SCP4500: This Compulsive Researcher's Choice... for his Momma!
Written: Mar 26 '01 (Updated Mar 31 '01)
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Pros: Gobs o' features, including speakerphone and voice dialing. Super cool looks, great quality, easy navigation.
Cons: Gobs o' features can be a little overwhelming at first.
The Bottom Line: Once again, I've researched them all, and there ain't a better phone than this one. Trust me.
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| vara's Full Review: Sanyo SCP-4500 |
As I've always said, I'm very careful about any purchase I make. However, when I'm making a buying decision for someone else who trusts my judgment, I am all the more cautious. Well, Mom needed a phone, and guess who was picking it for her? Yep, yours truly. So, the hunt was on.
I'm a happy owner of this phone's predecessor, the SCP-4000. Frankly, I've never regretted my purchase. I was really conflicted at the time on which phone to buy. After I bought it, I quickly realized I could not have done better for myself... that is, until the SCP-4500 came along. Like a dumb fish, I was suddenly lured by its futuristic metallic sheen and all its gadgetry. Sadly, I wasn't about to plunk down the cash it cost to buy the phone and activate it (BTW: Sprint PCS requires that you pay an activation fee when you buy a new phone, whereas AT&T does not).
Still, like the good son that I am, I was happy to do my mother a favor by steering her towards this phone. She's not... how do I put it... technologically inclined, but I still felt that this was the best phone she could buy, bar none.
* * * * * * * * OTHER MODELS CONSIDERED: * * * * * * * *
Yes, we did look at all the phones in the Sprint PCS store, and they all received a fair shot. They were as follows:
Samsung SCH-8500: This was the toughest call for my mom. She wanted the convenience of a flip phone, but there were two strikes against this particular model. For one, it costs $20 more than the Sanyo. No big deal. However, strike two came when a Sprint representative came over and whispered "don't buy that phone, Samsungs are returned here all the time". That did it. Sure enough, I walked over to the service department and I found out that three of these phones were being serviced that day. I was also informed that a couple SCH-3500 models were being repaired as well (whew... I had once thought of buying that one for myself!). We believed the representative because the Samsung was the most expensive model there (so why would she tell us that without us asking for her opinion?).
In addition, the Sanyo had better battery life, and basically had more features.
Motorola Talk-about: This phone interested my mom a little bit, but I remembered some of the negative comments I had read on Epinions.com, and told her to stay away from it. She asked the same representative about that phone and she said that there weren't problems with returns per se, but customers complained it was a little complicated to use. That scared my mom away!
Denso Touchpoint: The Denso phones were nice, but to put it simply, they didn't "do" anything for either one of us. We finally moved on to the Sanyo.
... and oh, what a phone it was. In the end, mom bought the Sanyo (with a $50 instant rebate printed from the Sprint PCS website), and has been happy with it ever since. It's taken her a while to learn the darn thing, but in all, she really loves it. She lent me her phone for a week, just so I could get a good feel for it. And here are my impressions...
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * EXTERIOR: * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Side by side with the SCP4000, the SCP-4500 is taller by a centimeter or so, and thicker. It's heavier, too, and whenever I carried it around, I could feel it in my pockets much more than my SCP4000. For those who don't know how big the SCP4000 is, it's often been compared to a Snicker's bar.
Still, without question, the SCP4500 is a cool looking phone. Its silver finish, large blue display, and visible speakerphone on the back have gotten plenty of "oohs" and "aahs" from my friends.
I'm also glad that Sanyo kept the four-way navigation button. It makes cruising through the phone's many features a breeze.
Build quality of this phone is top-notch. I can vouch for the quality of these phones because I've owned the SCP4000, and have been pretty rough on it. I've dropped it in parking lots, I've sat on it, I've rammed it into walls... and it still works like a champ. The SCP4500 feels like it can take on the same abuse. When I went from phone to phone in the Sprint store, I could really tell the difference in craftsmanship... no other phone feels as solid as the Sanyo does.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * CALL CLARITY: * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
If this phone has a good signal, the clarity is very good. I won't mislead you by saying it's like a regular phone, because it isn't. The person you're talking to usually sounds kind of "digitized" and every now and then there are little half-second pockets of silence. Plus, conversations with this phone are kind of half-duplex. By that I mean you usually cannot be talking while the person on the other side of the line is talking. Conversations are in more of a "walkie-talkie" fashion.
Still, every single cell phone I have ever used sounds like this. Cell phones have improved immensely, but they still have a ways to go before catching up with land lines.
* * * * * * FEATURES, FEATURES, AND FEATURES: * * * * * *
If you think I'm going to list off all the features this phone has, you're crazy. There's just too many. I'll name the major ones of interest.
Speakerphone! Even on regular phones, speakerphones aren't as good as when you use the phone regularly. Sadly, such is the case here. When you use the speakerphone, you really talk in "half-duplex". Plus, sometimes people will complain that your voice gets cut off when you talk to them.
Even so, this feature is no gimmick, guys. I've used it numerous times. In the car, it works great... no need to put on one of those headsets (although this phone does have that capability). The quality isn't as good as if you used the earpiece, but it is still a very, very useful feature nonetheless. This was one of the features that sold my mom on this phone, and she's glad that she went for it.
Voice Activated Dialing and Voice Memo:
I listed this feature next on purpose. Put simply, the only time you ever have to touch the phone while you're driving is to press the speaker button. Then, you can use the voice dialing to call someone and use the speakerphone to have the conversation! You know the drill: you program someone's name and number into the memory (there's 10 slots for this), and then all you have to do is push the "speaker" button... a female voice asks "please say the name"... you say the name as you programmed it and presto, the number is dialed. This feature has never messed up on my mom, and I never could fool it in my week of ownership. This is no gimmick of a feature either, guys. It's very useful, and an important safety feature when driving.
The voice memo feature is nice for storing 10 one minute reminders to yourself.
Long life battery: Supposedly, the battery has 12 hours of standby time, which is the best that's out there right now. We haven't gotten that kind of battery life out of the phone, but a good 5-6 days of casual use go by before the phone needs charging. The speakerphone drains the batteries much more than when the earpiece is used, as you can imagine.
Cool ringers! Show me a phone that's got better ringers than this one and I'll buy ya an island. The little melodies on this phone actually have harmony and percussion to them. They are plenty loud, too. Best of all, they aren't near as annoying as the Nokia ringers (sorry, Nokia owners, no offense). You can even modify the tempo of these songs. Mom's favorite is Pachelbel's "Canon in D".
Unfortunately, you can't download new ringers... :(
Wireless Web: You might use it, you might not. I've had it for over a year now and love it. However, one mistake lots of people make is to assume that you can browse all of the Internet. Unfortunately you can't yet. Right now, it's only the web sites that participate in the Wireless Web networks. Still, you can do so much stuff. To name a few things, you can read the news, check your stocks, check sports scores, buy movie tickets, buy airplane tickets, check the weather, receive and send e-mail, and even bid on eBay.
(Unfortunately, when you use the Web, Sprint deducts it from your minutes. AT&T doesn't.)
Scheduler and Planner: It's a basic weekly planner that allows you to write events. It's equipped with an alarm to remind you of them if you want. It even has a "call reminder"... if you have to call someone at a certain time, just enter it in the phone, and then when the time comes, the phone will beep, and the number will be drawn up for you. All you have to do is press "talk".
Multi-storage phonebook: I can't say enough about this feature. My SCP4000 has it too, and it's great. No one has just one phone number these days. On other phones, you'd have to type stuff like "John Doe home" and "John Doe work" and so on. All the numbers stored under one heading is convenient and faster.
Environment Settings: You can actually choose preset settings like "outdoors", "meeting", and so on to modify how loud the phone is... not just ringer volume, but key beeps, receiver volume, and even whether the backlight turns on or not.
KEYLOCK! My SCP4000 has this feature too, and it's indispensable. When activated, accidental button pushes are ignored. This is good for when the phone is in your pocket or a purse.
Remote security: Talk about nifty. If you lose your phone, you can send a text message to it through the internet, and it will activate its "security mode". This will prevent others from finding your phone and running up your phone bill. Most cool. I wish I had that.
T9 Predictive Text entry: In case you don't know what this is, it's a convenient way to enter text into your phone. This is mostly for the purposes of typing stuff on the Wireless Web (which this phone does have), but it's also useful for entering phonebook names. Once the phone "learns" a name that you type in the phonebook, it adds that name to its dictionary.
The way T9 text works is that the phone anticipates what word you are trying to type. Let's say you want to type the word "phone". Type the numbers that have those letters on them, and the SCP4500 anticipates what word you're trying to type. Sometimes, you might type keystrokes that could spell out more than one word. An example, is the word "cat". Both "a" and "c" are on the number 2, but this is no problem. Just type the keystrokes 2-2-8. The phone chooses "act" as the word, which is wrong. But, if you press the number 0, it chooses the next word that could be spelled by those strokes, spelling "cat". With my SCP4000, I can type, but to spell cat, I have to type 222-#-2-8. I know this may be confusing you. If that's the case, go to a Sprint store and try it.
Note: Studies have shown that T9 text entry is faster and more accurate than alpha typing.
* * * * * * * * * * * * WHAT DON'T I LIKE? * * * * * * * * * * * *
I usually don't like it when people are too positive in describing their products. Well... yeah, I've been singing nothing but praise so far, haven't I? But seriously, I've really, really tried to find things not to like on this phone. I honestly cannot come up with anything too bothersome. My very minor complaints are as follows:
Speakerphone sound quality: I've mentioned this shortcoming already, and it's my number one complaint. It's still useful, but can be a headache.
So-so signal strength: Sadly, this phone suffers from the same problems my other Sanyo has, which is merely adequate signal strength. If I go deep into buildings or underground, the phone loses its signal. Meanwhile, my friends with other Sprint phones are chatting away. This isn't a huge problem because 9 times out of 10 the phone does fine. But it does have its hiccups.
Bigger size: While still small and light compared to many other phones, the SCP4500 ain't no Tiny Tim... that's my phone, the SCP4000. I guess I had just gotten used to carrying such a small phone around that when I started carrying something a little bigger, I took notice.
A little confusing at first: When you first start using this phone, it's easy to get lost in the vast array of menus. It's not a confusing setup, mind you. It's just that there is so much stuff that this phone does that it is a little overwhelming at first. Still, I had the phone for a week without the manual, and I figured it all out on my own. Most importantly, MY MOM figured it out. Believe me... if SHE can do it, YOU can do it........ no offense, Mom...
Lame games: I told you I was reaching... the games on this phone are pretty blah. There's a crab game and a slot machine game. Play them a couple of times and you're tired of 'em.
VERDICT: WOULD I STEER YA WRONG? THIS ONE IS TOPS.
Deciding to recommend this phone to my mom wasn't the easiest thing, you know. I wanted to make sure I picked the best one for her. And honestly, this phone really was. If you don't think you'll need so many features, you just might be wrong. My mom is not very demanding at all. In fact, when she bought the phone, she thought it had a few too many frills. She now uses almost all of them and can't imagine using another phone.
Yeah, I'm a Momma's Boy, I guess. And if this phone was good enough for Momma, then it's a keeper.
EXTRA INFORMATION:
- Another Sanyo phone is coming soon, and it can actually download MOVIES from the Internet. Problem is, it costs over $500. So, the SCP4500 is a safe bet for now and won't be replaced anytime soon.
- There are plenty of eBay auctions and online retailers selling these phones. I advise that you be careful buying used ones... make sure you know everything there is to know, and make sure the phone's been deactivated. Also, be on the lookout for rebates!
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 179 - 50 reb
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Epinions.com ID:
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Member: Daniel Ramirez
Location: Miami Beach, FL
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You want a 15 word autobiography? Are you mad, sir?!
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