| Product: |
Alcatel One Touch 301/302/303 |
| Date: |
09/08/02 (485 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Looks good, speaker phone, standby time
Disadvantages: predictive text, storage, compatibility
INTRO: I am a techie (musician, recording engineer etc.) so I like my gadgets to do stuff and I use most of their facilites. However, I am mobophobic - my mobile is for txts, voicemail and very occasional calls.
GOOD: The 303 looks good, is light and compact and lasts ages on one charge. (Over a week on standby). I like the charging cradle, much better than a plug. Menu layout and navigation is quite good.
The best thing about it for me is that is has a speaker phone capability. Great for hanging on during droning menu lists or music on hold, I would really miss it if I didn't have it. Volume is adjustable via the nav key.
For a budget phone, it has a reasonable range of extras, including programmable ring tones and a library of preset text messages which you can add to.
BAD: The predictive text is terrible. It makes inexplicable choices from a non-editable dictionary and choosing an alternative word requires far too many actions (6 clicks!). Nokia's system blows it away. Punctuation is a wind-up sometimes - the apostrophe requires at least 6 clicks and the & (useful) is further away than colon and semi-colon (never use 'em). Storage capacity is only 20 messages, shared between sent and received. It just isn't enough, unless you tend to delete all messages immediately.
Somteimes the phone won't let me access messages or the phone book for several minutes after switching on.
The games are rubbish! Boring and fiendishly difficult.
MISSING: No downloadable ringtones or logos. No voice dialling. My last phone had a VIP list which had a separate ring tone - I liked that. And I think all mobiles should be made compatible with Nokia charge plugs as standard, either by design or with an adaptor. The music scene long ago recognised that brand dominance has to be acknowledged (most samplers are compatible with the dominant Akai range, for instance) and, as far as trading conditions allow, I think all phones shou
ld be compatible with dominant hardware and software systems - in this case Nokia's.
OUTRO: I'm quite happy with the 303 but if I used my phone more intensively I would probably upgrade.
Summary:
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