Motorola Krave ZN4
Phone Scoop Review
Oct 14, 2008 by Stewart Wolpin & Eric Zeman
Our in-depth review of the Motorola Krave ZN4 for Verizon Wireless. See how this unique new finger-touch entry stacks up. Full review added. read review ›
User Reviews
Average Ratings
Good PHONE
I don't use Internet or any of the data features. I do occasionally send a txt message. I like having the keyboard when needed. I just want a phone that works (good reception and sound). I tried the Dare and did not like the candy bar shape, then the Chocolate 3. The sound quality on the Krave is much better than the C3. The touch screen is better than the Dare.
Good -
Sound and signal
Shape
Good battery life
Bad -
A little heavy
No speed dial or easy way to bring up recent calls to quickly dial.
Bottom line, I will be sticking with Motorola phones from now on.
Best verizon phone concept yet!
I have had this phone for a week and there have only been a couple unique problems but I have an answer for those who have trouble with the cover getting in the way while qwerty texting. If you wrap your index finger around the left side of the phone, if works pretty well. I also don't use about half of the extra features, so keep that in mind when reading this:
PROS:
very cutting edge look
sound quality
ability to take pictures from the outside
well thoughtout
touchscreen works pretty descent
music player is ipod-like
CONS:
while setting the alarm my screen starts glitching and lagging a lot
I have to hold my mouth about 2 inches from the speaker
touch screen hurts gaming
scrolling is annoyingly slow
inability to set shortcut keys
don't be intimidated by all of the cons out there if you just want to use it for basic needs, this phone was really worked on a lot and really has much to offer if you look at it the right way. 4 stars out of 5.
Finally
I got the phone after it had only been out 5 days, which was mid October. I am finally liking it.
Some of the review I read about the phone praised it for having a above average battery life. My phone did not. I completely charged it, let it die, then charge it-everything to help the battery life. But it would go down a bar(or sometimes 2) after just 8 hours of stand by time-doing absolutely nothing on it.
It wasn't until this week, that the battery is finally keeping a charge-I even went through a different battery, and another phone.
Not too sure what happened, but now that the battery is keeping its life, I'm very happy with this phone.
I do wish their was a way to talk on the phone with keeping it closed, and the touch screen does take some time to get used to. ...I'm still getting used to it, specifically when it comes to texting.
Overall I would say this is a great phone.
It's a toy AND a cellphone!
I've been a cellphone/pda power user for decades. My dream is to have the perfect all-in-one device that looks and feels slick and still has the tools and toys I need to use. The iPhone tries, but isn't it. Today's other smartphones are close, but they're not it either. The Krave ZN4 from Motorola is not even close, but I like it anyway.
PROS: It's slick. It looks good and is very portable. I don't feel like I'm holding a calculator up to my head when I use it as a phone.
The touch screen feels good. Mind you, I've used the iPod Touch and iPhone so I'm used to "sensitive" touch screens and teensy qwerty "buttons". This screen is better than the Touch/iPhone because of the haptic feedback. I get a clicking sound and the little buzz.
The menu is WORLDS better than prior Verizon menus.
Screen is very readable, even in strong light.
Talk quality is terrific. Crystal clear.
CONS: Verizon loves to put their extra-cost goodies prominently so you end up selecting their TV or their Vz Navigator when you don't want to. They make them talk and sing loudly, too. Really irritating in an office environment.
Limited customization.
Difficult to add your own ringtones. Sure, you can buy them from VzW, but to get your mp3 on there as a ringtone takes an act of Congress.
Really want a quick dial. I want that to be one of the front buttons so that cool outer screen is more useful.
The side buttons are difficult to suss out. I'll probably get used to which does what, but for now I have to squint at them to find the camera button.
No flash for the camera, and the camera res is still way too small. C'mon, Verizon! Pony up for the bigger megs!
Proprietary OS, which means it's more difficult to get your own apps on there, and who wants to make an app I can use for something that's going to go away?
The "large" clock is too small.
Junk
Don't waste your money on this thing. Within a month, it bogs down, becomes slow and unwieldy, and turns into nothing but an overpriced paperweight.
Typical Moto Crap. They've only managed to put out one quality phone in the last four years, and that's going off the market soon. Is it any surprise they're getting blown out of the water by LG and Samsung?
If you're going to spend money on a model like this, get yourself a Dare or a Voyager. You'll be much happier with your investment.
a phone you love to hate!!!!
this is one sweet phone, loud ringers, voice quality is fantastic, feels great in your hand, solid piece, man i can go on,and on!! but what me send mine back was EXTREAMLY HARD TO TEXT ON, NO EDIT OPTIONS FOR PICTURES????? AND YOU HAVE NO OPTIONS FOR THE CAMERA, JUAT 2.0MP, THATS IT??????????, A AMAZING PHONE BUT LACKING WHAT I NEED!!, alot of people wont be disappointed!!
Almost but no cigar....
the race to get product out to the market has got to slow down. Product managers and developers are not looking at what's already out there and add a few more innovative features instead of leaving out features that should be a given. For example, unless I'm missing something, you cannot enter an appointment and have it repeat every other week or a certain day /date of a month. This one kills me!! the most obvious is the lack of customability. I also wish you could change the sensitivity on the touch screen especially while scrolling. Finally there is no way to create a contact from the call list ARGGHHH !!
I have to say the call quality is excellent, the construction feels real solid and the display is top, top notch.
Oh yes, BTW, I have no idea how long the clear plastic flip piece will survive.
Good Idea, not so great execution.
After reading the reviews of everyone on here, i thought i should go form my own opinion of the phone. everyone kept hyping this phone up so i had to see for myself. I went to my local verizon store to play with the phone, at first i was impressed with the quality of the phone. It has a good feel in your hands, its not too big, and the test call i made seemed to be of good quality, and the screen was big and bright. then, being the tech geek that i am i had to check out all the menus and settings. the interface is very smooth, didn't have any delay when an item was selected. then there was the settings. you cant change much of anything on the phone, except backgrounds and banners, you know normal stuff. as far as touch sensitivity and heptic feedback settings, you cant change any of that. also, the menus on the home screen and the multimedia menu(with the flip closed) you cant change any of the menus around to customize what shortcuts you want on there. i was also unable to figure out how to get the qwerty keyboard to work with the flip closed. I'm not saying it cant be done but i couldn't figure it out, and i usually don't have any problems with figuring out electronics. all in all i guess its a good start for Moto in the touch phone business, it's definitely a step up from the A1200/Ming. They just aren't quite there yet.
Pro's
Good craftsmanship, study well built phone.
Good call quality
Good UI responsiveness
Con's
Unable to customize to user's preferences, Verizon should have given the consumer more options when it came to Menu customization.
"Big Red" definitely kept a good phone from really being great.
Nice concept, but thats it
Ok. i work for a vzw retailer and have 5 years experience in the industry. I've worked for almost every single carrier and have played with almost every touch screen phone to date. Yes the phone has a great design and feels real sturdy. But other than eye candy this phone is useless. I was very dissapointed when i finally got my hands on one. I hope with a firmware update this phone can be improved. Here's a list of my pros and cons.
cons
- screen is very unresponsive
- screen calibration is way off and can not be adjusted
- while flip closed touch screen rarely works
- even with t9 input for texting still very laggy and off calibrated
- almost every time you try to touch a certain icon the one below or above or next to it is selected
pros
- beautiful screen
- vcast, vznav, and mobile tv capable
- great camera
- loud speaker
in conclusion the feature capablites are great but the overall touch ui experience is horrible compared to many others (ex: samsung instinct, lg dare, lg vu, lg voyager, htc touch and diamond, and att tilt and iphone)
Ugh...DONT EVEN TOUCH IT !!!
I picked up this eye candy on Thursday, got it home and was I disappointed.
The phone locked up on me several times. It brought my contacts in from Backup Assistant all garbled. Applications that I wanted to delete from GIN I could not. I had to do a master reset on it on from what Customer Service told me. All in all, garbage.
Pro's
Great Ideas
Con's
EVERYTHING !!! STAY AWAY !!!
