User Review History
GravityFails's review of the Huawei Mercury
original version, submitted Jul 26, 2012, 4:35 AM:
Crazy Little Thing Called Muve
It'll save me some trouble to simply rush headlong to the point; it's a hard life for wireless OEMs in North America; each company is under pressure to produce the Next Big Thing, and any of them can disappear in a flash. (Some, like Nokia and RIM, are just waiting for the hammer to fall.) Huawei is not known for their top-shelf devices; some of their stuff is bleakly utilitarian, and some of it has been simply awful, but if there's one thing that will eventually help them tear it up in the West, it's that they don't try so hard. To be clear, the Mercury is not a top-shelf device either; instead, it's a perfectly competent, sometimes surprising mid-tier phone at a perfectly reasonably low-to-mid tier prepaid price.
Like most techno-whores, I have one vision of the perfect phone, and I want it all; a luscious screen, a tight build, and an economical user-interface that doesn't bury essential functions beneath four or five unnecessary taps. The screen on the Mercury is not going to woo any Apple aficionados away from their iPhones, but its 480 x 800 pixels spread across 4 inches of LCD real estate provide a decent visual experience without sandblasting your corneas into mush.
The build quality is first-rate, though I must admit that I'm going slightly mad at the fingerprints that collect on the glossy rear panel; it wipes off easily enough, so don't lose your head if you're like me and smudges drive you stone cold crazy. (Smudges and fingerprints don't stop me now that I've gotten used to touchscreen devices, but who wants to live forever wiping off their phone?)
The miracle here is that Cricket and Huawei have proved that they can play the game, as they've crammed so much into such a diminutive price point; two hundred clams and fifty-five bucks a month gets you 1000 minutes, with unlimited text, data, and access to Cricket's impressive Muve Music library.
It's almost like it's a kind of magic.
edited Jul 22, 2013, 7:17 AM to the current version:
Crazy Little Thing Called Muve
It'll save me some trouble to simply rush headlong to the point; it's a hard life for wireless OEMs in North America; each company is under pressure to produce the Next Big Thing, and any of them can disappear in a flash. (Some, like Nokia and RIM, are just waiting for the hammer to fall.) Huawei is not known for their top-shelf devices; some of their stuff is bleakly utilitarian, and some of it has been simply awful, but if there's one thing that will eventually help them tear it up in the West, it's that they don't try so hard. To be clear, the Mercury is not a top-shelf device either; instead, it's a perfectly competent, sometimes surprising mid-tier phone at a perfectly reasonably low-to-mid tier prepaid price.
Like most techno-whores, I have one vision of the perfect phone, and I want it all; a luscious screen, a tight build, and an economical user-interface that doesn't bury essential functions beneath four or five unnecessary taps. The screen on the Mercury is not going to woo any Apple aficionados away from their iPhones, but its 480 x 800 pixels spread across 4 inches of LCD real estate provide a decent visual experience without sandblasting your corneas into mush.
The build quality is first-rate, though I must admit that I'm going slightly mad at the fingerprints that collect on the glossy rear panel; it wipes off easily enough, so don't lose your head if you're like me and smudges drive you stone cold crazy. (Smudges and fingerprints don't stop me now that I've gotten used to touchscreen devices, but who wants to live forever wiping off their phone?)
The miracle here is that Cricket and Huawei have proved that they can play the game, as they've crammed so much into such a diminutive price point; two hundred clams and fifty-five bucks a month gets you 1000 minutes, with unlimited text, data, and access to Cricket's impressive Muve Music library.
It's almost like it's a kind of magic.
