Originally Posted by archer6
I was in your exact position with the very same concerns a week ago. Then I finally and very reluctantly bought an UGLY at&t V9. Ahem....... and oh by the way did I mention that It's REALLY UGLY!.... OK....OK.... I got that out of my system..... :rolleyes:
So here's a quick review on the areas of your concern. A quick bit of background first, I was one of the "fools" that paid $500 big ones for the V3 the day it was released. I have enjoyed a huge number of RAZR's ever since. Both in stock form and then modded badly (by me) and modded excellently (by the new experienced me).
Like you, first and foremost any phone I buy must produce an acceptable level of performance as a phone first or else "what's the point". Speaking of points I will get back on track and get to the bottom line..... the RAZR2 V9 is an excellent phone right out of the box, when it comes to all aspects of phone performance. Thankfully, as not to beat a dead horse , but boy is this phone ugly. A super duper fingerprint magnet, and I'm just OCD enough to always have a small soft cloth that I can tuck into my pocket in an effort to keep the phone looking decent. And let me tell you, it's really needed and this phone is super shiny and even with squeaky clean hands it's impossible to pick it up without looking like you just worked on your car.... fingerprints.
I do think that Crystal Talk is more than advertising hype, but only by a small amount. I say this because I just bought another new V3xx Platinum/Chrome and frankly the call quality is so close to the V9 that to others ears they might claim it's better that the V9. I have very good hearing so while call volume is still very important as I tend to find myself in high ambient noise areas when calling from time to time, it's not quite as important to me as a good range of volume adjustment from high to low. At the high setting the V9 has very little, if any distortion. This is an improvement over the V3xx when set on high volume. In addition, the V9 has a slightly better "rocker" button for controlling the volume and it's somewhat easier to adjust it to your exact preference.
At the highest volume setting there is plenty of volume to hear even in the noisiest environments, and I can highly endorse this models phone performance. I have owned an obscene number of mobiles (more than 50) and this V9 is the best (phone) in my opinion. It easily outperforms my modded (for volume only) V3, which has more volume than any of my friends modded V3's. I also like the larger Nav Pad, and wider key spacing of the V9. Ease of use is exemplary. Texting is really fast, navigation is second nature. In fact I plan on keeping this until AT&T comes out with a better color such as gray, silver, or black. At that point, I will then use this Maroon phone to do some modding. Until then I'm leaving it stock as it performs very well.
Hope this helps your decision making.... :)
