Japan's had phones with true color screens for a while. And now, thanks to the arrival of Sprint PCS's Sanyo SCP-5000, the United States can say it has one, too. Whether that color screen--and the cool features that come with it--are worth the phone's high price is debatable. But what's clear is that, for the moment, the SCP-5000 is new and different--a real head-turner.
Picture this
Like Motorola's V60c and LG's TP1100, the 3.5-ounce SCP-5000 is compact (3.74 by 1.93 by 0.94 inches) and features a second, external LCD that lets you view caller ID info and time without flipping open the phone. While that's certainly a nice touch, the SCP-5000's internal 256-color display is the real eye-catcher.
Depending on the font setting (you can choose between four sizes), the screen displays up to a generous 12 lines of text, including photos. To our surprise, the screen is clearly viewable in daylight as well as dark rooms. You can upload up to 20 low-res images to the phone (software and serial-port synching cable included).
Once you get the images on the SCP-5000 (more on that later), you can select a picture with a message to appear every time you open the phone. You can also link an image to any entry in the 300-entry phone book. For example, when your good friend Bob calls, you can set the phone to display his picture instead of just his caller ID info.
Similar to a PC, the phone's wallpaper, or background, is customizable. You can opt for an image and choose between four different color schemes (green, orange, purple, and gray). You can download screensavers (little animations) to the phone, and the screen goes into sleep mode if you accidentally leave the flip open for an extended period.
Cue from the Far East
Like most Sprint PCS phones, the SCP-5000 has all the features you'd expect in a high-end mobile. These include voice-activated dialing, voice memo, Spanish/English menus, caller ID (also displayed on the external LCD), four-way rocker navigation key, a vibrating ringer, voicemail, games, calendar, a world clock, and wireless Web access.
As for the surfing experience, we were pretty impressed with the look and feel of the wireless Web on the SCP-5000. Taking a cue from Japan's iMode phones, the SCP-5000 has a button that automatically launches the Web (no scrolling through menus to get there) and one-touch access to e-mail from the phone's start-up menu.
While Openwave's (formerly Phone.com) 3.12 browser doesn't support color, Sprint has included color versions of action, casino, and other games in its wireless Web menu, a couple of which are actually fun to play. The company has also reorganized the main Web menu to include a Restart selection in case you find yourself tangled up in the wireless Web and want to return to the main Web menu. From the e-mail menu, you can also send short text messages along with little graphical icons (heart, star, lightning bolt, and so on) to other Sprint PCS customers who have wireless Web access.
As noted, the phone comes with a serial-port synching cable and Sanyo's
Multimedia Master software, which allows you to transfer up to 20 images and as many as ten MIDI tones to the SCP-5000. However, the software does not allow you to sync contact and calendar info from you desktop PIM (for example, Microsoft Outlook), which is a real bummer.
Using Multimedia Master, we found it rather painless to add images and tones to the phone. On average, it took 10 to 15 seconds to upload JPEG images from our PC to the SCP-5000 and even less time to add tones. Although you can save a picture in one of three settings (Wallpaper Small, Wallpaper Large, and Incoming Call), we found that images looked best on the screen when saved as Wallpaper Small files.
Power guzzler
Unfortunately, the phone's most prominent feature--its color screen--is also its Achilles' heel when it comes to battery life. Sanyo says the SCP-5000 has a talk time of 2 hours and a standby time up to 120 hours. We managed to come close, with about 1.75 hours of talk time, though disciplined users who are willing to limit the amount of backlighting may be able to eke out more. Luckily, the phone's charger is compact and juices up the battery quickly (in less than an hour).
We tested the dual-band (CDMA 1900/analog) SCP-5000 in the San Francisco Bay Area and were fairly impressed with call quality. Though we didn't always have the best signal strength, we almost always were able to make calls.
All that said, the SCP-5000 is an impressive, eye-catching model that marks the next step in the evolution of the American mobile phone. Most new products that feature technological advances usually carry expensive prices tags, and the SCP-5000, which will initially be offered at $499.99, is no exception. While we wish the battery life was longer and the phone had better personal organizer features (such as synching to Outlook), those willing to pay the steep price will be getting a cutting-edge, user-friendly phone that's sure to attract a lot of attention--until more color screen phones hit the market, anyway.
