Under the display is the navigation array, which consists of two soft keys, a circular toggle, and middle confirmation key, a dedicated music player key that also doubles as a speakerphone key during a call, a Back key, plus the Talk and End/Power keys. The circular toggle also acts as shortcuts to the Contacts list, the @Metro store, the Messaging menu, and the MetroWeb browser. Underneath the navigation array is the number keypad. With the exception of the circular toggle, we found the keys were a little bit flat to the surface of the phone. The keys had a slightly cheap feel to them as well. That said, there are clear delineations between each key, and they all have a nice give to them when pressed.
The ZTE C79 comes with an AC adapter, a USB cable, and a wired headset.
Features
The ZTE C79 has a 500-entry phone book, which seems a little small, but each entry is able to hold four numbers, an e-mail address, and notes. You can also assign each entry to a caller group and you can personalize each contact with one of 21 polyphonic ringtones. Unfortunately, you cannot assign a photo to a contact, thus you're not able to use photo caller ID. This is a shame, since the ZTE C79 has a pretty decent color external display. Aside from that, other basic features include text and multimedia messaging, a vibrate mode, a speakerphone, a calendar, an alarm clock, a calculator, a tip calculator, a world clock, and a voice memo recorder. More advanced features include stereo Bluetooth, and a wireless Web browser. We were disappointed to discover the C79 does not have a voice command or voice dial feature, especially since it appears to be a pretty basic cell phone feature these days.
Though the C79 has an MP3 player, it's pretty generic in its look and feel. It has all the basic music player functions, such as play/pause, fast forward, rewind, and the capability to create, edit, and delete playlists. The C79 has 60MB internal memory, but it can accommodate up to 2GB microSD cards for additional storage.
The C79 comes with a 1.3-megapixel camera, and you can take pictures in six resolutions (1280x960, 1024x768, 640x480, 320x240, 176x144, and 160x120), three quality settings, five white balance settings, and three color effects. Other camera settings include brightness, contrast, up to 5x zoom, a self-timer, and two shutter sounds (with a silent option). Photo quality was not bad. Colors looked good if a little overcast, and pictures didn't appear too blurry as long as you kept the phone pretty still.
You can personalize the C79 with a selection of graphics and sounds for wallpaper and ringtones. If you wish to buy more, you can get them from MetroPCS's @metro data services portal. The C79 comes with a free copy of Sudoku, and you can download more games from @metro, too.
Performance
We tested the ZTE C79 in San Francisco with the MetroPCS service. We encountered admirable call quality--callers sounded loud and clear and vice versa, with very little static interference. Callers could tell we were on a cell phone, and said we sounded a tad robotic, but it wasn't a big deal. Call volume was quite loud, and we couldn't ask for better clarity. Speakerphone calls were good as well, though as with most speakerphone calls, callers sounded a bit more muffled than usual.
The audio quality from the music player was decent. Music sounded a little light on bass, and the speakers were on the tinny side, but it was otherwise pretty good. Of course, we recommend using a headset for better sound quality.
The ZTE C79 has a rated battery life of 3.5 hours talk time and 7.5 days standby time. According to the FCC, it has a SAR rating of 0.869 watt per kilogram.
What You'll Pay
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