Siemens AX72

...ON SCREEN

Siemens seem to have stolen the formula from Motorola, or whoever first came up with the idea of having a menu divided into 9 blocks across the screen rather than a long list. Personally, this works for me, and if only the "soft key" wasn't made of galvanised, er, plastic, and was actually SOFT, I might be able to access my phonebook. Instead, I have a welt on my thumb. Nice.

VERDICT

...
...But my gripe with the Siemens AX72 is not due to the lack of high-tech applications, it's because they've cut so many corners in actually assembling it that it makes it very difficult to use (see gripe above re: softkey). In fact, ALL the keys are clunky and plastic and unresponsive, and for a fast texter (though I do say so myself) this proves to be a nightmare.
The colour schemes, also, good grief! This may seem like a minor issue, but when ... more

First, let me just say that I bought this phone as an emergency back-up. My old phone, a very pleasant Motorola V635, was starting to go to sleep at random times, and until I got it fixed I needed something to talk into and hear out of. Nothing fancy, nothing fun to use, just a basic phone. And lo and behold, that's exactly what this phone is.
I'm with Virgin Mobile so I got it online using my Red reward points (fantastic idea, by the way) for £20 (with £10 free airtime), paying £2.99 for delivery.

STATS & FEATURES

NB. For all you techno-heads out there, please note that I am purposely not including every single specification of this phone because, well, I think a lot of them are boring and people ignore them anyway. For full statistics there are a million and one dedicated mobile phone websites out there. Cheers!

Games: 3 (Marble Crossing, Sea Battle and Wappo 2) I haven't played them so I have no idea if they're any good, but judging by the reaction speed of the phone, probably not very.

Colour Screen: Yes, a meagre 65K resolution ensures pixels aplenty. Good job there's no camera eh.

Music Player: Nada

Camera: Nyet

Video: You're kidding, right?

Ringtones: Yes! 32, polyphonic. Not "real" tunes, mind, like a nice Moonlight Sonata or Carmen, but the lame copyright-free guff produced by out-of-work DJs.

Bluetooth: Nope

Infrared: Nope

WAP: Yes. Though you'll be asleep by the time it's connected.

Band: Triband

Standby Time: Up to 220 hours

Talk Time: Up to 300 min

Dimensions: 104mm x 46mm x 17mm

Weight: 76g

Plus you get all the other vital ingredients like a calendar, stopwatch, and different wallpapers. You get the idea.

LAYOUT ON SCREEN

Siemens seem to have stolen the formula from Motorola, or whoever first came up with the idea of having a menu divided into 9 blocks across the screen rather than a long list. Personally, this works for me, and if only the "soft key" wasn't made of galvanised, er, plastic, and was actually SOFT, I might be able to access my phonebook. Instead, I have a welt on my thumb. Nice.

VERDICT

Okay, okay, so I paid £20, what did I expect? And the mad thing is, ten years ago this phone would have been top of the range. But my gripe with the Siemens AX72 is not due to the lack of high-tech applications, it's because they've cut so many corners in actually assembling it that it makes it very difficult to use (see gripe above re: softkey). In fact, ALL the keys are clunky and plastic and unresponsive, and for a fast texter (though I do say so myself) this proves to be a nightmare.
The colour schemes, also, good grief! This may seem like a minor issue, but when you highlight something in a list, you want to know you'll be opening the tool you want. If the "highlighter" matches the background to such an extent that you get confused, you find yourself continuously looping round and round the menu trying to hit what you're looking for. And that's when phones get hurt.

I think you get the picture by now. Pay £20, get £20 worth of phone. Though I just wish Siemens had spent less time recording rubbish ringtones and put more effort into building the blasted thing. I've had it for about three days now. What are the bets it doesn't last until Christmas?

CONCLUSION

Bog standard. Good for someone who's never owned a mobile before (do these people exist any more? Even babies gurgle away on them now)
Don't buy this as a cheap alternative to a half-decent phone (like I did) because you'll spend the whole time you own it cursing yourself for being a tightwad and not putting down an extra £30 to get something that actually works. Ok, rant over! 

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