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View Full Version : low cost camera phone to replace my V3m/SCP-8100


cwerdna
05-12-2008, 06:18 PM
I'm a cheap plan ($30/mo Fair and Flexible 200 min plan w/nights and weekends starting at 7 pm) and am looking for something to replace the Motorola Razr V3m that I accidentally dropped in the water. I'm temporarily back to my old Sanyo SCP-8100. I don't plan to upgrade to a higher plan or one w/data.

My primary usage is voice and I've probably sent/received <20 SMS messages in my life on phones where I pay for service.

To make a long story short, I was to be eligible for a $150 off towards a new phone in Oct 08, but reactivating the SCP-8100 apparently bumped it for another 2 years. :( Sprint ended up giving me $150 credit on my bill immediately (I think the date still got bumped, need to check w/them).

So, I'm looking for a relatively cheap phone to minimize my out of pocket cost. Any recommendations or ones I should stay away from?

The new phone must:
- have Bluetooth
- have a camera (rules out Sanyo S1)
- let you transfer multiple contacts at a time via Bluetooth
- be cheap
- have decent battery life

Would like:
- decent camera w/higher than VGA res (I've seen the pix from the Katana, they're terrible compared to the V3m)
- better ergonomics than the V3m (hated the placement of the volume, voice command and camera buttons)
- repeating notification that I have voice mail
- visual notification of voice mail WITHOUT having to touch the phone (like a flashing light or envelope icon that's visible at all times w/o pushing buttons)

Don't care about:
- web browsing
- SMS and MMS
- flip vs. candy bar style
- paying more for PDA capability although a Centro might be nice if I can get it cheap
- music playback (already have an 80 gig iPod Classic and a 1 gig Shuffle)
- games

The camera isn't THAT big a deal, but I just loathe the idea of getting something w/a terrible camera when other cheap phones have had better cameras for ages.

I don't think I'd buy another V3m again since it:
- was slow
- had stupid limitations (like being unable to know I have voice mail w/o touching the phone)
- had buggy firmware (acted like it had sticky keys)
- had poor ergonomics (too easy to accidentally start up the slow camera when trying to change volume).

cwerdna
05-14-2008, 01:31 AM
^ Bump

Any suggestions? FWIW, I think the Katana and Katana II are too primitive along w/the Sanyo SCP-3200 (b/w LCD and poor camera).

How about the Samsung M520?

 
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