Sprint Upstage (Samsung SPH-m620) Review - Organizer
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Alfredo Padilla Published on April 10, 2007 Comment on this |
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Synchronization (0.0)
The Srint Upstage does not allow you to synchronize your personal information items with a computer out of the box.
Alerts (6.0)
You can only create alerts for calendar appointments on the Upstage. You are limited to certain presets: 10 minutes before, 30 minutes, 1 hour or on time. You can also choose to set no alert. We were pleased to see that you can choose any of your normal tones or ringtones as the alert directly from the appointment. You cannot choose to set a vibrate alert from the appointment however if your phone is set to vibrate it will do so when an alert goes off. When an alert sounds you are presented with a page that lists all of your alerts, including things liked missed calls and voice mails, and the tone you selected sounds. If you don't have any other alerts you are simply presented with an animated alarm clock with the name of your event and the time before the event which updates dynamically. You can choose to snooze the alert or dismiss it. When snoozed it will wait for 5 minutes and then sound again. If you miss the alert the tone will sound for 2 minutes and then the display will turn off. When you turn your phone back on the alert will still be on the screen ready for you to snooze it or dismiss it. We found the alerts to be fairly full featured, but we would have liked the ability to change the length of the snooze, or set it dynamically when the alert goes off. We would have also liked to see more precise control over when alerts sound.
Over the Air PIM Sync (0.0)
The Sprint Upstage does not support over the air synchronization of your personal information.
Address Book
Adding Contacts (4.69)
Entering a new contact is one of the few features that is available to the menu on the front of the phone, so we tested it from this point. To test adding a new contact we time how long it takes to enter the name and phone numbers of five test contacts with diverse names. The Upstage took an average of 21.3 seconds to enter each contact, this only slightly faster than the LG Chocolate's 21.7 seconds, but significantly faster than the Razr V3m's 27.9 seconds. As with many features you can also begin entering a new contact from the back of the phone, however you will need to flip the phone to enter text and numbers, adding several seconds to the time.
Looking/Sorting/Search (1.0)
The contacts interface on the Sprint Upstage is very simple and is the same on both sides of the phone. You are presented with a simple list of your contacts organized alphabetically by first name. You can also sort your contacts by group by choosing this option from the menu. There is a search feature built into the contacts program which you can access at any time by simple beginning to spell out a name. Unfortunately the search will only work with first name. As you type out a name it will jump you to the entry that best fits what you have entered, it does not filter your contacts. You will also have to use multi-tap to enter the text you want, it does not support predictive text search. Of course the search feature only works when you are on the front of the phone, when you are interacting on the back of the phone with the larger screen you cannot search, however you can use the scrolling touchpad feature to move up and down the list. Overall we were not very impressed with the sorting and searching options available on the upstage, perhaps they dummed it down because of the small screen on the front of the device. The Razr V3m provides you with many more sorting options.
Fields (2.6)
The Sprint Upstage has 9 different fields for your contacts. The phone number field allows you to enter up to 5 different numbers, and allows you to choose the type of phone number for each. You can also enter an email address and web address, assign a custom ringtone and picture. We were also pleased to see a memo field, allowing you to enter any information you wish. The Upstage's selection of fields is fairly standard for a feature phone, and compares well to the Razr V3m. The presence of a memo filed is a step above the LG Chocolate. Of course, none of these handsets compare with the dozens of fields available on smart phones.
Speed Dial/Voice tags/Voice command (3.67)
The Sprint Upstage allows you to assign speed dials to any of your contacts and has a voice command feature built in that allows you to dial numbers from your contacts without training them. You cannot assign a voice tag to your contacts. We found the voice command feature to be lacking, only recognizing 2 of the 5 sample contacts we tested it with. The LG Chocolate by contrast recognized all 5 of our test contacts. The voice command feature is buried in the menus, but can also be accessed by pressing and holding the talk button.
Calendar
Adding Calendar Items (3.78)
To test how easy it is to add calendar items we time how long it takes to add a simple lunch appointment for the following day. We repeat this test 5 times and take the average for our test. The Sprint Upstage took an average of 26.46 seconds to complete this test. This is significantly worse than the LG Chocolate and Razr V3m, both of which took 22.6 seconds to add a calendar item. The Upstage is hurt by the fact that it does not allow you to enter new calendar appointments on the front of the phone, requiring you to use the full interface on the back of the phone instead. This means that we needed to flip the phone in order to enter text information. It was also hurt by the fact that the touch controls used to navigate to the calendar in the menus gave us problems at times and the calendar application itself is buried in the menu system.
Calendar Views (3.0)
The calendar on the Upstage is only accesible from the interface on the back of the phone. The Sprint Upstage provides you with 3 different views, monthly, weekly and daily. The monthly view shows a single month and allows you to navigate between days using the directional pad. As you highlight each day an indicator at the bottom of the screen shows you how many appointments, tasks, etc. are listed in each day. You use the center select button to jump to that specific day's view. Days with appointments are surrounded by a red box, the current day is highlighted in red.
The weekly view on the Upstage is different than we've seen on other phones. It shows the days of the week in a list. Events on each day are shown by indicators that are the same as those seen on the bottom of the monthly view. You can move between days by using up/down or the scroll feature, and you can move to the next or previous week by using left/right.
The daily view provides you with a chronological list of all the appointments on that day. Tabs along the top allow you to view appointments, tasks or countdowns. Each item has a title and time, with no indicators for things like You can use the back key to navigate to the previous view. You cannot filter any of your views by category. Overall we found the views on the Upstage to be very basic, providing little information. We also found it annoying to use the touch sensitive controls to navigate the interface. Still, the Upstage's calendar is no better or worse than than the poor calendars found on the LG Chocolate or the Razr V3m.
Fields (6.0)
ToDo/Tasks
Adding ToDo/Task (3.52)
The Sprint Upstage allows you to add tasks through the calendar program. To test how easy it is to add a task we time how long it takes to add a simple task reminding us to pick up groceries. We repeat the test 5 times and take the average for our score. The Upstage took an average of 28.38 seconds to enter our sample task. This is significantly longer than the Sanyo M1, which took only 18 seconds to enter our sample task. The Upstage is again hurt by the fact that you need to start the task creation process on the back of the phone and then flip it around to enter text. The task program is also buried in the menus.
ToDo/Task Sorting and Prioritizing (3.5)
The tasks program on the Upstage is very simple and does not include any options for sorting your tasks. You can however set priorities for your tasks to either high or low.
Fields (3.0)
As we mentioned the tasks program on the Upstage is exceedingly simple. The only fields available are title, priority and due date. You can also set the task's status, however this is a menu option in the main taks screen, not a field when you create the task. There is not even an option for an alarm to sound to remind you of the task. The Sanyo M1 was a little more full featured, with the ability to set status from within the creation screen and the ability to set a category for the task.
Notes
Adding Notes (1.68)
The Sprint upstage includes a very simple text memo application. To test how easy it is to add a note we time how long it takes to go from the standby screen until we have completed entering a simple note about lunch the next day. On the Upstage it took an average of 29.72 seconds to add this note. This is faster than the LG Chocolate, which took 33.8 seconds. We still found the interface a little clunky however as again we needed to flip the phone over to enter text, but were forced to launch the note application from the back of the phone due to the limited menu options on the front.
Note Interface (1.0)
The Notes application on the Upstage is exceedingly simple, allowing you to view a list of your notes in the order they were created. There is no option to search through notes, categorize or filter them. The left soft key allows you to create a new note, while the right soft key allows you to erase one or all of your notes. The LG Chocolate had a more advanced options, such as allowing you to search through your notes.
Note Formatting (1.0)
The Sprint Upstage allows you no text formatting options, such as font, text size or color. We did however find a nice feature that allows you to add a "skin" to your note, which is basically a colorful background. You can choose from 18 different options for the background, including sports and holiday themes. Although not very useful, it is a nice feature for those who like their phone interface to be colorful.
Voice Memo (3.0)
The Sprint Upstage includes a voice memo application that allows you to record voice notes up to 1 minute in length. You can also record up to 1 minute of a phone conversation. You can edit the description of the voice note, however you can not send a voice note via MMS directly from the application. The voice notes application is also buried in the menus, so there is no one touch voice recording available. The voice notes application on the Upstage falls a little short of other phones, for example the LG Chocolate allows you to send an MMS directly from the voice note application, while the Razr V3m allows you to record notes up to 10 minutes in length and the Sanyo M1 has a dedicated key for easy access to the voice notes application.
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