Samsung SGH-ZX20
Average Ratings
This feels good!
My Moto 557 drowned in a bucket of water. A sad death to a reasonably good work horse of a phone. I use over 2000 min per month but would not consider myself tech savy. I went to the Cingular store in northern Ohio and got a new Nokia 6210i. Took it back in just a few days because the volume would automatically slide down to about half after each use. Also my bluetooth would not automatically pair with the phone. I looked around quite a bit till I stumbled on the ZX20. The Cingular store just got them in. I like the feel and it was reasonably easy for me to figure out the basics. The nokia was menue after menue after sub menue to get anything done with it. This phone is able to do streaming video (news clips, weather, soap operas etc. ) something I doubt I will want to pay Cingular $19.99 per month for. It does have a mini memory card slot and is capable of becomming an MP3 player. I may use that feature???
The outside display ( clock) is in greyscale but the inside display is really spectacular. The speaker phone is good. Reception is good. So far I am pretty happy. My kids will have to show me how to use the more advanced features. It has a 1.3 meg. camera whitch means nothing to me. I bought it ($100.) to be a phone.The kids at the Cingular store were polite and actually helpful. It aautomatically pairs with my Motorola blue tooth. Even they couldn't get the Nokia to pair automatically.
Cons: only 2 so far.
1. does not have voice dialing (as far as i can tell). I wish it did. It has everything else . Why not voice dial?
2. I wish it was a little easier to flip open. They could have designed the body with a little indent to make it easier to flip open. (what were they thinking?)
Sorry for being long winded .
I think this phone is a safe bet.
I guess it's what's on the inside that counts...
This phone has everything you could ever want in a phone packed into a handset that looks a little too much like the Motorola V400.
I've been using the phone for about a week, and I'm torn between the zx20 and cu500. Anyways here's my review...
PROS:
HSDPA
Cingular Video
Awesome Camera
Micro SD
Battery Life
Rubber feeling buttons
Email
Brilliant Internal Screen
Call Quality
Reception
CONS:
Monochrome External Screen
Looks like a basic phone
Can't change skin
No stereo speakers for speaker phone or CV
Heavy
Confusing Text Message Process
Overall this is a good phone in a horrible phone's body. When Samsung releases an HSDPA phone that's thin and fashionable for Cingular I will be there. This phone just doesn't cut it for the price.
Decent phone... at least on 3G
Decent phone - needs a few tweaks
Pros:
- Quadband GSM, dual band UMTS/HSDPA
- Decent battery life
- Camera with flash, rotating lens
- Clean calls on 3G
- Decent data rates on WAP
- Decent rates tethered (~600kbps on bluetooth, ~1Mbps on USB)
- Hacker menus - *#1546792*# 3 4 will allow you to pick your band (great in weak 3G areas).
*#1546792*# 4 *#2456987*# 3 1 1 gets you into 'test' mode. Audio gain tables are there as well
Cons:
- Difficult to find accessories (ie case, car charger)
- GSM audio quality isn't the greatest
Dropped by Cingular
Great features!!!
Ok, now the problems.
- Cingular dropped sale of phone shortly after release because of problems with the phone.
- battery is subject to shorting out
- 3G service is very flaky, often results in dropped calls.
Drops calls constantly
My company bought this phone for testing purposes. For work, I run voice and data tests using very sophisticated software that my company designs.
Anyway, I can tell you that I have had this phone replaced twice because it kept dropping outgoing and incoming calls everywhere it was locked on to a 3G network. GSM works fine, but UMTS is really bad. The only way I could get to hold a call was to constantly reboot the phone. Both phones did the same thing yet they had different firmware, so the software was not necessarily causing the problem.
Cingular is shipping the A707 to me, and it is supposed to be on it's way as I write this review.
I have tested the LG-CU500 and hands down it is a much better device than the ZX-20.
Samsung ZX-20
Pros
-HSDPA (high speed data) is nice and stable
-With an unlimited data plan you can hook up this phone via USB or Bluetooth and get 1.2Mpbs DL 300kbps UL.
-Inexpensive
-Voice call quality is very good when on a 3G network
Cons
-Voice calls drop constantly. It is still a phone, and the main thing here is to make calls right? well, not on this phone.
-Looks and design are so 5 years ago. Nothing worth showing off.
