Customer Reviews

Sprint Samsung Power Vision Bluetooth Cell Phone

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I signed up for a Sprint plan with Power Vision and the Samsung A920 was the choice I made for a Power Vision capable phone. The GUI interface of the phone is fine and it was easy to add contacts that I had from my old phone. It was easy to connect this phone to my laptop to use as a modem. All I had to was install Sprint's Connection Manager software on my laptop, connect the phone through the usb port of my laptop, and I was surfing the net (albeit at a somewhat slow speed) through my A920. The phone has a TransFlash slot which can accept a MiniSD card that allows extra storage for media files such as photos and music files. I currently have a 1GB TransFlash card (yes, the A920 can fully recognize the 1GB TransFlash card) and I am able to play mp3s from it. The phone is also GPS capable so it can actually be used as a navagation device if you use software such as TeleNAV or Mobile Garmin. It's very nice watching streaming video and radio with this PowerVision phone. The resolution is alright, but what can you do when it's just a small phone.

Now here are my problems with the phone:

1) Battery life - I can probably talk for two hours on the standard battery before the 1 bar of power is left. That's sort of poor for battery life. Sure, you can get an extended battery, but it adds to the bulk of the phone.

2) The Camera - There's a delay between pressing the capture button and actually capturing the photo. That means the photo isn't immediately taken. You have to hold the camera for a couple of seconds after taking the photo before it actually captures the image. Otherwise you'll end up with a blurry picture if you immediately move the camera after pressing the capture button. This is very annoying.

3) The front lcd and bright red light is on when charging. It's annoying if you charge at night and you're trying to go to sleep, but can't since the bright light of the phone is annoying you.

4) The phone only comes with a data-only usb cable. There are usb cables that charge and are also data cables for this phone, but you have to buy it separately.

I've owned this phone for a couple months now, and the device operates as an outstanding phone (good voice quality, no dropped calls, and at times I have access to the network where others using Sprint do not). The fit and finish are first rate, and it has survived a reasonable amount of wear and tear without any signs of damage. It's not the smallest phone, but I really think it's just right (I'm a big guy with big hands). I tend to use it with the extended battery, as I don't like to charge it more than once a week, and I don't mind the extra size of the extended battery. With the extended battery, a week without a charge is no problem, and I can use the web as much as I like without worrying about the phone dying from a lack of juice.

I have not had a chance to do much with MP3s, outside using them for ring tones, but I do like the ability to stick up to 1GB or transflash in the phone for storing songs and pictures. If I didn't have an iPod, I probably would use this as my primary music device (despite the annoying micro headphone jack). Besides the aforementioned headphone jack, I'm disappointed with the less than stellar Bluetooth performance (though it might be my Plantronics headset) and the fact that the phone lights up brightly when charging.

I'd give it 4.5 stars if I could, and my girlfriend is looking forward to getting one of her own when she's eligible for an upgrade.

I have to say I love this phone - with the exception of a few things which hopefully samsung will release a firmware update to fix:

No syncronization with any sort of PIM at all - not with bluetooth or the provided but useless USB cable which is used to "tether" the phone to a laptop for use as a modem

No way of reading wallpapers/screensavers/ringtones/games and assigning them or installing them from provided transflash card - or any transflash card.

The only way to add such things is to download them from the provider's site - Sprint in my case - for a fee or find an online service to send the files, which is a pain and sometimes still doesn't quite work.

I'm used to being able to add things like that almost on a whim, being a former Nextel phone user and modder but despite the drawbacks above I have to reccommend this phone to anyone looking for a really good phone to use for Sprint service. The MP3 player is excellent quality and is really limited only as how many transflash cards one uses and how much each card holds. If Samsung or Sprint fixes the above issues I'd be more than willing to give this phone 5 stars

I bought this phone in exchange of my sanyo 8400.
There are few drawbacks.I am switching back to sanyo.
Pros:
1.Looks are very good.
2.The screen has very high resolution.Images are crisp and sharp.
3.The camera fun features are nice.
4.Media player is good.
Cons:
1.YOU CANNOT TRANSFER MUSIC TO YOUR PHONE WITHOUT BUYING A CARD READER/WRITER.Buy a card reader/writer for 10$ more.
2.The phone cannot be hooked to your PC except for going online.Which means ,except for the modem functionality your PC will not identify your phone nor can you do the data transfer between your phone and your PC.Yuk.
3.Reception is average.This phone does not have signal where my other phone had signal.

First off, I thought the phone was little bit big compared to my previous Samsung A670(verizon) phone.
but, it sure has more/better functions.

when I played MP3 musics using this phone,sound quality was very impressive considering how small the installed speakers are.
There is even a slot for memory card. you can purchase upto 512mb(recommended by samsung) card, then, you can store more musics and photos.

the LCDs are so clear, you can enjoy vivid pictures (upto 1.4mb)

originally, I was hegitating whether to buy Motolora RAZR or this phone. however, when I saw my folks who use Motorola, I had no doubt choosing Samsung phone.

I trust Samsung phones' durability.

I've had this phone now for 2 - 3 weeks. It is a sturdy phone and has so many options and settings that after going through the manual a few times, I still don't know how to do a few things or what other things are for.

I like the stereo speakers, not that it is really heard as stereo on a cell phone, but it does add volume and breadth to the sound.

It's nice to have the option of having the mp3 player, but I keep hearing different reports: it will take a 1GB card and it will only take up to 512KB. Don't know which one is true.

One thing I definitely want is the ability to sync my Outlook Calendar and Contacts with this phone and I did find one application that is almost there: FutureDial. They have a paid for application that WILL sync your contacts but not the calendar... yet. I emailed them and they replied that they are working on it at this time. [...]

Other than the inability to sync, which I hoping will be resolved soon, I like the phone. When it does that, I will REALLY like this phone. Oh, and I almost forgot, I am looking for a blue tooth solution also, and am not sure if it will pair with a blue tooth stereo headset yet. I read somewhere that it doesn't - still doing research on that.

If you buy this phone, I'm pretty sure you'll like it and maybe love it if the syncing with Outlook is fully available.

They advertise this as a multimedia phone, but at the rate it devours batteries, you'll want to think twice about using it as both a phone and MP3 player. I can't even imagine the batteries it would consume as a video player.
The camera is decent (not great) and as others have noted, it seems to actually take the picture a second or so later than the phone indicates. That's not a big deal, once you understand it. But still? How difficult would it have been to sync the shutter sound to when the shutter actually operates?

The most frustrating thing about this package is the 'data cable'. Apparently, this allows the phone to function as a modem. (At an additional subscription fee.) It will not allow you to transfer files back and forth between the phone and your computer. For this you need to use the transflash card. The procedure is to remove the microcard, insert it into the bigger card, then put that into your computer's card reader. Not a big deal. But again, how hard would it have been to engineer the phone to do this through the 'data cable'?

Personalized ringtones? You can rent them from Sprint, or you can use a 3rd party web service (You will pay for text and data transmission). You cannot install them from the data cable or the memory card. Forget about it - it's simply not permitted.

The good:
Attractively styled. The screen is bright and easy to read.
The so-so:
Reception. Camera.
The annoying:
Most of the extra features are designed for Sprint to shake some more money out of your pockets - Customer convenience does not seem to be a factor in Samsung/Sprint's design concept.

I have had this phone for a year now, a great phone, the mp3 player is good too. the only real complaint I have is the delay in taking a picture with the camera, it is not instant,you have to hold the phone steady for about 3-5 seconds, this is fine for most pics but for taking pics of my kids, they dont hold still long enough

PROS:
-plays mp3s, takes pics, phone all-in-one thus eliminating the need for these items separately, which is why i got it.
-on-board software seems fine.
-stereo speakers actually work well.

CONS:
-pic quality is of that of your average cell phone (so-so). Pic-taking is not synched properly with the shutter sound for some odd reason. For some reason, some of my pics haven't saved...
-cannnot transfer mp3s/files to/from computer or with any 3rd-party data cable; uses a transflash (t-flash) MicroSD card so you'll need to shell out more cash for a decent 1gb or 2gb MicroSD card plus a USB card reader.
-since you can't connect the phone directly via USB (again, remember - you have to use the SD card), there is no easy way to transfer contacts from old phone to this one or this one to the next.
-supplied earbuds fall out of my ears every 5 seconds. 1 side of the wired earbud cable is noticably much longer for some reason. This looks and is MORONIC. Don't have any idea whatsoever what they did this for.
-supplied battery life is DEPLORABLE. you'll simply need to buy the extended battery which is more money down the drain, plus the extended battery is much physically larger and extendeds outward making the phone look odd.
-no supplied car charger

In the end, it's still a decent phone, and there aren't (or at least weren't) a lot of solutions for cam/mp3/phone combos out there at the time I got it. For example, I still don't think you can get the latest in vogue RAZR with an mp3 player and I simply won't put up with a phone that doesn't have an mp3 player option anymore. It's a widely used audio format that requires little technology or physical board space to incorporate into a phone.

I've had this phone for about 3 months, and use it along with my Sanyo (one for work, one for personal). Both are used almost equally. The Samsumg seems to have tons of features that I've not even had the chance to try out yet, and I do look forward to doing so. However, my main complaint with this phone, as I've seen other people note, is the messaging system. The T9 does not recognize the word 'me'! How can that be?? Since I use text a bunch (about 2,000 messages per month) this really bugs me. I was worried about signal strength as I've had issues with other Samsungs in the past (as compared with Sanyos) but this phone and my other seem to be comparable in this respect. Overall, I think most people would be very pleased to own this phone.