I got my Sprint phone in the mail today. Sprint is running a marketing campaign that involves handing out a free phone and 6 months of free service to selected people in certain cities. Since I am aware of several other bloggers who were asked to participate in this program, I imagine Sprint got my name via my blog.
The phone is a Sprint Power Vision phone, model A920, manufactured by Samsung. It comes with a charger, headphones, a USB cable to connect to your computer and a 32MB memory card (the phone has a slot).
It’s a pretty compelling deal. They gave me 6 months of free voice and data service, including web access, music downloads, etc. This will allow me to really put this phone through its paces and write about it a little bit. After 6 months, I get to keep the phone, but I have to buy service if I want to use it.
I will be comparing it to my current phone, which I bought the day before I got the email from Sprint (I’ve always been a master of bad timing).
So here are my initial impressions.
It’s a good looking phone, with a big, bright colorful screen. Other than figuring out how to turn it on, I haven’t had to consult the user manual at all. It came all set up with a new phone number (Missouri area code) and email address (ambassador7365@sprintpcs.com – feel free to drop me a line- no spam please – but I haven’t tried it so I can’t guarantee I’ll get it).
So far here are the cool things I’ve discovered. The phone is connected to a music store, where you can buy a wide selection of songs. I downloaded The Rolling Stones’ Monkey Man, and the sound is really good, even without the headphones. I’m not sure I’d pay the usual $2.50 for a song, but thankfully I didn’t have too.
The web access seems pretty fast, maybe even faster than my current phone, which uses the Verizon wireless broadband network. More on this after I experiment a little.
I have only begun to explore the media features. Movies, TV shows, Sirius radio and a ton of other stuff is available.
And it has a camera that seems to work really well (this is my first camera phone). I haven’t tried it yet, but you can send your photos directly to supported third party photo sites. Flickr doesn’t seem to be supported yet (that will be my first feedback), but you can email your photos to Flickr. Here’s my first camera phone photo ever.
Like my 7130e, this phone can also be used as a modem to allow your laptop to access the internet over Sprint’s wireless broadband network.
So far I’d have to say I’m pretty impressed. I suspect using all of the features would be a little costly if you had to pay for them, but so far, so cool.
Newsome.Org 