- Average user rating: 3.0 stars out of 412 reviews Back to product review
- My rating: 0 stars
Full user review
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80 out of 87 people found this review helpful
4.5 stars
"MOTO V551: I work in the wireless industry and can provide some very useful info...please read on"
Pros: 1. Rubberized and therefore durable and rugged-it can even sustain water! 2. Decent Camera and video 3. Reliable
Cons: 1. Like most motos, doesn't have much capacity to hold recent calls, would like the option to choose how many are saved. 2. When unlocked, internet featured don't work...
Summary: I actually work in the biz and have sold AT&T, CINGULAR, NEXTEL, T-MOBILE & SPRINT. I currently have the 551 and it's one of the best phones I've had-and I can choose just about any phone I want! But anyway, I hope a lot of CNET users read this review b/c it will be helpful for those who weren't properly informed by their sales rep about their phones, service, etc.
First off Powell is dead on about perserving the battery life. I have has many customers needed new batteries after only a few months, and many who are irrtate and complain that the battery life sucks. The battery didn't do it-you did! (of course I don't tell customers that, but it is true) What I do explain to them is that to get your battery to last as long as possible, you must treat it right-and not charge it every night when it has full bars. Ahh that's the worst! What you want to do, is wait for it to drain until you can't possibly bear the annoying beeps (that moto's, for example, make when they are down to their last juice) If you can, wait for it to die and then charge away. And w/ most phone these days, you can charge and talk. That's an important feature by the way. Phones like LG's sold by VERIZON normally have cradles, and you cannot talk while they are charging.
So here's a tip, besides the other one already given, b/c I will admit this batter is not the greatest. However, what you can do is this: remove battery while phone is on. Tap is against something (nothing foreful) and remove SIM. Wait a couple min and put it back together. Do this twice-3 times a week for about a month if even and you will see a difference.
Also, for those who don't know-rebooting a phone solves a lot of problems. One user says hers freezes-when she has apps on, and is using a lot of features. Well as we all know, when you are using a computer, the same thing happens. Mine sometimes cause it just feels like it. Well what is a phone in this day in age? A COMPUTER. Gotta treat it the same way. I have not experiences any freezing but have seen it happen to some customers. Don't be perplexed, just reboot!
Here's how: Turn off phone. Take out batter and SIM 3. Blow on SIM and inside of phone (no I'm not kidding) this gets off most of the dust 4. If you're dirty you may see there's more dust, so clean it! (papertowel should do the trick) 5. Then simply insert SIM in proper way and battery/back and turn the thing on. I guarantee it will no longer be frozen. Let's say it won't let you turn it off, well you do the same minus pushing the red off button. Works everytime.
In instances that this does not work, you may have a problem. Your phone may be defective. If you're under a year, you have a warranty! Cingular honors this warranty and I've even seen customers call warranty and walk away very pleases. First the company sends you a phone, usually same model (site note-you really luck out if this model has been discontinued, and if you know that it has been, mention this to the rep on the phone. In this case, usually they give u the next model!)
As far as dropped calls-it happens to everyone now a days. During the AT&T/Cingular merger there were more than ever due to combining some 40 million users onto the same network, towers, etc...it was an overload, but for the most part it has been fixed. If one certain tower gets overloaded at the same time (too many users in that area of the tower are all trying to make/recieve call at the same exact time)then a dropped call will occur. Or some interuption in service. Just be patient, and if you are traveling in your car wait a few minutes and try again b/c most likely you will be using another tower.
Dropped calls rarely ever have to do with the phone itself by the way. Also, Cingular IS the number one company in the U.S, w/the best digital voice and data network in America. They have over 50 million users. There's a reason for that.
Some CNET users of the 551 that gave it low ratings, and said things like "this is the worst phone ever" may just be experiencing a DEFECTIVE phone. And if you're under 30 days from your initial sign up date, go back to the store you got it from and get that exchange you're entitled too! Other wise go through warranty. Other than that, you can't expect a phone to cook you breakfast lunch and dinner, and remember it is a computer-oh and it's not personal! (sorry, SOME of the CNET reviewers act like the phone or carrier has a personal vendetta out against them!)Be rational and patient. This is a good phone, expecially for the price. But more so, I wrote this review not only on behalf of the V551 and Cingular service, but to hopefully educate wireless customers.
- 17 replies to this review
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It's funny that user error is assumed with battery life when most of the people posting have stated they've never encountered as serve battery problems with any other phone. I know how these battery's work and I've managed to get all my other phones to hold a charge. This phone is the worst pile of garbage I've ever used. I don't care if some of you have gotten a phone that wasn't defective. Look at how many people here have problems with this unit. I work in IT and I deal with technical equipment all day. It's not user error when calls drop, battery life is horrible, or the display dies. This phone also has the most annoying sound when the battery is dieing. I bet the guys that made this are have a great laughy. "Lets make a phone that never holds a charge and then give it the most annoying noise to alert you of low battery life." I ended up breaking this thing in too and just went ahead and bought a Nokia. The purchase just helped me further confirm how bad the V551 was. My new Nokia works like a dream.
I can't believe you suggested to people that they should have to take their battery out and bang it to make it work. What have you been smoking?? If you were my phone sales guy Id punch you in the face.
Motorola can go to hell. I will never buy there garbage again. If I find the maker of this phone the world will have one less useless human walking the earth. -
I've had the Motorola V551 for two years now and have missed a lot of phone calls because the ringer stops working. Then I have to pull the battery, wait a few minutes and reassemble. Here lately even that doesn't repair it to ringing again. Also, ever since I signed up with Cingular I have had a lot of dropped calls. By a lot, I mean like 90% of every call that lasts more than 5 minutes will get dropped. I have gone through four V180 phones and this V551 and they all drop calls equally. It is the poor system Cingular has. I wouldn't give 5 cents for this phone and even less for Cingular's service. This weekend I plan on switching to Verizon - now that my 2 year contract is up. Whew - so glad that it is!
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hi i sent a few new V551's outside the US, I got similar complaints, do you think that your tips would work over there also? one phone after doing that even got the processor damaged, according to the technician over there, these phones always have problems with battery discharging and dropping calls all of the sudden.
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First of all Cingular has 50 million customers because they have merged or bought out other companies. I had ATT Wireless who was notorious for dropped calls. When Cingular took over the situation did not improve where I live - it's just as bad most of the time. All I get from Cingular are excuses and doublespeak. I live in a major metropolitan area too.
The problem, however, is not just Cingular but all carriers. My landlord has T-Mobile and gets full bar service where we live (we have duplexs) in the basement. I havea friend who has T-Mobile and gets dropped in certain areas in the city where I live. We forget that a cell phone despite the many gadgets that it may have is basically a radio-phone. Reception can vary from place to place. For example, I visited a friend who lived about 12 miles east of Council Bluffs, Iowa and had great reception in what was a hilly area. It just happens that where I live Cinuglar has not found a way to make it better and still rely on the old ATT Wireless towers.
As for the v551, I do like most of the features. Battery life is better now that I am on my third battery. You have to let the battery just about die the first time you put it in before you recharge it. The screen is difficult to read in the car or outside if it is sunny. I would also prefer a longer time for the screen to stay on before it blacks out. Picture quality can be poor to good depending on lighting. This is VGA and not even 1 mp. Once my two year contract is over with I may look into a better phone with better camera features but for now I am quite pleased with the V551. Were I to point out a major criticism it would be with the instruction book that Motorola provides. For those whose technical expertise is limited the handbook can be a challenge. -
This phone may worjk for you but mine stinks. Terrible ear piece vollume and speaker volume is even worse. Dropped calls are very common Cingular confirmed.
Fight hard and get a free upgrade to the 557 model. Threaten to quit the contract and pay the exstortion fee and they will give in! They did for me. -
This phone may worjk for you but mine stinks. Terrible ear piece vollume and speaker volume is even worse. Dropped calls are very common Cingular confirmed.
Fight hard and get a free upgrade to the 557 model. Threaten to quit the contract and pay the exstortion fee and they will give in! They did for me. -
I have had my V551 for about nine months and I have had a good reliable phone with no problems. As far as the battery charging routine; I run the battery to near death before turning the phone off and charging overnight. I have ha NO problems with battery life (usually lasts three days with heavy use.) I even get great signal in a elevator in the middle of a hospital. My past phones couldn't get close to this feat. Calls being dropped are rare and usually around peak times (4-6:00pm). I live in a major metropolitian area and cell phone traffic is of the heaviest in the country, still good signal loud and clear calls rare dropped calls.
The calls received menu could be better to navigate but I've got used to it. Speaker phone option is good "for an option" I don't think that it very good for the class of the phone. However, blue tooth is very good!
I agree with "NOT BLOWING" on your phones internal components, not good for the life of the phone. Just clean with "clean air" or dry towel if you must.
I can't believe the bad reviews but everyone has their opinion of what a good phone should be. All in all Motorola created another good phone but it appears the QC is suspect in the manufacturing proccess. I guess I was lucky and got one of the great ones. -
I have owned my v551 for about four months now. I use it to connect to my Laptop to access the internet. It has edge tech which is really fast. For 20 bucks extra a month with my cellphone carrier Cingular I have unlimited access to the net. It does not count against your minutes and the speed is great, as a matter of fact I am connected to my cellphone right now while surfing and writhing this. Just been through the hurricane here in Florida and thanks to Cingular and my v551 cellphone I was always connected. Should you recieve a call while on the net no problem, answer it and when you done you continue on with your interneting.
I have tried using both hard wire and bluetooth to connect to the net with my v551, I would stay with the hard wire, bluetooth was a lot slower.
I have had no problems with battery life, so I don't know what these whinners are talking about. I have had one dropped call during the hurricane and this was the only time and there was a reason, everyone and their brother were trying to call out because there was no line phone working in most places with lines down.
The v551 takes nice pictures, the vidieo I really have not played.
The speakerphone could be louder, but I really only use the bluetooth headset which for those of you that have never experenced it, well lets just say you will never be without it again. With the bluetooth headset and your v551 your headset can auto answer in 2,5 or 10 seconds or manual for if you don't want to use this feature, you can use voice dial with you bluetooth headset. With your bluetooth and your v551 you can make and answer calls with you cellphone up to thirty feet away, yep no more hot batteries burning your ears.
No I don't work f0r Cingular,and have been using cellphone since the time when their weight could be up to five pounds. Hope my review helps you make the right choice for you and your needs. -
Im not sure what battery type is in your phone, but the one in mine is a Lithium Ion (Li-Ion. There is no memmery effect in Li-Ion batteries. The link below is one artical on the subject, but I have found more by searching for battery technologys.
http://www.mobileshop.org/usertech/batteries.htm -
One of Brinzie's comments on a later post says he now has a Razr.
Brinzie, if you see this, why did you switch, and what do you think of the Razr?
http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-3504_7-6251878-2.html?messageID=1395936&tag=lst -
It works better than my MPX220. It is unlocked and mail does not work, is there a way to fix this?
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my wife and I each got one....neither phone had as good reception as previous phones but we thought maybe that was due to changing carriers. Then I noticed that people at work w/the same carrier as I had great reception...while I did not (sometimes not even being able to get on the netwoork). Cingular was kind enough to send me another V551....it also was horrible reception-wise. Cincgular next gave me a Nokia 3120....and the reception is great. Can call from work, can call always from home (which I couldn't do before). Now once we exchange my wife's phone it will be the ned of dealing with Moto V551 CRAP. Good luck with this phone...if it works for you.....GREAT....if not....told ya.
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my wife and I each got one....neither phone had as good reception as previous phones but we thought maybe that was due to changing carriers. Then I noticed that people at work w/the same carrier as I had great reception...while I did not (sometimes not even being able to get on the netwoork). Cingular was kind enough to send me another V551....it also was horrible reception-wise. Cincgular next gave me a Nokia 3120....and the reception is great. Can call from work, can call always from home (which I couldn't do before). Now once we exchange my wife's phone it will be the ned of dealing with Moto V551 CRAP. Good luck with this phone...if it works for you.....GREAT....if not....told ya.
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It troubles me that Motorola keeps making phones with all these problems. The last motorola phone I had was a problem phone, but I gave them another chance because I wanted a flip phone with bluetooth capability, no one else seems to have this phone. I like the V551, but 2 main problems are causing me to research a new phone after only 2 months of ownership. The phone keeps shutting off on it's own, and it doesn't always take a charge. Will plug in charger (car or home) and it won't do anything, will try later on in the day and it will decide to accept charge. Was just on vacation and it was frustrating to not be able to use my phone when I needed it most. Then I will pick up my phone to make a call and find that it shut off, even though the battery was fully charged. This suggests a short of some kind. I just went to Cingular store to talk to them about this problem and another customer came up to me and said "If you are thinking of buying that phone, don't do it, I am on my 3rd phone." Cingular wants me to send it back and they will replace it with the same phone. Honestly, I do not know what to do. You give good suggestions, but why should I have to remember to reboot 2 or 3 times a week. I do not have to do this with my computer. Also, you are saying we have to wait to our phones are dead before charging them, for goodness sakes, I cannot be hooked up to my charger when this happens- my phone is used for medical purposes and this would not be convenient at all.
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I used Nokia for serveral yeasr, I then used and Ericsson, and I did not have the user shock until I purchased the V551. The user manual is useless, it does not cover all the features, the user interface is user hostile. I do realize it is sturdy but it is missing the point. As for the method this user gave to increase the battery life, it is rediculous to go thru these steps while Nokia and Ericsson have long battery life without the need to go thru the steps mentioned in this review. I am just waiting for the one year period to end so I can get a discounted Nokia or Ercsson from my carrier, this is the most user hostile phone I have ever used.
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You can't expect someone to actually have to reboot their phone. I owned this phone and switched the Nokia 6230 after a week and am so happy that I did. The Nokia is a much more capable phone with more features and even improves on almost every single one of Moto's mistakes. I'm a pretty nerdy guy, but I'm an IT Consultant and know that I wouldn't expect any of my clients to have a phone that they had to reboot or that they had to take extra special care of. People just want something that works, and IMO Nokia is the only company that is offering this right now for Cingular as far as normal phones go.
Hopefully at some point Cingular will start carrying nice SE's again like the K700 and K750, or even the W800.
Hello Moto... Good bye Moto -
While I think your intentions are good, your comment about your customers' actions causing poor battery performance is incorrect.
Before most cell phones used Lithium Ion batteries, Nickle Cadmium was the standard. NiCd batteries may suffer from a reduced runtime if they are not completely discharged before re-charging. This is what is called "memory effect," but can be corrected by completely discharging and recharging one or more times. Another cause of memory effect is overcharging.
However, the Motorolla v551 uses a 3.6v Lithium Ion Cell Battery. If you talk to any electrical engineer, he or she will know that Li-Ion batteries are NOT subject to the memory effect, and DO NOT have to be completely discharged before re-charging.
Some people are saying on this board that the v551 instruction manual states to completely discharge before charging the first time. This is NOT true. It just says under "battery tips" that "Some batteries perform best after several full charge/discharge cycles." Motorolla may be using the same manual for other phones or battery types, but I think this just proves this manual was written by tech writers who don't understand the product. There is very little in this manual that is useful.
As far as taking the batter out while the phone is on, tapping it on something, removing the SIM, waiting a few minutes, and putting it all back (and doing this twice, three times a week for for a month). Even if there was some logic to support this type of voodo remedy, who wants to do that? I'd rather just buy a phone that works! Also, it wouldn't hurt to use canned air to blow the dust off the SIM, but you should never blow on this, the condensation from your breath can cause damage to the connectors!
Unfortunately, the problems with this phone extend far beyond the poor battery performance (or I should say poor power management). The OS freezes, it drops too many calls, it's cumbersome to navigate, but what gets me the most is the ring tone button on the side. It finds a way to toggle the various rings tones, so you NEVER know when your ring tone is going to be loud or silent, and there is no way to lock this button. Overall, this phone is unreliable.
Motorola V551 (AT&T):
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