Customer Rating: 
Summary: Great Product
Comment: This phone is great for what it is. If you are looking for a smartphone at a cheap price and expect the world, stop being cheap and spring for a smartphone. I recently got rid of a Palm Treo I had bought because it turned out to be one of the worst phones I ever had. My GF and I merged our plans and ended up getting two of these for $31.99 and to be honest, we couldn't be happier.
We text alot and the QWERTY keyboard makes this a breeze. Yeah it is not a full size board but we are talking about a phone no bigger than a RAZR. How big do you expect it to be? The numbers are not all that difficult but who actually dials numbers anymore? 9 times out of 10 you are browsing to your contacts, which is not difficult.
The headphone jack? I honestly cannot believe that this is a complaint. Who doesn't use Bluetooth these days? Not to mention that you do have an adapter for those older headsets that works just fine.
The sound quality is much better than my pervious Treo. With my Treo I could not use it in my house without hanging my head out of the window. The reception was god awful. I dropped 2 out of every 5 calls without warning. This phone has been performing suprisingly well in my house reception wise. No dropped calls.
It amazes me that people complain about ringtones. Do you honestly expect a phone to come with the exact tone you want? This is why we have online options to download our own personalized tones.
So this phone is what it is. It is a realiable phone with a great texting feature, the ability to check e-mail and great reliability. After having every phone from smartphones to small compact flip phones, this gave me the best of both worlds rolled up into one tight little package.
Samsung is fastly becoming the industry leader in all things technology and their phones are obviously no different. I won't be so bold as to say go get it now. I do however urge everyone to at least give it a glance or two in the store before deciding to ignore it.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Battery is my biggest problem
Comment: I've had this phone for several months now and in general, I love it. The two-way flipping is great, the keypad has never been a problem for me, and it has features I haven't even explored like web browsing and email. My two biggest complains however are that there is no way to put music on this phone without buying it. You can not hold the phone up to a speaker and record it, or download your own onto it. But the biggest problem of all, for me especially as a college student is that I use the phone as my alarm clock to wake up for class. 90% of the time, it works great, but the phone has a nasty tendency to die overnight even if you go to sleep with 2 battery bars. My previous phone could last all night with one bar as long as it was left untouched. This morning I missed class because my phone died overnight and failed to wake me up, which inspired me to write this review. I wish the "standby" mode was more efficient at keeping the phone alive through the night.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Better for VZW, but needs a better antenna
Comment: This was the first VZW phone I've owned that I didn't hate. Which isn't to say I like it though:
Pros: Solid battery life. Thin. Fits well on ear, and loud enough to hear in crowded areas. The two way flip and qwerty keyboard.
Cons: The antenna is awful. Places where verizon reception used to be fine now aren't. I get a ton of missed calls now b/c the phone never rings. It's hard to dial a phone number on this b/c the buttons are small and each has a number, a letter, and three smaller letters and all are the same color. I got used to it quickly but if you have thick fingers or poor vision I'd suggest taking this for a test drive before you buy it. Last complaint is there's no headphone jack. You have to plug in an adapter (included) and then plug headphones into that.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Worst phone in the world
Comment: This is the owrst phone in the world. the keys are wayyy to small and it takes 4 or 5 times to dial a phone number, also it turns itself off. My battery broke because it was in the fog (moisture or something) now my battery keeps on telling me that i put a car battery in it so it can't charge. Worst phone ever. period.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Some complaints here can be solved for this phone
Comment: Some complaints here - like the calendar sync problems -- can be resolved with a little investigation. If you purchase the Verizon data office software program - it comes with a sync chord and will sync with MS Outlook on your computer with no problems. If you buy it soon after you buy your Samsung u740 you get a discount from Verizon. It's worth it - I think I paid $24.00 with no shipping charge. With this software you can only sync your contacts and calendar in MS Outlook so be aware of that but that's all I needed.
As for the complaint regarding sound - I drive a Jeep Grand Cherokee and crank the music up when I drive. I can hear the ring perfectly - it's very loud - even my downloaded ringtones which are crystal clear - the default ringers that come with the phone are very loud too. I don't even keep it on the loudest setting. So perhaps the person who complained had some hearing issues. My hearing is fairly acute - however - the ringtones are very clear and loud as far as I'm concerned.
There also is a way to get your own ringtones with the same data cable I mentioned above - if you use a free software called "BitPim". It now supports the u740 and with this program you can take any wav file you might have or made yourself and put it on your phone through BitPim. BitPim will automatically place it in the proper file. I suggest however you get a 2 Gig media card if you want to add your own ringtones. I used wav files that were ripped from CD's I bought (they are huge files) then ripped to my PC then synced with the u740 using BitPim. I don't know how this will work for MP3's - I do CD's - but BitPim has a "convert" option so I'm guessing it will work for these files as well.
With BitPim you can also transfer photos from your PC as the camera on the phone isn't nearly as crisp as my 10mpg HP camera. I just resize the photos down and then transfer to my phone - again via BitPim.
Re the complaint about the email - through Get it Now and choosing Mobile Email. For a nominal fee - I can access my Comcast email anywhere any time and it was a snap to set up and use. I think in less than 3 minutes including downloading from Get it Now - I was checking my email.
The u740 for me - is the very best phone I've ever used. The keyboard is bit small - so if you have big fingers - it might be tough for you - but for a small woman like myself - it's a PERFECT phone. It's sleek, opens clamshell style or horizontally - and you can buy really cheap feminine covers for the phone as well. I've had a lot of LG's and my last phone was a very bulky Audiovox XV6700. I've never used a Samsung before but I knew almost all the features in a very short time.
Two quirks to note - if you dial using the horizontal mode - you'll be on speaker phone. However, if you close the phone you will NOT be disconnected. You either have to hit "end" or go back to clamshell mode and re-close the phone. So be careful what you talk about if you close the phone during a horizontal conversation.
Also a sort of strange quirk - when adding text - if you are in horizontal mode you can NOT use the "v". It's just a bad quirk. You must be in clamshell mode in order to add text and use the old fashioned keypad style i.e. for the letter "c" you'd have to hit the number "2" three times.
Otherwise - while not a perfect phone, it's perfect for me and I think almost any non-business users. Even business users could love it - it's just not going to do the things a Smartphone or Blackberry will do.
Summary: Great Product
Comment: This phone is great for what it is. If you are looking for a smartphone at a cheap price and expect the world, stop being cheap and spring for a smartphone. I recently got rid of a Palm Treo I had bought because it turned out to be one of the worst phones I ever had. My GF and I merged our plans and ended up getting two of these for $31.99 and to be honest, we couldn't be happier.
We text alot and the QWERTY keyboard makes this a breeze. Yeah it is not a full size board but we are talking about a phone no bigger than a RAZR. How big do you expect it to be? The numbers are not all that difficult but who actually dials numbers anymore? 9 times out of 10 you are browsing to your contacts, which is not difficult.
The headphone jack? I honestly cannot believe that this is a complaint. Who doesn't use Bluetooth these days? Not to mention that you do have an adapter for those older headsets that works just fine.
The sound quality is much better than my pervious Treo. With my Treo I could not use it in my house without hanging my head out of the window. The reception was god awful. I dropped 2 out of every 5 calls without warning. This phone has been performing suprisingly well in my house reception wise. No dropped calls.
It amazes me that people complain about ringtones. Do you honestly expect a phone to come with the exact tone you want? This is why we have online options to download our own personalized tones.
So this phone is what it is. It is a realiable phone with a great texting feature, the ability to check e-mail and great reliability. After having every phone from smartphones to small compact flip phones, this gave me the best of both worlds rolled up into one tight little package.
Samsung is fastly becoming the industry leader in all things technology and their phones are obviously no different. I won't be so bold as to say go get it now. I do however urge everyone to at least give it a glance or two in the store before deciding to ignore it.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Battery is my biggest problem
Comment: I've had this phone for several months now and in general, I love it. The two-way flipping is great, the keypad has never been a problem for me, and it has features I haven't even explored like web browsing and email. My two biggest complains however are that there is no way to put music on this phone without buying it. You can not hold the phone up to a speaker and record it, or download your own onto it. But the biggest problem of all, for me especially as a college student is that I use the phone as my alarm clock to wake up for class. 90% of the time, it works great, but the phone has a nasty tendency to die overnight even if you go to sleep with 2 battery bars. My previous phone could last all night with one bar as long as it was left untouched. This morning I missed class because my phone died overnight and failed to wake me up, which inspired me to write this review. I wish the "standby" mode was more efficient at keeping the phone alive through the night.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Better for VZW, but needs a better antenna
Comment: This was the first VZW phone I've owned that I didn't hate. Which isn't to say I like it though:
Pros: Solid battery life. Thin. Fits well on ear, and loud enough to hear in crowded areas. The two way flip and qwerty keyboard.
Cons: The antenna is awful. Places where verizon reception used to be fine now aren't. I get a ton of missed calls now b/c the phone never rings. It's hard to dial a phone number on this b/c the buttons are small and each has a number, a letter, and three smaller letters and all are the same color. I got used to it quickly but if you have thick fingers or poor vision I'd suggest taking this for a test drive before you buy it. Last complaint is there's no headphone jack. You have to plug in an adapter (included) and then plug headphones into that.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Worst phone in the world
Comment: This is the owrst phone in the world. the keys are wayyy to small and it takes 4 or 5 times to dial a phone number, also it turns itself off. My battery broke because it was in the fog (moisture or something) now my battery keeps on telling me that i put a car battery in it so it can't charge. Worst phone ever. period.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Some complaints here can be solved for this phone
Comment: Some complaints here - like the calendar sync problems -- can be resolved with a little investigation. If you purchase the Verizon data office software program - it comes with a sync chord and will sync with MS Outlook on your computer with no problems. If you buy it soon after you buy your Samsung u740 you get a discount from Verizon. It's worth it - I think I paid $24.00 with no shipping charge. With this software you can only sync your contacts and calendar in MS Outlook so be aware of that but that's all I needed.
As for the complaint regarding sound - I drive a Jeep Grand Cherokee and crank the music up when I drive. I can hear the ring perfectly - it's very loud - even my downloaded ringtones which are crystal clear - the default ringers that come with the phone are very loud too. I don't even keep it on the loudest setting. So perhaps the person who complained had some hearing issues. My hearing is fairly acute - however - the ringtones are very clear and loud as far as I'm concerned.
There also is a way to get your own ringtones with the same data cable I mentioned above - if you use a free software called "BitPim". It now supports the u740 and with this program you can take any wav file you might have or made yourself and put it on your phone through BitPim. BitPim will automatically place it in the proper file. I suggest however you get a 2 Gig media card if you want to add your own ringtones. I used wav files that were ripped from CD's I bought (they are huge files) then ripped to my PC then synced with the u740 using BitPim. I don't know how this will work for MP3's - I do CD's - but BitPim has a "convert" option so I'm guessing it will work for these files as well.
With BitPim you can also transfer photos from your PC as the camera on the phone isn't nearly as crisp as my 10mpg HP camera. I just resize the photos down and then transfer to my phone - again via BitPim.
Re the complaint about the email - through Get it Now and choosing Mobile Email. For a nominal fee - I can access my Comcast email anywhere any time and it was a snap to set up and use. I think in less than 3 minutes including downloading from Get it Now - I was checking my email.
The u740 for me - is the very best phone I've ever used. The keyboard is bit small - so if you have big fingers - it might be tough for you - but for a small woman like myself - it's a PERFECT phone. It's sleek, opens clamshell style or horizontally - and you can buy really cheap feminine covers for the phone as well. I've had a lot of LG's and my last phone was a very bulky Audiovox XV6700. I've never used a Samsung before but I knew almost all the features in a very short time.
Two quirks to note - if you dial using the horizontal mode - you'll be on speaker phone. However, if you close the phone you will NOT be disconnected. You either have to hit "end" or go back to clamshell mode and re-close the phone. So be careful what you talk about if you close the phone during a horizontal conversation.
Also a sort of strange quirk - when adding text - if you are in horizontal mode you can NOT use the "v". It's just a bad quirk. You must be in clamshell mode in order to add text and use the old fashioned keypad style i.e. for the letter "c" you'd have to hit the number "2" three times.
Otherwise - while not a perfect phone, it's perfect for me and I think almost any non-business users. Even business users could love it - it's just not going to do the things a Smartphone or Blackberry will do.