Baltimoremick.com

So, I have had my new RAZR2 for just under two weeks. After some time with the phone, I wanted to jot some thoughts on the phone and how one can use it better considering my carrier is the one who cripples their phone the most, Verizon.

My upgrade was part of their “New Every 2.”  Essentially, every two years, you can get a new phone–possibly free.  In my case, I was getting a phone not in the pool of available phones.  This meant that I paid a little bit more than I could have, but that’s the price I pay for having a new phone.  I paid $262, and I have a $100 mail-in rebate coming back to me.  So, I paid $162 for the phone.  My monthly plan will cost $79/month, and that includes$59 for my monthly plan of 900 Nationwide minutes and $20 for unlimited text messaging to anyone on any carrier.  This is slightly more than I was paying for my previous plan with my e815.

I found quite a few great resources for configuring, hacking, and other pieces of information about the RAZR2.  HowardForums is a great site for all things mobile phone, and a frequent poster to those forums has his own page where he has consolidated information.  The following links are very useful:

Official Motorola RAZR2 V9m How-Tos Thread

Official Motorola RAZR2 V9m Release Thread

Motorola RAZR2 V9m: Bluetooth

Mark_Venture’s Verizon Phone Info Page

Here are some thoughts on my new phone:

• Compared to the original RAZR, I like both the form factor and the feel of the RAZR2.  It doesn’t feel as top-heavy to me as the original RAZR felt.  Additionally, the rubberized back and keypad make it much easier to use.  It doesn’t feel nearly as delicate as the original RAZR.
• I have to admit that the display on this phone is pretty damn good.  It’s bright and colorful.
• The camera is actually pretty good too, although I find that the phone appears to do an incredibly bad job at compressing the images.  The images never look as bad when I take them then when I send them to myself via SMS.
• In typical Motorola fashion, though, I find some of the default options on the phone out of the box to be annoying.  For example, the default text input for text messaging was not set to the iTAP input method.  It was set to abc, which is annoying when you are used to iTAP.  It took me a couple of passes to configure this correctly.  To configure this correctly, enter the Settings when in the Messaging menu.  Select All Msg, then select Entry Mode.  Select iTAP English, and you will now use iTAP for text messaging.
• There are actually a number of customizations that one can make to the phone, and one of them allows you to remove the annoying Verizon Wireless banner from the displays.
• The RAZR2 appears to be hackable, much along the lines of my trusty e815 that this phone replaced.  This is handy as it will allow you to re-enable some of the features that Verizon has disabled–namely Bluetooth file transfer functionality.
• One of the things that took some getting used to on my part, as the RAZR2 changes the location of the space key.  On my e815, it was the * button while on the RAZR2   it is the # button.  A slight retraining of my fingers as they type the text messages.  I have found iTAP to be quite good at predicting what I am planning to type.
• The RAZR2 uses a different connector than the original RAZR.  If you hope to use any of your accessories with the RAZR2, you are out of luck.  Of course, if you have had Motorola phones for sometime, this is not an uncommon occurrence.  This means after having the same USB data cable for my last two phones be compatible, I will need to break down and purchase a data cable.
• Motorola Phone Tools works with the RAZR2, but I have borked with the Bluetooth functionality on the phone.