I bought this phone over a year ago, because I wanted a mobile that was:
- stylish - could be used as an MP3 player - could be used to surf the Internet (GPRS/WAP) - could interface with Outlook - was reliable - had a decent battery life
The Motorola MPX-200 fails on nearly ALL of the above.... as you can guess, I'm pretty hacked off with it!
ON THE PLUS SIDE: Well, it looks great - shiny black case, silver keys, compact... it look a well engineered, solid phone. The screen is huge, with great colours and resolution. It interfaces seamlessly with Windows XP, and especially Outlook via USB. The sound quality from the MP3 is good. And... errrmmm... that's about it.
AND THE CONS:
The battery life! It simply will not hold a charge for longer than 24 hours. I am not a huge user of the phone, but any sustained use of the applications simply leeches power like you would not believe. It was getting to the stage where I was getting 8 hours usage from the original battery... so, I bought a new one from Motorola. After a month on the new battery, I am getting... about 8 hours usage. Apparently this is a common complaint with it - the battery cannot handle the amount of effort needed to run everything on the phone! This is just not acceptable, and is the main reason I am getting a new phone.
The mp3 player! It comes with a version of Windows Media Player on it... a version stripped of all the useful functions. There is no playlist fuction, and no ability to sort tracks in any sort of play order. It come with decent headphones, bu the jack socket for the phone is 2.5mm, not 3.5mm, which mans you can't use any other 'standard' headphones from Walkmans or other mp3 players. No equalizer, or treble/bass controls... sheesh.
GPRS/WAP/Internet! This was AWFUL. The setup was one of the most complicated, difficult and annoying setups I have EVER gone through, and I'm (fairly) computer literate. Technical support from my network (02) and Motorola was non-existant. When I finally did get WAP fired up (after searching on the Web), the response time was hideous, hardly worthwhile; additionally, the installed software couldn't handle many websites.
Software/Menus! Really badly laid out, with no logical organisation, and no cluses to where key functions might be. It looks like it was designed by the same people who did Windows 95!
I can't begin to tell you how disappointed I am with this phone. It looks nice, and if you wanted it to just talk and text then it does that well - but you can get better phones at a qurter of the price for just that.
As a PDA, it has a useful interface to Outlook, but thats about it - everything else just creaks, or looks dreadful, or goes really slowly, or very difficult to set up. You're much better off buying a dedicated PDA.
It plays MP3 and WMA files, but not very well - again, you really need to think about buying a dedicated MP3 player, rather than use this.
Basically, this phone is a jack of all trades, and a master of NONE. This could have been SUCH a good idea - but instead, its a crock. Avoid.
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Just stumbled across this review and am pleased (sorry) to see that I am not the only one having a hard time with this phone. I have had it for a couple of years now because my employer pays for it, but it truly is rubbish! - Very good and fair review though!
MAFARRIMOND 29.11.2004 22:17
A well balanced review. Welcome to Ciao. Maureen
jsrennie 29.11.2004 19:10
hey good first review, i have a similar problem with my fone the battery life is terrible...but plays music well though so some plusses! j
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Review of Motorola MPx220
Advantages: Looks, Applications, Internet Explorer, Activesync Software, Connectivity to PC Disadvantages: Battery Life, Software/Phone Navigation Speed, Ease of Use, Weight (to some perhaps), reception levels
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