Let's talk the Motorola Razr

[Aaron]

So I've never had a phone I liked as much as my Razr. It's small, light, easy to use, and does everything I need and nothing more. Plus I'm familiar with it, and I love the texting program (It learns words). I get over it's short-comings (Battery life, slow processing).

I bought a new V3 Razr off eBay about 2 months ago, since I put my previous phone through the washing machine. Up until yesterday, it's been fine. Then yesterday, out of nowhere, it starts to fvck up. I mean out of nowhere. No water, no sunlight, no excess heat, nothing out of the ordinary. But I flip it open, and half the screen doesn't work. The bottom 1/3 of the main screen is all white. The information that is supposed to be displayed there, is now displayed at the top of the screen, covering the usual information there. It's pretty fvcked up to look at and use. But it's only like that half of the time, the rest, the screen is just all white, no info at all. So it's a crapshoot on whether I see nothing, or mumbled sh!t.

Anyone had any similar issues? Is there a solution, other than new phone?

[jelly2m81]

V3 razr worst fucking cell phone I had the displeasure of having.

Cheap feeling, scared the fucker would break when you touched it, Worst battery ever, you need to recharge it after just turning it on and the Bluetooth capability absolutely sucks.

Cut your losses and buy a real phone, not one made flashy by the advertisements and everybody jumping on the bandwagon of having that ' cool ' phone.

Had great luck with my Samsung, it even went for a swim in the saltwater when the old man knocked me off the wharf with his 4 wheeler ( epic lulz!), fell out of my pocket many times onto the shop floor, and I only charge it to make use of the charger it seems.

Wife currently had a LG chocolate flip, seems decent. The bluetooth works flawlessly in it. Though she had a battery issue but it seems to have resolved itsself.

[Indy]

Samsung FTW. Dropped one in a parking garage a couple of winters ago, and didn't notice it. Ran over it with my car, then when I realized it was missing, I traced my steps back to the parking garage 8 hours later and literally chipped it out of the 2" deep puddle it had frozen inside. Worked for about a month after that. Pretty decent interface, had it for 2 years.

[Aaron]

V3 razr worst fucking cell phone I had the displeasure of having.

Cheap feeling, scared the fucker would break when you touched it, Worst battery ever, you need to recharge it after just turning it on and the Bluetooth capability absolutely sucks.

Cut your losses and buy a real phone, not one made flashy by the advertisements and everybody jumping on the bandwagon of having that ' cool ' phone.

Had great luck with my Samsung, it even went for a swim in the saltwater when the old man knocked me off the wharf with his 4 wheeler ( epic lulz!), fell out of my pocket many times onto the shop floor, and I only charge it to make use of the charger it seems.

Wife currently had a LG chocolate flip, seems decent. The bluetooth works flawlessly in it. Though she had a battery issue but it seems to have resolved itsself.

know it's old school, but I like them for what they are, minimalistic. They have everything that I use, and nothing more. No qwerty keypad in this massive gigantic flip phone that can fly planes I don't even know the names of. It's like a Fiero, it's only got sh!t you need, everything else is left out. One of my favorite quotes of all time:

"The cup is neither half empty nor half full---It's merely twice as big as it needs to be."

I'm thinking I'm SOL. However, I have an old old Razr V2 that still works great. The reason I bought a V3 is because I was told the 3 rings and vibrates at the same time. Turns out, it doesn't. So for my uses, it's the same as the V2. So I'm going to go back to my V2 until I break it. I'll look at the Samsung phones, do they make ones for Verizon? Any like the Razr in size and features?

Thanks!

[CincinnatiFiero]

For Durable minimalists I've always favored a Nokia, had great luck with them in the past. Had a Sony Ericsson, it was a piece, tons of features, but never worked. Currently have an iPhone, great, but very much not what you are looking for. I would just keep buying unlocked V3s on eBay, they aren't very expensive.

[whipped]

I like my Razr. Does everything I need and then some.

[The Dark Side of Will]

I have an LG ENV. As a phone goes, it's only mediocre. It has a LOT of user interface gaffes that just make it obnoxious. The worst is that when it rings and I push the button to QUIET the ringer, it still makes noise to tell me a missed a call ( A: I know that because I QUIETED the ringer without picking up and B: I QUIETED it because I want it to be QUIET) AND makes noise to tell me I have a voice mail. It makes having my cell go off in meetings triply annoying and embarassing.

The eccentric mechanism is SO loud and vibrates the phone so hard that turning it to vibrate in a meeting doesn't really help.

Verdict: get a phone that's a phone. Don't waste time with something that tries to be a fashion accessory or a music player or a symbol of your inimitable coolness.

I've even heard complaints about the iPhone when used simply as a phone.

[CincinnatiFiero]

iPhone cannot:

text a picture (that I have figured out)
camera does not zoom
does not shoot video
cannot re-send a text
cannot forward a text

The iPhone does all of this amazing hand wavy shit, but there are little nuances that the $29.99 managers special nokia can do that the $199.99 iPhone cannot do. But I love it. Carrying an iPod, Camera, and Cell was a bitch. The iPhone camera is decent (the last two pages of my 3800 thread are all iPhone), got a thousand songs in my pocket, and it makes calls. I love it. If you're the way aaron describes himself when it comes to phones, don't waste you time, but it is a very fun gimmick if you've got $200 + the $20 data plan.

[derangedsheep]

Had a Sony Ericsson, it was a peice, tons of features, but never worked.

Which one did you have? I have a Sony Ericsson right now (w810i) and it's the best phone I've ever had. Previously I had a Nokia 3100 and a Motorola V180. I wouldn't recommend a Sony though as they seem to be hit or miss on quality. My brother had one (w580i) and it was a pile and my mom had a similar experience with a w580i too. I will have had mine for 3 years in September and it's been great.

Anyway, if you're looking for a phone that is great as a phone and doesnt have all the BS, I would recommend a Nokia. Also, check out the cnet cell phone reviews: http://reviews.cnet.com/cell-phones/

[CincinnatiFiero]

I had a W600i, well I had 4 with the Cingular warranty.

Oh, the iPhone does not show the time of each text, only periodically will it toss in the time and date.

[lucky]

I LOVE my Ericsson Z750.
It looks like a normal flip phone. It has a 4 megapixel camera, a 2 meg video camera, both zoom, night vision, red scale, negatives, and turn the image into cartoons; pics can be texted, emailed or sent straight to your snapfish account, also can edit photos before or after saving. It has an MP3 player (up to 8GB memory card optional), FM radio, XM radio ($8 a month extra). All the usual bullshit, day planner, calculator, alarm clock, etc. With a usb cable not only can you transfer your photos or music, you can use it as a thumb drive for any kind of file you want.
It is only slightly glitchy at times, but I really didn't have any problems with it before I had dropped it a half a dozen times. My only big qualm is that when the bluetooth is on you can watch the battery discharging. Also the predictive texting isn't quite as good as the V3, but I got over that pretty quick.
Oh yeah, it was only a $30 up-charge over the free phone from ATT.

A aron, you want another cheap V3 let me know, I have 3 in very nice condition that will be going up on ebay shortly anyway.

[Blue Shift]

I've been packing an LG VX-8600 for the last couple years. I liked the blacked out, clean design of the thing, which is what caught my eye at first. It's a standard flip phone that's sort of razrish, but not so needlessly thin. I've dropped it on concrete, rocks, dropped then kicked it/tripped over it. It's fallen off my car, and I've gone back to pick it up off the street. it's been thrown around repeatedly, splashed by every car fluid known while following me to junkyard and under the car. I take no measures to protect it, and it's proven to be quite durable. The one thing that may help is that I got one of those otherwise lame fake leather cases, which helps soak up the damage. Mine's way overdue after 2+ years. Hell, I think I got it in 06?

It doesn't have any new bells and whistles, just a 1.3MP camera that'll do if you have absolutely nothing else. You can store pics on a microSD (my JVC HDD camcorder coincidentally uses the same card), and you can bring MP3s onboard for those times you want to hear a song or two during a trip away from civilization, again if you have nothing else better to do the job with. Don't bother with trying to browse the web. Bluetooth works pretty good if you have an earpiece for driving.

Functionally, the thing I like most is that you can turn the volume up pretty high - I can't hear worth a shit. This is a huge plus since there's been times using a borrowed phone that I simply cannot understand what is being said. It has speakerphone which works alright as well. The best upgrade you can get is an extended battery pack. I literally have no need to charge the phone for one week at a time. Maybe more if I don't talk much. It just fits inside that optional case, which hides the bulge.

A week of use between charges, rugged, and loud, that's about all I need. They've made a VX-8700 now with a stainless steel case, if that's your thing. But anyways yeah.

[Fastback86]

My fiance has a Razr and it's a massive pile of shit. I'll bet the original Nintendo has more processing power than that thing, and god forbid it gets more than one text at a time. If it were my phone, I would've purposely destroyed it years ago. I have an LG Dare that I love and I used to have an LG VX-something that was about unbreakable.