Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsExcellent, if you don't expect a smartphone!
Reviewed in the United States on January 31, 2019
I have been using this phone as my main cell phone for 9 months. I was formerly an Android user, and wanted to get away from smartphones.
Overall, I've been very happy with this phone. The ringer is loud, speakerphone is loud, and call quality is solid. Besides phone calls, I do some texting. I find the T9 texting with predictive text to be fairly quick, once you get the hang of it (sometimes VERY quick!). Sure, it's not as fast overall as a smartphone keyboard, but I like that, because it makes me not want to text all the time! In my life, I want texting to be limited to short messages conveying important information, such as "traffic - running 15 minutes late." I don't want to carry on long, involved conversations via texting. I prefer to talk on the phone for that.
I like some of the other features of the phone, and find them quite usable. The mp3 player is fine, and even supports a playlist. I've used it on many morning hikes (I put a 2GB card in the phone and carry plenty of songs), and have often used bluetooth to connect the phone to bluetooth speakers and car stereos. The sound quality is great. My only complaint would be that the interface is slow inside the mp3 player. That might be because I am using an external card with many songs - I'm not sure.
I sometimes use the stopwatch, countdown timer, basic calculator, and flashlight. They are all solid.
I didn't expect the camera to be great, and it's not. But it has come in handy a number of times when I was in a store and wanted to take a picture of a product or product label for later research. If the lighting is bad, however, it's hard to get a shot that isn't blurry. Even good shots don't look great on the little phone screen, but when I upload them to a computer using a usb cable (very simple to do) they look much better.
Here's what I wish was better about the phone:
(1) When texting, I wish there was a way to save words in a custom dictionary. For example, if I want to spell an ethnic name, I can't use predictive text - I have to choose one letter at a time. And then the next time I want to use that name, I have to do the same thing again. I wish I could save the name in a custom dictionary that the phone would later use as part of predictive text.
(2) There is no notepad type app. Yes, the keypad would make typing long notes impractical, but it would be handy to be able to save some simple notes on the phone. I end up texting myself, which isn't ideal.
(3) The phone "times out" very quickly, turning the screen off while I am pausing to think. For me that means when I press a button to turn it back on, I am at the lock screen. I like a lock screen to prevent" butt dialing," but I wish I could increase the time before the screen turns off.
(4) There is no way to remove the bloatware games, which I have no use for.
Despite those limitations, I'm very glad I bought the phone. It does what I need it to do, is well constructed, and doesn't use much battery. I didn't mention the 3G data support, because I can't get it to work on my cell company's network in my city. This is the network's fault, though, not the phone's. But I don't need the data features, anyway.
Consider your needs and expectations carefully! As for me, I would buy this phone again.
