I've had this T730 for about 9 months now, an upgrade from a 3 year old StarTac that gave up the ghost. I never could bond with the StarTac due to its unintelligible menus and command structure, and hoped this new generation would be better. It is, but not by much. I remain a person who is unmoved by all the poorly-implemented functionality in cellphones, and cannot understand why so many people love them so much. To me, they are a constant irritant.

The improvements over the Startac in this T730 for me were the phone book, the ability to see who's calling while the phone is shut, and the battery life -- unlike some other reviewers, I find the battery life to be quite good. But among the irritants are spotty charging of the battery -- sometimes the phone will say it is charging, but after an overnight charge it will remain with a dead battery. I also hate the boot-up/shutdown sequence. Both take far too long and I have not yet figured out a way to make the thing do either of those functions silently without playing incredibly annoying music while it does so - just what you want in a serious environment when you realize you forgot to turn the thing off.

I made the mistake of buying the accessory charger (the Motorola product, not an aftermarket one) and cannot believe how awful and cheap the thing is. It has a useless analog clock in the front that I cannot set, but don't care about anymore anyway because its battery is apparently now dead. The charger supposedly will take a spare battery and the phone itself, but it does not do both simultaneously. Useless. Plus, instead of just having an AC adapter to plug it into a wall outlet, you need to use the phone's travel charger! So forget about having one charger at home and another at work -- you need to buy a second travel charger to use the accessory charger. Inexcusable, and a triumph of awful engineering.

So I remain disappointed in cellphones and await the next upgrade window to ditch this one and try to find one that actually thinks the way I think. So far, no luck.

Recommended: No

Amount Paid (US$): 100
Recommended for: Stylish Trendsetters - Hip and Trendy