Motorola ROKR E1

hi, someone mentioned a problem with the screen being completely black in sleep mode. in my case, when i try to 'wake' the phone from sleep mode, i can see it 'trying' to light up in the background but doesn't light up completely. it has happened several times. i purchased the phone last year (summer/fall 2006), i have used it for a few weeks. i don't use it any longer but i am thinkin of getting a plan with fido. i've been looking at service providers, at phones and i can't seem to find a simple, basic, easy to use, device. i tried a razor for a few days, but i didn't like it. i found the screen to colorful and too bright, and too many features, more of a teeny or kiddy phone. i just want a phone with large enough keys, easy to use, good variety of ringtones, no camera, no extra gadgets. just a phone, more into candy bar style, than flip ones, i guess. any suggestions?
please don't mention kyocera or audiovox, or the bulky lg 500, i think it is, lol.
to sum up, the rokr is pretty good, except slow to download music from my pc, i was told by friends that it's done on purpose since it's not an mp3 player in intself, but a phone, to cut on the competition. the rokr is not too thin nor too thick, it's just the perfect size too.

I bought this phone last year thinking it looked "cool" and was practical since my MP3 Player died on me.
It seems I didn't know what I was getting myself into.

This phone spent 2 hours in snow at -26 C, 5 months later, it was under water for at least 10 minutes. Amazingly enough, it still works like a charm. Well, the volume down button doesn't work anymore but the up one works so I can still work my way around that. (Although I do not suggest you try this at home)

The quality of the camera (both prior to and after drowning) is the best I've experienced so far although since the phone is now over a year old, I am sure that you could find a better camera in as good of a phone. The option to purchase bigger Trans-Flash memory is perfect and doesn't require more battery power.

Overall, this may just be the first and only phone I will not exchange as soon as the year is over. I love it!

overall the phone has everything and more youd need in a cell phone. some things i find wrong are that every once and a while i will go into I-tunes and it will just go through all my songs not play them, then i have to go back plug it into my computer wait about 10 mintutes for it to connect then things should be fine. why this happens? i have no clue.

Here is a quick follow-up to my first review of this phone mid-November. About me: I am regular to heavy user and the cellphone is my primary (only) phone – no landlines.

The phone is still a 4-star phone and overall I am very happy with it.

Reception and voice quality have proven to be superior to most phones I’ve tried and even hold reception in places my previous Rogers phones haven’t… a real surprise for a phone that is best categorized a multi-media phone. Voice quality in particular is wonderful, even with 1 bar of reception in rural areas.

Also wonderful about this phone are its speakerphone and included headsets. Absolutely wonderful sound both the caller and receiver. This holds true for using the speakerphone in the car or using the headset in a windy field.

Battery life is great, and of the phones I’ve tested is better than most, but still isn’t as good as the Sony Ericsson T616, which could go uncharged for over a week with regular usage. This phone I need to recharge every 2 – 4 days. An oddity is the speed at which it charges: The house charger takes about 5 – 8 hours to charge the phone from empty, but my car charger (not included with the phone) charges the phone from an empty battery in about 2 hours. A note: This Motorola phone matches up with some of the other Motorola phones when it comes to chargers… so if you’ve had a Motorola phone in the past check to see if the charger is compatible with this phone.

iTunes I used a lot during shopping for the holiday season but have not really used it since. Again, the sound is wonderful and I enjoyed phone’s implementation of iTunes on this phone, and the related accessories that come with the phone are impressive, especially since some of them cost as much as the phone itself if sold separately. A small note: I called the card in the previous review a mini-SD card… it isn’t… it’s a TransFlash card that comes with a regular SD adapter card to fit in SD slots. Battery life of the phone while using iTunes both in combination and exclusively was very very poor, giving me a combined average usage of only 2 – 3 hours before requiring to be charged.

Problems and Concerns:

Since my initial purchase I have had 2 units. 1) On occasion would enter a ‘sleep mode’ of sorts every once in awhile that I mentioned in the previous review while navigating through the phone. My second unit does not do this which suggests it was an isolated case. 2) The phone was actually returned because of a constant problem where if I would enter my voicemail password, Rogers wouldn’t be able to authenticate. For example, if my password was 1234, and I entered “1 2 3 4”, Rogers would say, “one-four is not the correct password. Please re-enter.” The phone display would however show “1 2 3 4.” For some reason the phone would not send out what I had typed across the cellular network. This at the time was not a widespread problem (the Rogers representative had no literature on it) but the phone was replaced within 2 days via mail. 3) The screen goes into sleep mode when locked or left alone for a few minutes. While lengthening battery life, I wish that there was an option to have the screen a bit darkened but not near-black, while always on so that I could always see what is on the screen. 4) Somewhat of an annoyance to me is how ‘recent calls’ are managed: Because of the number of calls I send and receive, I am the type of user who wants a quick way to review all calls and make dialing selection. Sony Ericsson, at least with the T616, has this best setup, where you press the ‘call’ or ‘send’ key, then have a choice between all calls ‘dialed’, ‘received’, or ‘missed’ all on one screen. You can then simply select the number that you wish to call from this screen. The type of call is easily identified by a simple icon telling you of what kind of call it was. This Motorola model (and others I’ve tested) still doesn’t have this. In order to dial a recent ‘received’ call, you have to hit the ‘recent calls’ key (if configured… if not, you have to first go through a menu), then select ‘received calls’, and then select the number you wish to dial. This is unnecessary # of steps to have to take to make a phone call. 5) Similarly, to redial your last call, you need to hit the ‘call’ or ‘send’ button once, wait for the screen to populate, then press ‘send’ again. With most non-Motorola phones, hitting ‘send’ twice quickly and in succession will redial your last call.

From the last review, I’ve discovered how to program the side key (which was #2 in my list of concerns in my last review), so it is possible. I’ve also discovered a quick way to change the ring mode which was a happy surprise and is much nicer than the way it is controlled on the V600, which was #4 in my list of concerns: Hit one of the volume keys and then hit 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7, where 0 = vibrate and 7 = high volume.

So once again, I’m very happy with this phone.