Motorola v300 review

12 May 2004 10:50 GMT / By Dan Leonard

The Motorola V300 looks and feels great. Hardly surprising, Motorola have been producing quality clamshell handsets since the StarTac days, and this is no exception. The blue panels feel soft to the touch, with surrounding crisp chrome.

The flip hinge is reassuringly strong, but as the phone is small (89 x 49 x 248 mm) and light (122g), it won't wear out your pocket. Gone is the blinking Motorola service light (a pet hate from earlier models), replaced with 2 line (96 x 32 mm) external screen that displays the operator logo, time, battery and signal in a blue LED.

Open the handset and you will find a 65k TFT colour screen (176 x 220). Where previous models have suffered from poor navigation, the v300 offers a range of menu options and you can redesign your menu lists, and reprogram the hotkeys.

There's side mounted volume and phone book options, as well as a central navi-key. The main number buttons themselves are a mix of two shapes- but the added space between keys helps avoid typing errors. Not just a pretty case, it packs a good 5MB internal storage, with sensible file management to keep things tidy and optimising loading speed.

You can Assign photos to the address book and desktop, or on the model we tried loaned to us from T-Mobile hit a T-Zone to share and download. Some nice java games are included, stuntman and monopoly, and the phone was set up to download games, screensavers, wallpaper, ringtones and interactive content from T-Mobile's T-Zones. The Standard Battery delivers up to 200 hours standby and 390 minutes talk time. The battery is built in to the handset of the phone, which means the aerial is external.

Although lacking in Bluetooth and a rotational camera, the v300 really packs a punch, bringing all you would expect from a java-enabled phone. The rest is all here- full calendar with date alerts, PIM functionality, java games, email support and one-2-one chat. Sound wise, you can choose from 21 Embedded Polyphonic ringtones, 4 MP3 ringtones all broadcast via a 22 Khz Polyphonic Speaker, with 22 Chord support. Also included on the v300 is the MotoMixer (Remixable MIDI ringer software), allowing the more musical to further customise their sounds. If you really must, you can test those bedroom DJ skills on your phone, blending your polyphonic bleeps- something however we suggest you avoid.

Verdict

This is another strong, stylish handset from Motorola that offers great looks and durability that are matched by the clear signal and wealth of features making this a strong contender in its class.

This product was kindly loaned to us by T-mobile.

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Review Recap

Made by: Motorola
Price as reviewed: £price dependant on contract
The good: The Flip; killer battery; java games
The bad: (At Launch) single network
Quick verdict: Hopefully this great model will have travelled across networks since launch, because it's great. Shortlist if you're upgrading.
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