Click to Save up to $300/yr on calls
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12 out of 14 people found this review helpful
2.5 stars
"Wait fo the new modesl in early 2006"
Pros: Easy to use once you figure out the icon menus
Cons: Audio quality of voice calls is muffled and garbled
Summary: The 6.6 out of 10 assigned by the CNET reviewer is about right. I chose the V360 to try out an MP3 capable cell phone. A friend works for T-Mobile and hooked me up for half price. As a phone it's fair at best. The person I'm talking to often sounds muffled and distorted. Can't figure out if its the phone or the GSM network pinching bandwidth on voice calls. Quality varies from call to call. Voice messages are even worse, sometime hardly understandable. Compared the V360 voice quality to a friend's Razr V3 and mine sounds better. Not much of an endorsement, eh?
Setting up the phone was frustrating because of the icon menus and the manual not matching the menu trees. Keep looking, it's all there somewhere. T-Mobile and Moto "Customer Care" doesn't - neither were much help. This is a phone brought in from Europe to give T-Mobile both MP3 and Bluetooth. Be aware that when using a Bluetooth headset the phone has a default ringer that can't be changed. Moto may or may not fix this problem, but it's annoying since you don't get the ring assigned to your friends phone numbers when using the headset.
The MP3 does work fine - sort of. The MP3 player is buried in the games menu under the joystick icon. Silly me, looking under the CD icon for sounds. The player is very rudimentary with no tone controls. Just play/pause, advance/back, and repeat/shuffle. There is a 'visualization' function that puts colored squares on a black screen. Save your battery, which wears down fast when playing music. Make a shortcut to the Music Player so you can open it with the 'smart' button and not have to wade through six layers of menus.
You will need a special headset for stereo. I have used both the Motorola stereo headset ($25 at T-Mobile, $30 at Best Buy) and the Jabra ($30 at Best Buy). The sound quality of the Jabra is superior to the Motorola but the answer button on the Jabra does not answer the phone - I had to set up the Headset parameter to a timed auto answer (2/5/10 seconds). The Jabra also comes with the most annoying ear pieces ever devised and they absorb a lot of the sound. I removed them and use the rubber replacement rings ($4 at Radio Shack). The foam replacement covers ($3 at Radio Shack also work well. Another advantage to the Jabra is they come with a screw-on adapter so you can use them as regular stereo headphones with your walkman/iPod or CD player. The Jabra's sound better than the headphones that come with the iPod products. Unfortunately, no adapter exists to use regular stereo headphones with an MP3 cell phone.
In order to get any real use from the MP3 player the mini-SD Transflash memory card has to be upgraded. The 64Mb that comes with the phone only holds 10 - 14 songs or about 40 minutes of music at 128K. The V360 only supports up to 192K MP3, a trade-off to conserve battery by using a low power processor. The 512Mb chip is available only online (search eBay for 512 Mb transflash) and costs only a few dollars more than the 256Mb card available in local stores. Be aware that there are ring tones that come with the phone that show up in the song list. The MP3 player does not reliably read the ID tags so some songs won't show up under Artists, Albums or Genres. The result is the T-Jingle (default ring) getting played when you're expecting a song. Motorola is introducing new 'multimedia' (read MP3) phones in the US in the first three months of 2006, so wait for something more capable. (Note:Avoid the iTunes phone at all costs now that the relationship between Moto and Apple is on the rocks.) Good luck making your own playlist. Oh, and the menus don't match the manual from Moto, so be prepared to search around to find what you're looking for.
The V360 will probably cost you $200 and another $100 for the stereo headset and enough memory to make the MP3 player worth having. T-Mobile has a new Samsung slider that's a step up ($100 more for a better camera, clearer voice quality and MP3 player) and Moto has announced new models to be available in early 2006 that make the V360 obsolete. Wait for more functionality at the $200 price point or wait for the price of the V360 to drop to $100 or free as part of a promotion.
- 8 replies to this review
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The phone has the issues the original poster mentioned, but here's another thing about playing mp3 files... I bought the motorola "stereo" head phones that go with the v360 (and plug into its USB port) and they work and sound OK, except that they play the tunes in "mono" through both ears, not in stereo. I don't know if it is a software issue or a headphone issue, or a combination of the two- but I'm finding that none of my mp3 files will play in "stereo" using the stock motolorola applications with the motorola "stereo" headphones on the motorola v306. Disappointing after going to the trouble to pay extra for the special "stereo" head phones and a big enough microSD card to make it meaningful. Not aware of any fixes here... Anybody?
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I also was having problems with the mp3 tags. The problem was that the mp3 tags must be version 2.3 for the V360 to read them correctly. On my mac I was able to use the advanced tab to change all of the mp3 tags in my library to version 2.3 and now the songs are filed by album/artist/genre correctly!
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Hey there,
I lost my Digital Audio Player on my motorola v360 and there is no way i can download it if anyone knows a way please let me know i am desperate.
pls, pls, pls. -
Reading the past comments, I agree mostly with what has been said.
I like this phone, but I will mention the annoyances.
Being a T-Mobile customer, I don't expect a whole lot of help with the phone. Most answers are vague, with the "try it and see" approach to answering.
About the phone: The menus are a bit awkward, but a newer feature allows setup of shortcuts by holding down the menu button while at the function. Suggest setting up a soft key to direct towards shortcuts, it will save you time.
The memory issue isn't as bad now, but when asked about using a 1gb card, I was told the phone would probably support it. The documentation takes it to a 512mb, but anyone who has ever put a very large drive in a computer will have apprehensions.
Headsets: Correct, the Jabra will not answer or disconnect calls. Neither will the Moto OEM stereo headset. What is discomforting is that the phone doesn't seem to acknowledge the presence and you have a full ringer, other than the nice discreet beep, or other sound in the headset. The button will work for mute, but forget about handsfree if you want to dial out using voice. You will touch the phone. One other thing.. The last volume set is not recalled when you plug in the headset. I recommend plugging in first, turning down the volume, then placing the earpieces in. The unit starts fairly loud. Bluetooth headsets work as advertised, but no choice other than a tone for incoming calls.
Menu items: All seemed to be present with exception to one: Video length. I have two of these and both are bereft of this item. With the possibility of 1gb memory at this time, why limit clips to 20 or 30 seconds? This is contrary to the manual. T-Mo couldnt help. Told me " wow, be glad you can get 20-30 seconds". Pretty typical answer.
Applications: Though the apps are nice, they load slowly. Especially the MP3 player. I really wish the player was configurable. Like said before, it lists ringers, and likes to duplicate entries. Thank God for playlists.
The outside display is fair, but I wonder why phones like the Nokia 6101 has color, and this doesn't. Small point.
All in all it isn't a bad phone for the money. If you buy a second one for a seperate line, negotiate for a better price. T-mo has room to work with you. -
When I tried to transfer songs from itunes into the phone, the id tags didn't transfer reliably and therefore I wasn't able to view songs by artist or album. However, when I ripped songs from cd via Realplayer, all information transferred reliably.
Also, my phone came preprogrammed with a shortcut to the MP3 player (the bottom left outside button). I imagine that this would be consistent if the phone is purchased through T-Mobile. -
"Save your battery, which wears down fast when playing music." -- It is expected that if the phone is doing anything aside from being idle, the battery will wear down much faster. "T-Mobile has a new Samsung slider that's a step up ($100 more for a better camera, clearer voice quality and MP3 player)" The samsung phone being commented on is the Samsung SGH-T809. The T809 however has a smaller battery, making your mp3 player battery issues even worse. Aside from that, the call quality of the T809 is NOT at all better than the quality of the V360. The T809 has often been described as "too quiet". To once again address the MP3 Player of the phone, phones weren't made to be MP3 Players. Therefore, I think given that this IS a phone, the functions of the mp3 player are all the functions required and are suitable. The only time I can immagine anyone using it however is while waiting perhaps in a line, or on a bus. In that case, the stereo headsets would be a good investment, and would not at all put a hole in your pocket. Short uses of the MP3 player, such as on bus rides would not require you to purchase a larger Memory stick for the phone. The supplied 64 mb card holds the same amount of songs as the smaller mp3 players, and will suffice for mostly everyone. A larger memory card is not needed, and would simply be a waste of money to add more songs that you will never listen to. If you wear down the battery while listening to music waiting, it may easily be charged at a computer via a usb cable; so suck the battery dry if you want, because charging it is much easier than one would think. Regarding the bluetooth ringer "problem", it's not a problem at all. All motorola phones default to a "ring ring" ringtone when using bluetooth so that it may also be heard through the headset. If knowing who is calling is a concern, there are bluetooth headsets with a caller id built into them. Therefore you may see who is calling without ever having to remove your phone from say, your pocket. All in all, the phone is a very good investment, and if you are currently in the market for a phone, this one deserves an 8 out of 10 at the least.
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When I loaded my mp3,s they went under the ringtone setting, but I realized that I did not switch the system device to trans, so the songs downloaded to the phone. If you change that to trans, then all the songs download into the cd icon and also into the games and app icon. It works, you just have to make sure you download to the right folder.
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When I loaded my mp3,s they went under the ringtone setting, but I realized that I did not switch the system device to trans, so the songs downloaded to the phone. If you change that to trans, then all the songs download into the cd icon and also into the games and app icon. It works, you just have to make sure you download to the right folder.
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