Verizon's Samsung SCH-u550 Cell Phone

The new Samsung SCH-u550 cellular clamshell phone from Verizon Wireless was my recent upgrade from the LG Chocolate. I would have to say that the upgrade was a mixed bag of good and bad. Overall, the sound quality, reception quality, and minimum number of dropped calls was a huge plus with the u550. Out of all the phones that I owned, the u550 had the best call volume and reception in even the worst coverage areas. Also, since I use my phone as a music player in addition to the phone features, I found the touch-sensitive controls on the front of the clamshell to be very easy to use and appealing to the eye. The design of the phone was quite creative, since the colors of the exterior shell are a very interesting hue of grayish brown and metallic green that attract many peaks and questions from friends and co-workers. Also, I found the actual interface of the phone to be very friendly, especially since it is very generous with the customization features that allow you to choose between 2 themes that within them have a variety of choices for menu layout, shortcut assignments, and a large variety of colorful dial fonts, text sizes and colors, and numerous types of clocks to adorn the exterior display.

The build of the phone is very solid and feels comfortable in the hand, as the size is not too big and the hinge between the phone's components are well-designed and smooth in operation. I found the phone to be extremely texter-friendly, as I was able to type very conveniently and without any mistakes. The keys are large and soft, and the touch of the plastic is smooth and allows great versatility with the keys. Also, the messaging mechanism in the phone apparently has a memory of its own, since it adapts to your phrasing of words and your spelling or use of words in other languages and actually incorporates it in as you prepare a text message. For example, it can calculate which word you use most often out of a series of the digits you typed and modify the first word it gives you to choose from based on how frequently you used it compared to the other ones that could also be made from those numbers. The camera is descent, but nothing revolutionary or exciting about its features.

However, the exterior display of the phone could have been larger. I found the screen to be too small, especially when the clock on the exterior display was not digital. Also, the battery of the u550 became absolutely disastrous about 6 months after I had ordered the phone. At this point, after 9 months in, I am charging my phone on a daily basis since it cannot hold a charge of more than 24 hours. Also, the car charger that came with the u550 was very clumsy, since it relied on spike-edged charger ports that had to be jammed in at the right angle to offer any successful charging. Another minus was the fact that I found the keys and screen to be grease-prone; after a lot of texting and flipping open of the phone, I found myself wiping grease and oily debris from the entire phone. Also, the speakerphone was quite clumsy since people who were on the other end said my voice was getting chopped up.

Overall I would recommend the phone to teenagers and habitual texters, since the phone itself is built for texting and customization a music-playing. The phone offers no features for those looking for corporate internet features or high-tech junkies, since the heart of the phone is far from those options. Overall good phone if you are not too worried about the battery life and would really like a texter-friendly clamshell.