Good phone for the family!
Written: Mar 04 '03 (Updated Jan 04 '05)
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Pros: Great size and lightweight; durable phone!
Cons: Flimsy antenna which has already broken on mine!
The Bottom Line: I would recommend this phone to the active person. The antenna is flimsy and may break, but that didn't stop mine!
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| ivplay's Full Review: Motorola V120c |
Why I have one
I purchased this phone 16 months ago for my own personal use. I bought this when I signed up with Verizon Wireless, and I really enjoyed this phone except for a few things which you will see below. Since this time, my company has bought me a cell and this has become my wife's cell. She absolutely loves it!
The good
Now that you know why I have one, I will tell you that I love this phone. There are so many neat features on it, I will try to list what all I like here.
First and foremost, it feels like a sturdy little phone that you can knock around, leave in your pocket, etc. and not worry about breaking it. I wear painter or cargo type jeans frequently, and it fits very nicely into the side pocket on these. The only issue I have had with this durability and this phone is the antenna, which I will write more on later. If it were not for the antenna, I would have given it a 5 in durability. As I said, in comparison to the other phones I have had, this one is the most durable I have had!
I really like the address book function. You can add contacts in fairly easily and text looks very appealing. It is easy to pull up a contact while distracted and call them on the fly!
Also of note is the voice dialing. You can program in several numbers with voice recognition software, and then at a later time simply press the button on the side of the phone and speak the name. For instance, while driving home, I can push the button, say "home" and the phone will automatically dial. Other than while driving I do not see this as being very useful, as the menu system is not so hard to navigate that you couldn't very easily find the number. It is very handy while driving, however!
The relative size and shape of the 120C is very attractive. It appears that Motorola recognized they were getting beat by Nokia for the non-flip phones and set out to make a better one. This is definitely it! My wife and I really like the size and feel of this phone!
The battery lasts and lasts. This is a tri-mode phone which means that you can use either digital or analog. Warning: if you are in an analog area, the battery will not last very long! This is a problem with all cells, though, and not specific to this phone. With a full charge and digital service, I have anywhere from 2-3 hours of talk time. The phone retains a charge if left on all the time but not talked on much for up to five days.
The bad
I bought a leather carrying case with belt strap for ease of use. However, once I had this around the phone, my charger would not work. The leather case was thick enough that it would not allow the charger contacts to make contact. This makes it very inconvenient as you have to take it out of the leather case every time you need to charge it. Not the end of the world, but an inconvenience no less.
The voice recognition has a hard time recognizing your inputs in loud cars. As I said above, I do not know why you would need this feature if not for the car, and in the car it has a hard time picking up what you are saying. This makes it limited in its usefulness. However, if your car is nice and quiet, you have no worries!
The antenna, as I said before, is the only major downfall of this phone. I had mine broken within the first two months. This is not easy to fix as is the case with my new phone, the i-60C.(see review http://www.epinions.com/content_91800964740) However, I have used this phone with no antenna for over 12 months since and have had no bad reception, etc.
I have seen some that say this menu system is not easy to navigate. I must have had mine too long, because it is easy for me to use it now and I do not remember having difficulties with it at first. Maybe I have not had an 'easy' one yet to compare it to!
The bottom line
This is a very good, sturdy phone that I would recommend to almost anyone. I would utilize this with the family share plan, if I had a family reason to own one yet. I would recommend this for people of all ages, as I think it is relatively easy to setup and use, and with the handsfree add ons, you can utilize it safely while driving your own car.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 49.99 intro
Recommended for: Adventurous Technophiles - Tough and Durable
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