Sprint SANYO SCP-2700 QWERTY Phone

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With devices like the Samsung Magnet competing directly in this mega-low-cost portrait QWERTY space, expectations for quality and style are pretty frigging high here.If Sony hadn't already used the appellation, the Sanyo SCP-2700 could easily be called "My First Cellphone." For just $30, your pre-teen or tween gets a barebones, but stylish candy bar phone with a full QWERTY keyboard and all the non-verbal communications options necessary – but little else. Sprint and Kyocera SANYO have announced the SANYO SCP-2700, a slim and affordable messaging device in a simple block form factor.

Blending a QWERTY keypad with vibrant colors, the SCP-2700 will be available in both Impulsive Pink, with a subtle floral overlay, and Deep Blue, has a tactile square designer pattern on its back.

This affordable CDMA messaging phone sports a QVGA display, QWERTY keyboard, 1.3 mega pixel camera with Geo-tagging, GPS navigation, Bluetooth, and voice control.The candybar 2700 is actually very comfortable to hold, both with one hand and two. The materials are less than high quality, and despite the comfortable feel the feel is as low end as the price. The keyboard keys are rubber nibs, which are a bit cramped and feel cheap. Still, the keyboard performs quite well and we were tapping out accurate messages rather quickly.The keys are raised just enough and they squiggle from side to side, which actually makes texting very easy. The ringer is so loud you can hear it in any room in your house. The speaker phone feature is pretty loud but very clear! It has threaded text messaging.

The phone feels good in the hand, but the glossy surface does make it prone to fingerprints.It has a 1.3 MP camera, but doesn't record video. It doesn't have a microSD card slot. And it's not EV-DO. Oddly, it does include Sprint GPS navigation, hardly necessary for those too young to drive. Other than the music player, however, it's doubtful a child will notice these missing amenities or care about its GPS capabilities.

The dedicated camera key is below it. It doesn't feel as good as the volume toggle, and comes off a bit mushy, with no firm click until you're really pressed it down. There is a microUSB port on the left side of the phone for charging and data transfer. The right side of the phone has only a 2.5mm headset jack.You can pick it up for just $29.99 after a 2 year agreement. This is definitely one of it’s biggest selling points as Cnet mentioned. But the fact that it’s very slim, has an excellent user interface, a very touchable keyboard and has great messaging support make this phone a very decent buy.

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The new SCP-2700 has 2.2-inch display supports 65,000 colors and the keyboard offers a fair number of shortcut keys.You can upload photos to your favorite social networks using Sprint's Social Zone application, which gives you access to Photobucket, MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, and more. In the menus the display looks good enough, but then looking at pictures it quickly becomes clear that the color saturation just isn’t good enough. The display is easy enough to see however, even in high lighting conditions which make it usable.

The SCP-2700 features Bluetooth integration and Sprint Navigation allows users to utilize turn-by-turn directions given by voice or shown on-screen.You can access the internet, texting is very very easy, the Navigation is great! Not only doe sit give you directions, but it will give you address and phone numbers in 10 seconds. For texting, e-mail, and Twitter, the SCP-2700 is an absolute star. The SMS client shows messages in a threaded format, so you can easily carry on several conversations at once. Sprint's e-mail client, from Seven, is one of the best in the business.

The IM client, from OZ, handles AIM, Microsoft Live Messenger, and Yahoo. On the flip side, the QWERTY keypad's tiny keys are closely bunched, but humped to help separate one from the other. Our slim adult fingers made few typing errors, though we suspect a child's smaller fingers/fingernails will be able to tap far faster and furiously than we. Unfortunately, you'll have to memorize where the number and punctuation keys are. The number icons on the pink version we tested are pink-on-gray and, along with the tiny gray-on-pink punctuation marks above the alpha characters, are impossible to read in anything but bright ambient lighting conditions.

This his and hers duo sports a QWERTY keypad .The keyboard is well executed. It is very tiny, and I feared for a moment that I would have trouble using it. The full QWERTY keyboard on our production review unit shows remarkable improvement over the units we saw at CTIA just a few weeks ago.At 3.4 ounces, it's light as a bundle of feathers. But when combined with the unit’s smooth, but cheaply rounded plastic enclosure, this light weight makes the 2700 feel as if it actually was a toy – not a plus in our book.

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It's doubtful a child will notice these missing amenities or care about its GPS capabilities. Sprint Family Locator uses GPS technology to locate a child's phone and displays the location on an interactive map.That's great if you have a tween who's not quite ready for picture messaging, for instance. Parents can also track their kids' phones with GPS using Sprint's Family Locator service, which is also available on the Samsung Rant. Sprint Navigation provides full-feature GPS navigation, including voice and on-screen, turn-by-turn driving directions and more than 10 million business listings.

The main focus of the Sanyo SCP-2700 is messaging, and for the most part it does well. Conversations are threaded which is always great, but it’s a bit backwards since the newest message is at the top and not at the bottom as is customary. This is in line with other devices running this operating system though, not unique to the Sanyo. Like the Rumor 2 the keyboard features an emoticon button, though most other phones won’t display the smiley images.

If you're into media, this is not the phone for you: The SCP-2700 does not have music or video players. You get NASCAR and NFL applications, as well as a few game demos, but the phone didn't perform well on our JBenchmark gaming benchmarks. There is a microUSB port on the left side of the phone for charging and data transfer. The right side of the phone has only a 2.5mm headset jack.

There is no music client on the 2700. If you're looking to rock out while your get your messaging action on, move along. It ain't happening with the 2700. Ringtones and other notifications could be set to insanity-inducing levels. In other words, the 2700 is plenty loud, and you're only going to miss calls if you're in the loudest environments.

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The keys have a great shape to them and the perfect amount of travel and feedback. The only criticism I'd voice is that there's a little bit too much side-to-side wiggle with the keys. This is only noticeable if you wiggle them on purpose. I didn't notice it when typing out messages. Sprint has a healthy lineup of messaging phones that have full keyboards but don't run the powerful apps or require expensive data plans.While the Sprint Sanyo SCP-2700 has it’s good and bad points, their final analysis of the phone is: With its great messaging interface and affordable pricing, the Sanyo SCP-2700 offers excellent bang for your buck.

Specifications:

1. Screen Size: 2.2 inches
   
   
2. Screen Details: 320x240, 65k-color TFT LCD display
   
   
3. Camera: Yes
   
   
4. Megapixels: 1.3 MP
   
   
5. 802.11x: No
   
   
6. Bluetooth: Yes
   
   
7. Web Browser: Yes
   
   
8. Network: CDMA
   
   
9. Bands: 850, 1900
   
   
10. High-Speed Data: 1xRTT
    
    
11. Processor Speed: 92 MHz

Over all the call quality is good, the keyboard is better than it feels and the price could be lower, but not much. Still, we think Sanyo could have done a few things, such as add a microSD slot, to win some market share.The Sprint SANYO SCP-2700 will be available in pink and deep blue color schemes on May 10 for $29.99 with a two-year service agreement and after a $50 dollar mail-in rebate.

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The contacts applications is simple and straight forward. A search bar at the top of the contact list lets you scan through your database.From the contact list, the left soft key automatically initiates a text message, as does the dedicated text button. The right soft key brings up a short list of options, such as edit, pre-pend, delete, etc. The one feature I really like is the "set as secret" feature.

Its signal is amazingly consistent where I live. Nearly every phone I test on the Sprint network exhibits the same signal coverage, and the 2700 is no different. It shows two bars of coverage in most of my house, but drops to zero bars or one bar in my basement.Battery life was good. I managed to eke out a full 4 days on a single charge. That was with moderate SMS and voice usage, but not a whole lot of web browsing. With heavy use of the browser, you can expect to lose a half-day of battery life.

SANYO SCP-2700 Features:

• Integrated 1.3-megapixel camera with 12-step digital zoom and 2x magnification
  
  
• Equipped with Sprint's Social Zone, allowing quick one-button access to Photobucket, MySpace, Facebook and allowing users to post mobile photos and updates from virtually anywhere
  
  
• Sprint Family Locator allows families to locate their loved ones
  
  
• Text messaging capable with threaded messages and quick-access button
  
  
• Sprint Navigation with GPS-enabled audio and visual turn-by-turn driving directions, one-click traffic rerouting and more than 10 million local listings
  
  
• Sprint Mobile Email for access to POP3 email, including AOL, Yahoo!, Windows Live and Gmail as well as corporate email
  
  
• Rear-ported speakerphone with dedicated key
  
  
• Wireless Backup to manage contacts list in the event that the phone is lost, stolen or damaged
  
  
• Built-in tools, including calendar, scheduler, to-do list, world clock, calculator, stopwatch and alarm clock