Taiwanese electronics maker Acer expanded its Android smartphone line-up with a new handset called the Liquid E1, and it's not washed up at all.

Acer unveiled its new offering in China, introducing the Liquid E1 as a mid-range smartphone in hopes of finally seeing some success in today's highly-competitive smartphone market.

Acer may be popular for its laptops and high-end systems, but when it comes to smartphones, the Taiwanese hardware maker still has a long way to go, especially with the likes of Samsung, Apple, HTC, LG, and other giants dominating the smartphone market.

The mid-range Acer Liquid E1 sports decent specifications, but no bells and whistles. It packs a 4.5-inch IPS touchscreen display with a resolution of 960 x 540 pixels, a 1GHz dual-core processor, and runs on Google's Android 4.1 Jelly Bean operating system. The latest Android version is 4.2, also called Jelly Bean, but Acer made no mention of an update to that version.

The rest of the handset's specifications are equally decent, yet somewhat mediocre for a mid-range device. The Acer Liquid E1 has a 5-megapixel front-facing camera with 720p HD video capabilities, a VGA front-facing camera for video calling, and 4GB of internal storage with a microSD expansion slot for additional storage. Regarding the expansion slot, however, it remains unknown at this time just how many gigabytes one could add. The phone features a rounded design that seems to go well with its 4.5-inch display.

Other features include a built-in FM radio, as well as DTS audio support. The handset also packs a 1,760mAh battery which will reportedly support up to eight hours of talk time and roughly 400 hours of standby.

The new Acer Liquid E1 smartphone will make its debut in China, but the company did not offer any specific details regarding the handset's release or pricing. Acer did, however, tell the Inquirer that it will release the Liquid E1 smartphone in Europe as well, and it will offer more details next month, at the upcoming Mobile World Congress (MWC).