Mar 21, 2001 03:48 AM
2923 Views
(Updated Mar 07, 2010 02:03 PM)
I bought this phone a couple of months ago, in the misguided belief that it was better than my trusty Nokia 5146, which I have had over 2 years. So money in hand I dived into Dixons, not a sensible choice
from what I have read, but anyway I handed over the princely sum of £29.99 and walked away with my new Philips Savvy on the orange pay as you go tariff.
Once home I ripped open the box to see a levely metallic blue phone, about 5 inches in length and just short of 2 inches wide. The ariel is fixed and protrudes about 1 inch above the phone.
The keypad has the usual numbers/text buttons and hash and star key. There are also 5 other buttons, a menu button, ’c’ button, green button with a telephone on it, a red button and the navigation key. The buttons are similar in size to the Nokia 5110, one of the reasons I bought the phone, as some phones buttons are too small and very fiddly to use, especially when sending text messages. The keypad can be locked again another feature essential to me, as I am terrible for running up a bill for dialling the speaking clock or something, after placing the phone in my pocket or bag.
The battery is small and very easy to install, resembling 4 AA batteries strapped together, the battery pack even has an arrow so you know which way up to insert it into the phone!! So sim card and battery installed I switched it on, by holding the red key for a few seconds.
On switching the phone on you recieve a greeting then a few seconds later a clock face appears. On the screen at all times are a battery indicator, signal strength indicator and the clock.
On pressing the menu button you are given ’names’ and 2 arrows, either left or right, to navigate you use the directional buttons in the middle of the phone. If you want to look at your address book press ’ok’ on the directional button and you will be taken into the ’names’ section of the phone. You can add a number, search for a number, scroll through all the numbers. The phone book can hold upto 90 numbers, a few less than the Nokia, but still a good amount.
There is a call register also, where you can see who has called, who you have called and any missed calls. You can also see how long you have used your phone for, in the call duration section. I find this section of the phone a little difficult to understand, as rather than telling you who has called, or who you have called etc, it gives little icons. As I an not familiar with this I got in a bit of a mess, returning calls when it was not necessary, amusing but expensive!
’Extra’ section: within this section you have a handy alarm clock, calculator, stopwatch, clock settings and boi-calendar. The others are pretty self explantatory, but the bio calander will tell you after you have put in your date of birth, what your chance level will be, your love level, energy level and your sucess level will be on any given date inputted by you. How true it is I don’t know, but I have just done mine for tomorrow and my success and chance are on 5 (top most level) which has made my day as I am having an operation! This extra section is pretty similar to the Nokia as that too has a calculator and alarm clock. These functions are handy but non essential really when considering a new phone, in my opinion anyway!
The settings section comes next, here you can set the ringer with a choice of 20 ring tones, you can also turn off the annoying keypad tones, which is a real pet hate of mine! The savvy comes with 6 alerts, silent, vibrating on/off, vibrator - continuous vibration, low, medium and deafening! YOu can also set 10 numbers to ’voice dial’, I must admit this hasn’t been a success for me as I can never get it to work.
There is a security function settings within the menu, here you can set your pin code, have fixed names - handy of you lend it to someone, as they can only dial certain numbers fixed by yourself and protected by the PIN.
Messages section, there are 8 ’usual’ messages which are pre entered into the phone. These include ’I love you’, ’call me’ ’I’m waiting’ I must admit I haven’t had cause to use any of these as yet, and feel it would be more useful if you could enter your own personal ’usual messages’ like ’get yer kit off’ and the like. You can also send pictur icons to other savvy users, things such as smile, wink and so on. If these are sent to a non savvy user, the icon shows as :o) or ;o) in the two expample given above. The main thing I dislike about text messaging with this phone is the screen carries only 2 lines of text, as opposed to the 4 lines I have been used to with the Nokia. I also find the text very slow to complete. From 2 seconds with the nokia when a repeated character is wanted to about 5 seconds with the savvy, very time consuming!
All in all the savvy is a neat little phone, with some great functions and a good look. However when compared to my battered, trusty out dated Nokia it fails miserably. As I found it very hard to navigate and use. Having said that, people who are not stick in the muds, and who are prepared to persevere with this phone, may have better luck. It is for this reason I am recommeding the phone to others, as I feel it is failing on my part that I can’t get on with it.
