressions The addition of a pull-out QWERTY keypad does make this phone heavier than its predecessor, but it feels comfortingly solid to hold, with clean lines, a brushed aluminium bezel and pop-open battery cover. The 3.7-inch capacitive SLCD touch screen is a notch below AMOLED, but it’s still vibrant enough, with a 480x800 resolution.

Along the bottom are the four standard Android buttons, but these are touch sensitive, unlike the physical ones on the Desire. A welcome addition is the optical trackpad centred along the bottom of the fascia, which lets you navigate between home-screens, the call log, menu, etc.

It’s not as big as the one on most BlackBerry handsets, but it’s convenient because you avoid the usual clumsiness that is a part of the experience while scrolling on touch screens.

A power button, 3.5mm headphone jack, volume rocker and camera control are the physical buttons which are dispersed over the edges of the phone. The back panel holds a 5-meg camera with LED flash.

The inside The phone runs on Android 2.2 (Froyo), though personally we would have preferred Honeycomb to better the user experience. But what helps is the HTC Sense UI, which throws in features like flip to silence, map with compass and drive previews. You can also download widgets, wallpapers, scenes and ringtones from the HTC Hub, which does a good job of giving your phone’s Android interface a

nice makeover. The capacitive, multi-gesture touch screen was smooth, but we had some problems with the touch buttons at the bottom being at times unresponsive.

The seven home screens are customisable, and pinching the screen shows up thumbnail views of all seven, which you can drag to rearrange. The bottom of the screen has a customised concave HTC panel with three buttons, for Menu, Phone and Personalise. The phone button brings up the call log as well as the list of all your contacts in one handy pane, along with an alphanumeric keypad for punching in a number or quick searching for a contact.

The personalise button is a convenient way to choose a skin, wallpaper, ringtone and add items to the home screen.

The notification bar on the top also shows you a list of recently used apps, along with alerts. There’s a notification light on top of the screen which notifies you of any missed calls or new messages.

The main feature that differentiates the Desire Z from the Desire is the pull-out QWERTY keypad with a ‘zhinge’. It flips out easily to reveal a neatly spaced out keyboard with a dedicated Tab and Menu key, and double Function and Caps keys, which make it easy for both the righties and lefties to type.

Media The phone supports 3gp, mp4 and wmv video playback.

We played some videos and were impressed with the good colour reproduction and smooth playback. You can also double tap to zoom in to the video. The music player displayed album art, and you can swipe between albums, or organise by artist or song. Sound quality on the speaker wasn’t that great, so we’d advise using headphones. The phone does support Adobe Flash, and we had no problem loading websites with a lot of flash content like Cartier’s or streaming YouTube vids.

Apart from your usual Android Facebook and Twitter

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apps, there are also HTC apps for Facebook, and Peep to log in to Twitter. Friend Stream by HTC shows all your SNS in one place, and you can browse through status updates, check notifications and look through friend lists.

Push email allows you to configure any email account and receive instant notifications.

The 5-megger camera was exceptional as far as mobile phone cameras go. It provides a variety of effects like Vignette, Depth of Field and distortion, and you can adjust White Balance, Colour Saturation and Exposure. There aren’t any scene modes, which we didn’t really miss, but a big downside was the lack of a front facing camera for video chats. The camera can, however, record HD video up to 720p.

Performance An 800 MHz Scorpion processor, Adreno 205 GPU, Qualcomm MSM 7230 chipset make this smartie pretty nimble, and although some would argue that it’s a downgrade from the 1 GHz processor of the Desire, we didn’t notice any difference in performance. Connectivity options include HSDPA up to 14.4 Mbps, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n and hotspot, Bluetooth 2.1, DLNA and micro USB 2.0 (for charging and data transfer) - which are pretty much all you need in a smartphone today.

The phone gives you about a day of juice on a full charge, with the usual browsing, media usage, SNS and a couple of hours of calls. We had some problems with in-call volume, and even when it was set on maximum we had to press the handset to our ear to hear clearly.

Our Verdict Though it is lacking a few features, the Desire Z makes a nifty smartphone package. Unlike other manufacturers, HTC has priced the phone just right, which we think will help it remain a cut above the competition.

Rs 25,590

The Final Face-Off

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AUTO focus

Photos: Bloomberg

Ferrari bursts out of the blue with the fantastic Four Jason H. Harper errari keeps its secrets better than a Cold War spy agency. No one saw the radically-shaped, twodoor, four-seat Ferrari Four coming.

It broke cover in late January, along with the news that it would be the company’s first-ever all-wheeldrive.

Two months later, I’m tucked behind the wheel of the $300,000 FF, testing its V-12-powered moves deep in the Dolomite mountains of northern Italy. Talk about a happy turn of events.

Painted a luminous blue, my Ferrari is tackling a series of thickly stacked switchbacks, white snow spilling onto the asphalt on both sides.

A skier on a slope alongside the road fixates on the car and wipes out.

I know how he feels, breathing shallowly as I steer around an uphill hairpin and hammer the gas, engaging the AWD. A risky move in an expensive car that isn’t yours.

There’s only a slight chirp of tyres as I drift around the wickedly sharp turn.

Then I’m through and tearing up the hill at 60. The FF is deceptively civil - except for the banshee howl of the front- mounted 651-horsepower motor that could cause avalanches.

South Tyrol’s vast landscape offers snow-covered crags and DayGlo-green valley grasses. Dry and wet, cold and

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sunny - ideal for testing an AWD system.

While Lamborghini uses AWD on all its cars, Ferrari has always maintained that rear-wheel-drive is performance king.

Perhaps that’s why it insists this system is meant only for inclement weather, as if the FF were a snow plow with especially nice leather bucket seats.

‘That’s a Ferrari?’

Either way, in addition to the denizens of Aspen and St. Moritz, it will also appeal in emerging markets like China, Russia and India, since it accommodates four adults and is robust enough to handle all types of roads.

The funky shape is what insiders call a “shooting brake,” essentially a long nose mated to a two-door cockpit and hatchback. Some say it’s a far cry from what a Ferrari should be, but I like the design gumption.

It’s officially the replacement for the less-than-adored four-seat 612 Scaglietti, but over pre-dinner drinks, Ferrari chairman Luca di Montezemolo told me: “It’s revolution, not evolution. We started with a blank sheet of paper.

To me it’s an emotional car.”

The FF looks oversize in photos, but the shotgun wedding of four seats and aggressive sports styling is more organic in real life. The gaping black front grill is as fearsome as the mouth of a Great White. It seems ready to snack on lesser vehicles unfortunate enough to be caught

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in the asphalt current.

Optional DVD Though the word “practical” is surely Ferrari anathema, the rear hatch has a big opening and the back seats also fold down. Turns out you can take it with you after all.

The word “Ferrari” is embossed front and centre on the dashboard - as if you might forget - in addition to an “FF” logo and the prancing horse emblem on the wheel.

Big windows let in lots of light and you can generally see well, even from the back seats, which are set slightly higher than those in front. The front seats are deep, ideal for capturing your frame as G forces pound you into the leather.

As for actually sitting in back: Though I had to slouch, my head didn’t touch the headliner.

About those two optional DVD flatscreens in the seatbacks: Sorry, but if a $300,000 sports car can’t keep you amused, you’ve been either overindulged or overstimulated.

Practicality aside, it’s still a Ferrari. The FF hits 62 mph in 3.7 seconds with a top speed of more than 200. In a single hard blast down a curving section of the Autostrada, my guts turned to jelly. It’s fast.

Uphill, Downhill Racer There are no obvious drawbacks to the AWD. Goose the

gas on tight curves and some torque will transfer to the front wheels. But it always maintains a significant rearwheel bias. There’s little to no understeer.

Suspension is firm, but I can’t think of another car that feels so supremely confident on all four wheels, and of its rightful place on the road. The same 7-speed, doubleclutch, automated transmission found in the 458 Italia is here, too. Technical brilliance.

The steering wheel is a bit too light and the kinetic information transmitted about road conditions is scant. If you ignore the shift paddles and leave it in automatic (slacker!), downshifts come on lazily even when you stomp on the gas to make a sudden pass.

But, you know, geez. A Ferrari and the Italian Alps. I circle to the top of a snow-slicked plateau and briefly get a glimpse of the horizon - icy escarpments sparking in the late winter sun - before dropping down the other side and attacking the winding road.

A short time ago I didn’t even know this car existed.

Now it’s all I can think about.

(The author writes about autos for Muse, the arts and leisure section of Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own.)

The 2012 Ferrari FF At a Glance Engine: 6.3-liter V-12 with 651 horsepower and 504 pound- feet of torque Transmission: 7-speed dual-clutch automated.

Speed: 0 to 62 mph in 3.7 seconds Gas mileage per gallon: 12 city; 18 highway (estimated) Price as tested: $335,000 (estimated) Best feature: Ferrari performance meets hatchback practicality Worst feature: Having to listen to colleagues pontificate about whether it looks like a “real” Ferrari Target buyer: The Ferrari lover with friends

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AUTO news

Bond with Aston’s best A

fter winning hearts on the roads and on screen in 41 countries worldwide the iconic British luxury sports car brand Aston Martin finally makes it to Indian roads too.

Aston Martin marks its foray into India with a new dedicated facility in Mumbai in partnership with Performance Cars (a division of Infinity Cars Pvt. Ltd.). The latter has enjoyed a strong reputation in the Indian luxury car market for several years and has been associated with brands BMW and Princess Yachts.

The Aston Martin dealership in Mumbai is located at Kemp’s Corner at the junction of the ultra premium Peddar and Altamount Roads and will offer customers a premium boutique environment wherein they can custom specify the cars to their exacting needs, an official statement said. The after-sales facility near Worli is a first of its kind dedicated, air conditioned workshop in the high luxury segment. The showroom and after-sales facilities have been specially designed to follow the international design elements that have timelessly identified the elegance of the Aston Martin brand worldwide.

While the British brand is willing to offer any car from its stable including the very special One-77 at a starting price of about Rs 20 crore, there will be models on offer to potential customers who want to get a taste of the Aston experience starting all the way from a low Rs 1.35 crore.

Aston Martin customers and enthusiasts will be able to view and test-drive select models from the entire range of V8 Vantage Coupe, V8 Vantage Roadster, V12 Vantage, DB9 Coupe, DB9 Volante, DBS Coupe, DBS Volante and the four-door sports car; Rapide (Rs 2.15 crore). These models will also soon be joined by the recently launched

India gets its first F1 academy F

orce India Formula One Team has announced the launch of its F1 Team Academy, to identify and promote racing talent in India. The academy will focus on nurturing talent, providing vocational training for a career in motor sport or related industries and specialised academic programmes related to the field of motorsports. In the first year, the Academy’s predominant focus will be on unearthing and discovering racing talent while the initiatives in the other two focus areas will be rolled out in a phased manner over the next 12 months. The Academy will launch its first comprehensive initiative, ‘Hunt for 1 from a Billion’ on April 25, which will include Regional Trials in seven cities and a National Final. The hunt is proposed to be held every two years and the ten finalists from the National Final will be part of a week-long intensive stint at Silverstone, UK.

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V8 Vantage S and the new Virage.

The Aston Martin’s association with James Bond 007 adds to the aura surrounding the brand. But, with the rate at which the luxury car market is growing in India, one thing is for sure…there wouldn’t have been the need for any undercover work to decipher the market here.

MELANGE luxury redefined

Summery bags

On a spree!

Adding to the cheery summer accessories, Lavie has launched its Summer Straws range of bags. Made of organic fabrics, the bags come in beige and taupe hues and can be bought at its outlets in New Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru.

Rs 1,900 to Rs 2,500

Doing a wheelie, a stoppie and all the stunts you can possibly do with your strolley, eight of VIP’s new ranges will feature its ‘360 degree wheeling’ innovation. Grab one and try the moves at its outlets across India.

Rs 4,200 to Rs 6,000

Simple framing Lites is the latest collection from Titan Eye Plus with minimalistic designs, crafted in titanium and thin stainless steel for the ‘light’ experience. Head to its stores and choose from a platter of 40 stylish frames.

Rs 2,500 to Rs 5,000

Precious decanter

Sexy six

An envious collectible, this Equestrian Decanter from Steuben Glass is a crystal masterpiece inspired by Sidney Waugh’s 1937 Horse Head sculpture. Available at Right Address Boutique, New Delhi.

Price on request

Taking a break from aviators and cat-eye frames, DSquared2’s latest is its hexagon shaped eyewear collection. This one creates an unusual silhouette and adds glamour with the tortoise and gold details. Available at select lifestyle stores.

Rs 23,000

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April 20, 2011

RESORT review

An Arabian night’s tale Rasheeda Bhagat ith a km-long private coastline and beach with fine white sand and an incredible 65 acres of elegantly landscaped lush green gardens to lose yourself in, Dubai’s extremely elegant, stylish and plush beach resort ‘Residence & Spa’, sets a new benchmark of luxury in the hospitality industry. It is one of the trio of properties that jointly form the One&Only Royal Mirage.

Beauty and elegance, tranquillity and personalised service, great food and three swimming pools with controlled temperatures to choose from… these are the essential elements of this swish resort that pampers its guests to the hilt in true Arabian style extravagance and courtesy.

And then, along with the chirping of a host of birds, peacocks too are attracted to this serene, green haven. As I photograph one that is lounging on a reclining chair outside a guest’s room, a couple of pea hens hanging around in attendance, a staff member says that these resplendent birds are frequent visitors from the Royal Palace belonging to Sheik Mohammed, Dubai’s ruler.

Philippe Dupont, Manager of the Royal Mirage, who is a member of the association of The Leading Hotels of the World, confirms this. “Yes, the gentlemen and ladies are not staying with us, but they visit us regularly from the Sheikh’s palace, three km away,” says the Frenchman. But thanks to their frequent visits the pea hens have quite a large family to manage!

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Dramatic architecture The first thing that strikes you about the Royal Mirage — The Palace, the Arabian Court and Residence & Spa — is the dramatic architecture that evokes the spirit of Arabia with traditional Islamic architecture blending in with

contemporary flourishes and touches. The arches, surprise curves and meandering, picturesque walkways, fountains and other water features, romantic lighting, trellis work and the lavish use of silk and other fabrics for the furnishings, evoke the magic of an Arabian era that had once powered and dazzled the world Together, the three hotels have around 450 rooms and suites. The Palace, which was built first, is a huge facility with 197 rooms, 35 suites, including two royal suites, each of which is a gigantic 3,500 sq ft. These have separate living and dining rooms, linked to a large balcony overlooking the Arabian Gulf, which is barely 50 metres away, and a private kitchenette. The Arabian court has 162 rooms and 10 suites, including two Prince Suites. The highlight of the Prince Suites is the outdoor terrace with Majlis-style seating complete with cushions and bolsters… and of course, fancy hookahs!

But it is the much smaller Residence & Spa with 47 rooms and suites that is really recommended as a getaway for a special, intimate occasion. Several facilities here, including its swimming pool, is exclusive for its guests and can’t be used by those living in the other two resorts. Both its interior and exterior areas have an old world charm that blows you; overlooking manicured gardens and water bodies and walkways, all the rooms are done stylishly with the finest of detailing. Having sampled One&Only Le Saint Geran in Mauritius, the design and décor of my room, particularly the wash basin and wash room areas, gave me a feeling of déjà vu and comfort. Small wonder then that the letter welcoming guests always says: ‘Welcome back’.

An impressive 50 per cent of the guests here are on repeat visits and this figure goes up to an unbelievable 70 per cent for the peak season or New Year’s Eve. For the coming New Year season, the resort is already fully book-

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ed, and many of the guests reserved their room before leaving in the first week of January 2011. The average stay of the guests here range from seven to 10 days; the rates in the low season or summer range between $600-1,000 per night depending on the room, but the Garden Villa can set you back by $4,000-5000 a night.

Uber luxury If you can afford it, check into the ultra luxurious Garden Villa, which is very close to the pristine beach, has a private driveway, two bedrooms separated by an elegant lounge, dining room and entertainment area. And the ultimate in luxury, at least for me, is the shaded terrace opening out to a private temperature-controlled swimming pool! What more could one ask for?

Most of the guests are from Europe — UK, Germany, Switzerland, France and Italy – but the Indian market is opening up too; the Bollywood stars have been coming here for some time as the resort offers luxurious pampering with incredible service. Interestingly, the Indian guests are here not only for shopping and relaxing “but also to discover some new culinary experiences. They know that Dubai is a city of the future and only a few hours away from home,” says Dupont.

Apart from three swimming pools and a spa that houses the Oriental Hammam where you can get an unbelievable traditional Turkish or Moroccan hammam experience (in other words the good old royal scrubbing, but only embellished with special touches to enhance the pampering), the resort also indulges golf lovers. Just five minutes away are located several world-class 18-hole golf courses. The more adventurous can opt for horse riding, scuba diving, desert safaris and other sightseeing tour options that Dubai has to offer.

There is enough put on the table to pamper the palate; the best in Mediterranean and West Asian cuisine is available at the many restaurants in the Royal Mirage. The Palace has four speciality restaurants - Olives, serving delectable Mediterranean food; Tagine, dishing out authentic Moroccan fare; Celebrities, which serves international cuisine; and The Beach Bar & Grill for mouth watering seafood and grills. In contrast to these plush specialty restaurants, the Dining Room at the Residence & Spa, that has several tables laid out under the cool shade of the innumerable palms, is a place where you can enjoy a relaxed, leisurely meal. An added bonus is that over 80 per cent of the staff is Indian; most from Kerala but speaking impeccable Hindi.

But the most romantic moment, and my favourite, is The Jetty, the classy beach lounge where you can settle down for a couple of evening drinks as the dipping sun gives a dramatic hue to Dubai’s impressive skyline. The cool breeze blows from the Arabian Gulf, and the sound of the water weaves an Arabian magic around you.

Old world charm My special takeaway from this resort is its old-world charm…the extremely high ceilings often panelled in wood creating a feeling of abundant space; the warm, earthy colours —beige and brown —in the entire décor beginning with the furniture, the flooring, the furnishing that exudes class; the colonial ambience in the Library which houses the bar and where high tea is served each evening. The large French windows, the classic chandeliers, the wooden arches and stairways, the trelliswork, all blend together beautifully to recreate the magical aura of an ancient civilisation.

The various facilities are so charmingly and ingeniously arranged that you get the feeling of abundant space and privacy. The resort, I was told, was full, and yet, I could barely see, or hear, the guests. rasheeda@thehindu.co.in

Photo: Rasheeda Bhagat

TASTER’S choice

Photos: Bloomberg

Younger the better!

John Mariani won’t tell you to pour your five-year-old white wines down the drain. But if you don’t drink them now, that’s what you might end up doing.

The fact is 99.9 per cent of all white wines in the world do not improve after a year or two of aging. They are at their best on release, which may be the spring following the autumn harvest.

This was brought into focus after tasting a bottle of 2008 La Follette Manchester Ridge Chardonnay from Mendocino Ridge. At $48 it is among the pricier California Chardonnays - at 15 per cent alcohol it is also one of the most potent.

It’s a big wine, well made in the bold California style, not too much oak. But I felt that, at less than two and a half years old, it was unlikely to get any better in the bottle.

There may have been some oxidation, or it may be going through what is called in the trade a ‘dumb’ period, when some wines hibernate and later flourish.

So while I enjoyed the wine with a grilled red snapper, I was glad I didn’t have a whole case of it in my cellar. More and more with white wines I’m drinking them as soon as possible after I buy them.

If a wine store is selling - always at a discount - a white wine more than three years old, you can bet it’s because it doesn’t sell very well upon release

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Aging whites The vast majority of winemakers around the world give little thought to aging their white wines for more than a few months or a year in the first place.

I have, of course, had impressive examples of Muscadet,

Pinot Blanc, Chardonnay, Gewürztraminer and Riesling several years old. The greatest of all, German Riesling dessert wines are aged for many years and can be drunk with delight even decades later.

One of the white wines I’ve always been amazed by is Valentini’s Trebbiano d’abruzzo, a varietal made in huge bulk by other producers and disdained by many in Italy as nothing but a workhorse white. Somehow Valentini manages to make his Trebbiano long-lived, and I’ve had bottles a decade old that are still brilliant.

So, too, connoisseurs and producers of white Burgundies insist that the very finest, like Puligny-Montrachet, Batard- Montrachet, and the rare Montrachet itself (which sells for about $2,000) need at least three and perhaps even ten years of aging to reach true maturity.

Onion skin taste I’m sceptical and have no plans to wait that long, even if I could afford such prices.

The Brits have long exhibited a preference for what they call an ‘onion skin taste’ of old vintage Champagnes, which comes from a certain amount of oxidation, which does nothing for my palate.

I have tasted some fine old vintage Champagnes and applaud their longevity, but I much prefer younger, vibrant examples precisely because they are so fresh and blooming with fruit and acid.

Most people don’t order expensive ancient white wines, especially in more casual restaurants, like New York’s new Lyon bistro, where the best-selling wines are Sauvignon Blanc and French Chardonnay. “I personally love old Chablis,” says owner Francois Latapie, “but I don’t have

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the clientele for it here.”

He continues, “They do like St. Veran, Macon, and Alsatian Riesling, and the vintages I stock are the most recent, 2009 and soon 2010.”

Younger vintages There are, however, fine restaurants that proudly toe the line for older whites. “I look for wines that have phenomenon mineral force, concentration of fruit and can benefit from aging,” says Ruben Sanz Ramiro, sommelier at New York’s Veritas restaurant, which stocks 3,200 labels and 75,000 bottles, 25 per cent of them white. “They become better integrated and complex aromatically.

“We have old white Burgundies and even California Chardonnay going back to the 1970s - Stony Hill, Chalone, Mount Eden,” he added. “They are absolutely sound, with extraordinary acidity that protects the wines over time. In most cases when I recommend them, our guests are really pleased and surprised.”

You take a chance with every bottle of wine you open some might be corked, others oxidised by accident - which is why a good wine steward is crucial when ordering expensive wines in a restaurant.

With whites, youth trumps age most of time. When a waiter at Napa & Co. in Stamford, CT, recently apologised because the bottle of Spanish Albarino I ordered was a younger vintage than the one on the list, I just smiled and said, “Even better! Let’s see how it tastes.”

(The author writes on wine for Bloomberg News.

The opinions expressed are his own.)

EVENT meter

Fashion extravaganza While Spring Summer collections are flying off the shelves, the fashion industry is busy setting the trend for the winter months to follow. The Wills Lifestyle Fashion Week Autumn Winter 2011 showcased some of the best Indian designers’ winter wardrobe. The ramp saw fascinating silhouettes, structured dress, flowing drapes, traditional Indian prints and fabrics, chic evening wear, pastel hues and bright colour blocks. The show was kick-started by Neeru Kumar’s ode to the Indian fabrics and continued with prominent designers like Varun Bahl, Tarun Tahiliani, Ritu Kumar, Rajesh Pratap Singh, Shantanu & Nikhil, Manish Malhotra, Monapali, Anita Dongre and Sabyasachi, among others. Apart from the ramp walks, WLFW also had an interesting World of Wearable Art (WOW) presentation, with an unique blend of creative art and fashion.

Anupama Dayal

Neeru Kumar

Premium home store for kiddos Unique children’s furniture to kids art or nursery décor, the newest destination to cater to the little one’s room interiors is American brand Sandcastle. With a recently launched plush store in New Delhi, Sandcastle is a subsidiary of International Furniture Brands and offers a wide range of furniture for the 0 to 16 age group.

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A mouth-watering experience!

Have your feet ever been treated to some yummy blue berry cheesecake or perhaps a divine chocolate fondue? Well, it will soon be. Seven Seas Spas Group has launched India’s first ‘fantasy’ spa, Seven Seas Evania in New Delhi. Apart from an interesting range of exclusive therapies, the spa will also launch LaRic, a Pedicure and Manicure line.

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April 20, 2011