Great phone with some minor annoyances
Written: Oct 29 '03
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Pros: Nice, easily read screen, good reception, thoughtfully designed, easy & accurate voice dialing
Cons: Terrible manual, side buttons too easy to accidentally press, limited ringing volumes
The Bottom Line: I easily recommend this phone. It has most of the features, gets reliable reception, has a well-designed OS and easily read color display.
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| detappe's Full Review: LG VX4400 |
I'm very happy with my LG VX4400. While not perfect, it is much better than the other flip phones I've had to try recently.
After 3 months of struggling to find a workable combination of a good phone and good cellular service to replace my old Nokia phones and AT&T, I finally found something I liked with the LG VX4400 and Verizon. Before, I had tried Cingular because of their great plans, but couldn't get reception in my home or office, even though I lived and worked in 1-2 story buildings in the metro Bay Area, having tried both a Motorola T720 and V60. So I switched to Verizon and the VX4400.
Next I wanted to get my wife onto a family share service with me. After being unsatisfied with 2 other flip phones offered by Verizon (an LG VX10 and Motorola T730), I traded in for another VX4400 and she's been happy. The reception is reliable and the battery life, while not great is at least acceptable, especially compared with the T730.
Some of the things I really like about the VX4400 are:
- The voice activated dialing is a snap to use and works very reliably even with loud background noise.
- The screen is bright and when you type in a number, they appear in huge type that's effortless to read. Such a simple idea that so few phones have implemented.
- The menus are fairly easy to navigate
- The side button is handy for turning off the ringer and putting the phone into vibrate mode, all while in my pocket
- Reception is good and the sound perfectly acceptable.
- It seems quite rugged and has survived several falls without incident
- It's small and fits comfortably in my pocket without need to use a holster.
- Has a very handy and easy to use voice recorder for capturing spur of the moment memos without need of a pen.
Some things I find a little annoying include:
- There's no even remotely quiet ring. You go directly from silent vibrate to loud no vibrate, with further options of louder, loudest and loudest + vibrate.
- The side buttons can be handy, but they maddeningly can easily be pressed when groping for the phone (e.g., from my pocket) when ringing. The first press turns off the ringer -- handy I guess -- while the 2nd push disconnects the call! There is no reason anyone would ever want that behavior, so why build it in, except to annoy?
- The manual is essentially a re-print of the menus with absolutely no explanations for some of the functions and capabilities and with little instruction in general. They can do better.
- The OK button in the middle of the 4-way circle button is too small and adjoining keys are too easily pushed by mistake.
- The supplied desktop charger is tinny and hard to get the phone onto correctly. If you're not careful and don't put it on just right, it will discharge the battery for you! After a while, however, you learn the signs and do it right.
- They make (apparently) every LG phone battery slightly different, making sure you can't use with more than 1 model of LG phones. Again, I see no reason for this except to annoy and/or squeeze customers.
- While the screen is usually bright and easy to read, in bright sunlight, it can be very hard to see
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 49 and 129
Recommended for: Stylish Trendsetters - Hip and Trendy
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Epinions.com ID:
detappe
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Reviews written: 1
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