Cellular Telephones, Motorola V3c

kryoptic

I'm considering jumping the boat with my prepaid provider and am wanting to jump to Virgin Mobile and was eying the Motorola V3c. They apparently changed the pricing today but I think I can still pick one up for $199 in-store. I've read around and reviews are somewhat lackluster but to be honest, I'm mostly after the looks. I'm not a heavy phone user at all. I have a hard time spending my $10/mo. at 30c/min each month. Spending this much on a phone that I'll hardly use seems counterintuitive but I just really like the way this thing looks.

So question, does anybody have or has used one who feels like telling me how it is? Hardware wise, is it durable? Software wise, is it responsive? My current bottom of the barrel cheapest phone has a response time of 1/2 a second and it's... annoying. Is this any better? I played around with a V3 but I wasn't really paying much attention to the software. It feels nice to use though the side buttons are kind of a pain.

Thanks for any advice you might have to offer.

catalyst

I have a V3c and have actually had it since last year.

It's a nice phone, very thin (duh) and easy to put in your jeans pocket. It does everything I need it to do. I'm also a light phone user and send the occasional text message. The T9word function is great for text messaging and rarely scews up.

Speaking of durability, it looks fragile but I'd beg to differ. Ive dropped this thing from about 6 feet above pavement and its only sustained minor dents in the finish. This could be due to a lucky drop or resilient plastic. Most major sustained damage is a chip in the plastic towards the bottom of the phone.

The worst part about this phone for me was the software. I have Verizon, so you probably won't have to worry. I bought the phone with the first version of the software was loaded onto the phones. It took about 4-5 seconds for anything to happend after I hit the menu button from the home screen.

I got this remedied by taking it to Verizon and getting the software updated, it is nice and smooth now.

Overall, I'd recommend it...keep the software up to date if you can. There are also some fun modding tricks you can perform if you are brave. Check out Howard Forums for some interesting tips/projects.

blanknogo

I have this phone. I don't recommend that you get it based on the following reasons:

Battery life - it sucks. My phone barely lasts 1.5 hours of talk time. That sounds unusual, right? Well, I've had the phone replaced once, and the battery replaced twice. I still get that same 1.5 hours of talk time and what works out to be about 24 hours of standby. That is really, really terrible. This is particularly so if you don't use the phone that often and don't have constant access to a plug in (car, home, etc). Imagine this: You've had your phone on all day and haven't used it once, then when you finally need to make that emergency call, it dies.

Mini-USB plug. The mini-USB is the only input plug this phone has. Sure, you can use Bluetooth, that's great. But what about those 1 dollar corded headsets that are incredibly useful? And don't even bother with any car plug ins or other power adapters you might have (I've had phones that use the same ones before) - they won't work. And if you're like me and like to keep the phone plugged in while you talk with a corded headset... well, you can't. Only one plug - one thing at a time.

Those are my complaints about this phone. I recommend you consider another option.

kingmetal

blanknogo wrote:

I have this phone. I don't recommend that you get it based on the following reasons:

Battery life - it sucks. My phone barely lasts 1.5 hours of talk time. That sounds unusual, right? Well, I've had the phone replaced once, and the battery replaced twice. I still get that same 1.5 hours of talk time and what works out to be about 24 hours of standby. That is really, really terrible. This is particularly so if you don't use the phone that often and don't have constant access to a plug in (car, home, etc). Imagine this: You've had your phone on all day and haven't used it once, then when you finally need to make that emergency call, it dies.

Mini-USB plug. The mini-USB is the only input plug this phone has. Sure, you can use Bluetooth, that's great. But what about those 1 dollar corded headsets that are incredibly useful? And don't even bother with any car plug ins or other power adapters you might have (I've had phones that use the same ones before) - they won't work. And if you're like me and like to keep the phone plugged in while you talk with a corded headset... well, you can't. Only one plug - one thing at a time.

Those are my complaints about this phone. I recommend you consider another option.

I don't have this phone but I know several people who do, and if you're only getting 24 hours of standby and you've replaced the phone and the battery then you're probably doing something wrong, the technology gods hate you, or you are dealing with amazingly incompetent technical support.

DekuStick

I've got the V3c and Virgin. I love it. Never buy stuff from VXL however. You can get songs and pictures onto it using Motorla Phone Tools V4.

My phone has lasted about 2 days playing full length songs and minimal talking. It's only got like 40mb in it but I just really like certain songs.

kryoptic

Thanks for the input. I'm not big on the headsets so that's not an issue for me and it seems okay. I'll see if Walmart is still selling it at the lower cost today, Future Shop seems to have changed it already.