The best verizon phone
Written: Mar 19 '02
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Pros: Awesome screen, stylish, good reception, loud ringer, strong vibrate, wireless web
Cons: Somewhat awkward in hand, menus need improving, long antenna, small buttons, games worthless
The Bottom Line: If you want Verizon (which you probably should), you will also want the SCH-T300. Although it has weaknesses, it is hands-down the best Verizon phone.
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| tsaimelv's Full Review: Samsung SCH-T300 Cell Phone |
In my opinion, Verizon has one major weakness -- phone selection. Verizon's selection of cutting-edge phones has always trailed behind Sprint's selection, the cornerstone of which is their phones from Samsung. Samsung phones have always been a favorite of mine for their technology, ease of use, and quality. So, when Verizon introduced the SCH-T300 into their lineup, I immediately took notice and decided to grab one.
For a bit of perspective, my last phone (with Sprint) was the Samsung SCH-8500, an amazing phone that leaves little to be desired. It had wonderful navigation, good battery life, and awesome clarity. But the SCH-8500 is now yesterday's news, and has been surpassed by a host of new Samsung phones with some incremental improvements. In fact, many new Samsung phones seem to be simply repackaged SCH-8500's (i.e. the SCH-N150 available with Verizon). But this is not the case with the SCH-T300... With a gigantic new graphics LCD and a host of new features, this is an almost an entirely new phone from Samsung.
First and foremost, the SCH-T300 simply LOOKS impressive. In standby mode, the gameboy-ish screen can display either some pictures (a forest, an animated cheetah, etc.) or a variety of time/date display options, one of which is a cool digital time readout with characters over 1 cm tall. This is great for looking at the time from a distance.
The size and shape of the T300 is quite good; it has a very solid feel to its construction. The SCH-T300 is thinner and much lighter than the SCH-8500 and it fits in my pocket better. Unfortunately, the T300 does not seem to "sit" on your face as well as the SCH-8500 does and it takes a while to find the talking sweet-spot. Yes, the antenna is long, but I've never noticed an improvement in call clarity with the antenna extended, so this is not too much of a disadvantage. Nonetheless, even when retracted, the base of the antenna protrudes a bit too far for my tastes.
Unfortunately, one of the major strengths of the 8500 was its awesome and tactile keypad, which has been replaced with a mushier and smaller keypad in the T300 which can be annoying if you have large fingers.
Signal reception on the T300 is as good as it gets, but the call clarity of the SCH-T300 seems to be worse than on my SCH-8500. Nonetheless, some of this is the Verizon network and not entirely the phone (despite their problems, Sprint always seems to have the best voice quality). The microphone is not as close to your mouth as it is on the SCH-8500, so unlike on my 8500 I can no longer whisper or speak quietly and expect someone to hear me very well. Even the small nokias (i.e. the 8260 from AT&T) seem to have better microphone pickup than this phone, despite having a microphone that is even farther away from your mouth and having no "phone flip" to direct the sound.
Navigation of the menus could use some improvement, but this does not get in your way of daily use. Each of the 10 top-level menu items is represented using a graphical icon, and you must use the rubberized "pointer" button to push your way through the menus. At first I didn't like this button, but after a while you get used to it. These menus contain seemingly hundreds of options, most of which you will not have to touch but it can be useful for customization. If you've ever used a Samsung phone, the menu contents themselves are not much different than with previous phones.
Disappointingly, the phone book is not as good as the SCH-8500's. Displaying an alphabetized version of the phone book has significant lag compared to the 8500's (we're in an instant-gratification society!), and the phone makes poor use of its screen by displaying oversized characters for the phone entries. This allows the display of only four phonebook entries at a time, whereas the screen is easily capable of 10+ lines of text. At the very least, the speed dial has not been changed, and luckily I use this for most of my dialing.
The wireless web is amazing on the T300. Displaying a full nine lines of text in wireless web mode, it's an incredible improvement over other phones if you use it frequently (like I do).
The ringer options have improved on the T300. Not only is the ringer even louder than on the already-loud 8500, it has many more volume-level settings. The volume is easily changed by the navigation buttons on the side of the phone, a feature I've always loved. The vibrating ringer is extremely intense in this phone, much more than on the 8500, and when its vibrating it's surprisingly loud but you can't really hear it through a pocket.
Some features that I rarely use on any phone are things such as voice dialing, voice recording, PIM features, and games. This is no different with the SCH-T300. The PIM functionality on Samsung phones are somewhat useless IMO, and the four (highly graphical) games on the SCH-T300 are also pretty worthless. To make matters worse, I cannot figure out how to turn off sounds on the games, which makes the them even more worthless in a classroom or meeting!
The battery life on the T300 is quite good; I get about 2.5 days of standby and plenty of talk time. This is better than on the 8500, but not as good as some other phones such as the Motorola V120 and the Nokia 8260. From experience, the T300's talk time seems to be disproportionately better than its standby time, which is understandable considering its large LCD (backlighting traditionally consumes a lot of power) and its intense vibrating ringer.
Despite its weaknesses, I must say that I would highly recommend the SCH-T300 for anyone considering Verizon. I've used about three phones from Verizon, and this one is definitely the best. This phone has bee available from Radio Shack for a while, and was recently introduced on verizonwireless.com.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 199
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Epinions.com ID:
tsaimelv
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Reviews written: 1
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