after almost a year (to the day) of reviewing this phone, I thought I'd give an update.
I stopped using this phone after about a month and a half for several reasons, the primary one being the bad signal. Despite everything being clear from my end, almost everytime I called someone from the phone, they would claim that my voice sounded tinny, muffled, and far away, and often ask me to repeat myself. As one of my friends accurately described it, "It sounds like you're talking through a pillow."
I knew it was the phone, because whenever I switched my SIM card to another phone, everyone said that the problem went away.
In addition, even though I got some degree of service in my house, I got ZERO signal at school. That was a problem, because with my other phone, I picked up signal just fine. I chalked it up to the Tri-band, and eventually gave up on it. Now it's in a box in my college dorm, pretty much in good condition other than some scratches on the back, a missing stylus, and the broken plastic circle around the center button that can be easily fixed with super glue.
Ah well, it was a good run while it lasted. Thinking the signal was bad because it was triband, I bought a quadband chinese phone about a month ago:
It was a nice phone and picked up signal outside, but not in my dorm, where I needed it the most, so I ended up having to send it back.
Overall, my opinion on these "mp4" phones based on my experience is iffy. The triband ended up not working out too well, and I can't accurately review the quadband because I didn't have it long enough, and my other AT&T phone was also having signal problems in my dorm. Anyone else have experiences they'd like to share?
I really like what these phones have to offer, but I don't like the fact that they seem to have weaker signal than other name-brand phones.