Motorola i205
Average Ratings
Vanilla is the most popular flavor you know!
I have used this phone for 2 years in the Houston, TX area via NEXTEL. It was issued to me by my employer and is required for my job. Now on to the phone....
This is a plain vanilla phone and that's not a bad thing. It has a full featured contact list that makes my wife's RAZR feel like a pad and pencil.
The sound quality is decent both using as phone and speaker phone. The only problem with the speaker phone during Push-to-talk (PTT) is usually the other person holding it too close to their mouth and speaking to loud when they use it.
The signal strength and dropped calls have become an issue in the Houston area since the merger with Sprint.
The ringer is loud loud loud if you want it to be even though the included ring tones are really poor. Unfortunately I can't change them as some features have been disabled do to being a company phone.
If you just need a phone then this is for you. Remember, plain'ol Vanilla is still the most popular flavor!
Pros:
Good Sound Quality
Powerful address/contact list
Easy to use
Cons:
Slow to power-up and read SIM
Signal Dead Spots worse since Sprint merger (Houston)
Great Simple Phone
Reading all these reviews that think that this is a horrible phone need to think about what you are buying, if you even paid for it because they are being given away by Nextel.
I used this phone as a temporary replacement after my primary phone broke. It wasn't quite the i730 that I had before, it worked, and that was all that mattered.
PROS
-Decent RF Performance
-Good Battery Life, for a Nextel
CONS
-No Java Apps
-No Color Screen (Come on, its a free phone)
Pretty much I think that the i205 is great as a phone, and only a phone. If you want to have a color screen and other gadgets and gizmos, then you are going to have to put out a little bit if money and maybe get an i560, just my .02
Wish my phone worked
I was told a great phone when I bought it, but since then nothing but problems! I constantly have dropped calls, call failed messages, and the phone always says redialing when I try to make a call, but never actually redials. The Direct Connect doesn't seem to work to good either. My phone has been to service now twice, in the last 4 months just for this problem (still not fixed). I am on an ongoing quest with Nextel to just get a phone that works. Its not worth buying a phone like this, to never be able to use it when you need it.
Kinda cool
The only cool feature is the GPS- that's it.
The phones reception sucks, I lose signal totally when the phone rests on my keyboard (and I'm on a second floor of a building, right next to a window) My old i1000 gets fine signal even in the same location. Go figure...
At any rate, there are no games, and the screen (B&W) is pretty tiny and when navigating menus, you can't see everything. You have to "hover" over it in order to get it to flash back and forth- scrolling so you can read it all.
The phone is a pretty nice size though- it looks just like the Nokia phones that a lot of people have, much nicer than the i30sux was. It does feel rather flimsy- I wouldn't trust it to survive a drop, but for $50 w/service, or eBay special boostmobile (what I did) it's not a bad entry-leve phone.
The GPS locater for me is the strong selling point- hopefully it will work even when the phone doesn't- ie when camping away from the highway. I like to know where I am.
Overall, the phone is o.k. my personally biases persuade me AWAY from Nextel but that aside, this phone will do the basic job for you in a nice little package.
EXCELLENT replacement phone.
This phone is your basic Nextel DC phone. I really liked it because it had good battery life and good reception. The phone was tough and durable and the ability to change the outer "plates" was really neat. The speakers were loud and the vibration was really good. This was a very cheap phone and a very good one too.
Motorola i205
Wow. I had this phone for far too long. I don't see why anyone would need this review now, but I just wanted to give a proper send off to this hated phone of mine.
Service was never all too bad until the merger with Sprint.
Worthwhile features: nada
What it doesn't offer: -it doesn't even have calculator
-does not display missed calls when phone is off
-recent calls only displays the very most recent call to or from and individual, no indication of how many calls you might have received from that person
-GPS worked once for me
-sometimes would just decided on itself not to receive calls (thanks sprint)
-dropped just about every call over five minutes once Sprint came aboard
So I suppose it was a decent vanilla phone and got the job done, until Sprint came aboard. Heavy as sin and a real burden to have in yr pocket. But those twits at Sprint locked me into a dastardly contract. Looking forward to T-Mobile.
decent phone
Phone is simple and works for the most part like it should. The biggest problem is not the phone but the servide. I hate Nextel and I am so glad to be done with my contract and have Cingular now.
The phone is fine, Nextel sucks
This phone is what you would expect to get for free. It works fine. Dropped calls are frequent, but this is a service issue, which is simply that Nextel is horrid (I used to to do their customer service, trust me). The phone is durable though. Dropped it, kicked it... Just would NOT break. Blame the service, not the phone.
I Like It
As with any carrier there are going to be spots where reception isn't what you would like it to be.
That being said, my Nextel experience has been the absolute best cell phone experience. I've been on AT&T, Alltel, T-Mobile, Verizon (5 differnet phones), Nextel and now my wife is on Cingular, so I also carry a phone on her Cingular plan, so we can talk for free. She still calls me on the Nextl about half the time because I get better reception in the data center on the Nextel than any other phone I've owned.
Now on to the phone. It's a phone, that's all I want it to be (plus some decent address book functions - which it has). I want a solid phone that provides good reception and durability. And that's what I've got with the i205.
The address book will store multiple numbers per contact - something my co-workers bemoan the lack of in their phones (even Moto) from other carriers. I have used the text features to gradualy replace my pager, and find it to be reasonable. The only feature I would really like is Bluetooth.
The speakerphone is also very loud and clear on both ends, as is the normal in-call use.
Sure I occasionally long for a Treo, or a phone with a color screen, or a camera, or some other feature that I lack. But when I pickup those phones at one of the stores and play with it for a couple of minutes, I really appreciate the simplicity and reliability of my i205.
PROS: Solid, reliable phone, great call quality
CONS: No Bluetooth (a minor lack)
