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Bell Samsung Vice Review
We have been playing around with the Samsung Vice for the past few days and find it to be a solid – just above entry level – device. The best quality about the Vice is it’s price point at $49.95 on a 3-year contract. This is currently exclusively available at Bell and is a North American first.
At first when we saw pics surface that this was coming to Canada, I thought it was going to be another basic device that feels cheap in the hand. Rest assured when you hold this it feels solid and you feel you get more than you pay for. The Vice only weight 134 grams and has overall dimensions of 114.1 x 48.3 x 17.9 mm. The reason I say you feel like you get more than you pay for is because of its slide out full QWERTY keyboard. For the size of device this is one of the more spacious designs I have seen. Your fingers/thumbs will not get in the way of each other… even if you have a slightly larger digits you’ll find the keys are just the right size. Texting, e-mails and IM are a dream on this as this comes with threaded text messaging so you’ll be able to follow your conversations.
With the ease of typing, comes the quality of screen. This has a 2.2 inch screen with a resolution of 240 x 320. The max number of characters for a text is 140 and I found that the screen could have been improved, possibly made just a bit bigger. The resolution was somewhat pixelated with viewing TV or videos but the speakers were great quality. In regards to surfing the web, the screen size made it a bit of a challenge as some sites we viewed were simply text links, even when we switched to the full HTML browser option the screen did not do justice.
Apart from the standard features such as contacts, speakerphone, voice memo, alarm clock, calendar, other key features of the Vice include its GPS, MP3 player, 3.5mm headphone jack and can expand up to another 8GB with a MicroSD. With this said, I was pleasantly surprised with the 2.0 megapixel camera. I like how many options you have with this feature (picture and video messaging) and can take video as well. When viewing pics you can simply use the scrolling directional pad to work your way through your albums and view them either in portrait or landscape.
This is available in Blue (and White May 20th) on the following price plans
3-year: $49.95
2-year: $99.95
1-year: $199.95
Prepaid: $249.95
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26 comments for “Bell Samsung Vice Review”
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I wouldn’t say $50 is a great quality at a 3 year contract price price-point. You can buy it for $250 prepaid, or get more expensive phones for the same price or less on a 3 year contract.
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Considering it’s bell it is awesome for a 3 year contract and is $100 cheaper to buy outright than the LG Rumour was last year at this time (which I bought then, am regretting it now that i know of the Vice)….
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i was wondering if you can put music on your phone from your computer once you get the extra memory or do ya gotta buy it?
also, i was wondering if you can use the music as your ring tones instead of buying them?
if some1 could let me know that would be awesoomee =] thankss.
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What about it’s function as a phone??? What is the voice quality like?
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This phone is being sold at Virgin Mobile now…
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I would like to know, cause im getting this phone this week, how is the texting and the signal strength.Thanks
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WOW! so expensive! i got this phone prepaid for 149.99 at virgin mobile!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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the samsung vice has a horrible battery life. i cant even leave my phone on for the night. every night i have to turn the phone off… then the phone lasts me for about 40 hours… NOT 230 hours like they said on the description of the phone… otherwise this is a great phone for features,style and texting
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Colin Reply:
August 27th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
I took mine out of the box and without charging it I was able to get 3 days out of it before it starting powering down. I made numerous phone calls and texts… I think you got a faulty battery because mine has excellent battery life.
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Antonio Reply:
September 24th, 2009 at 9:29 pm
I just got mine about two days ago… I would have to say I’m in between both of your comments… mine can last about two days or so… I use the text function A LOT… I also used the camera often enough as well… I haven’t attempted having it on at night, since I new battery life would have been used up when it’s not necessary or needed (since I’m asleep and a text can be sent to me when I turn it on anyways…)… but like the person said a bit further below, we should put the phone in power saver mode! xD)
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The samsung vice phone is a CDMA phone meaning that its always looking for reception. Because of this the phone’s battery life drains out much faster than a GSM phone that doesn’t look for reception as often. Telus, virgin mobile, and bell usually sell CDMA phones whereas rogers and Fido sell GSM phones that have better battery life.
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yin5yan Reply:
August 10th, 2009 at 7:48 am
Battery life for the Samsung Vice is indeed horrible.
Does anyone get following message:
‘!’ ‘Not enough memory/new message is rejected’
I seem to get this message now and then on my phone, although my phone indicates plenty memory available.
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jason Reply:
September 30th, 2009 at 10:01 am
I think you can change a setting on the phone to automatically delete text messages when the inbox is full. My old LG did that all the time and I just changed it to auto delete. Maybe this helps.
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Colin Reply:
August 27th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
But Rogers is one of the worst cell companies in Canada. I hate Bell but they outprice every other company by a long shot. I got a 3 year contract with 150 anytime minutes(not much) 10 unlimited talk and text numbers, Eve and weekends starting at 6 (compared to 8-9 for other companies) all for $20 a month. No other company can come cloase to that price point. I hate Bell but it was just cheap. Koodo comes close but they charge a little more for a little less and the phone selection is kinda crappy.
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I got the vice last week and its awsome. N yes u can download music of the computer plug in the usb n ur phone to the computer n then on ur phone go to ‘entertainment’ n the press ‘memory card’ n the press ‘connect to pc’ n transfer all ur files its pretty easy. I agree the battery life sucks but overall great phone.
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Does anyone know how many text messages the vice holds in the inbox?
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I had my vice for about 3 weeks and the battery is not holding charge more than two day even if I don’t use it at all. I mean literally I am not using the phone and the batter is dying fast. If I talk on the phone after a 10 min conversation I see that I lost a slash from the battery. Is that normal? I don’t think so. I saw a review saying that the batter should live for 240 hours on standby. Which is about 9 days, it is only lasting 2 days.
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Jacob Reply:
September 24th, 2009 at 9:35 am
@ Tim:
My battery lasts about a good 9 days like advertised.
But do you have your power saver on? If your power saver is off, the battery usually lasts shorter because the backlight is brighter and that tends to suck the battery.
I hope I could of been of some help. =)
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The only things that have disappointed me with this phone are as follows: the short battery life when not in power saver mode (I will give power saver mode a try and hope for the best), the camera’s megapixels (2.0 megapixels is kind of low compared to other phones I have seen, but all together I don’t need the camera for anything specific like a photography class or something, so it’s good enough considering the fact that I don’t own a camera… so I can’t really complain too much on that part), and the reception. I don’t know if it’s the phone itself or if it’s just Bell… but the reception I get can be so bad when I’m inside my university. My friend’s cellphone got reception where I couldn’t even get it, meaning it’s either Bell’s fault, or it’s the cellphone. So for me to send a text message or carry out a conversation, I have to avoid certain areas in university that block out the reception. Oh and I also wish that the phone would come with a small bit of external memory (like 512 MB worth at the least). With my plan I got a 4 GB card free (equivalent to 30 dollars from bell), but I haven’t received it yet because they have to order it in… I’m hoping it comes soon because I want to make my own ring tones for it. And yes, to all of you who wonder about making your own ring tones, you CAN make your own ring tones! The link explaining it can be found here: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Can_I_use_my_mp3_music_as_ringtones_on_my_samsung_vice_from_bell_Like_the_music_I_downloaded_into_my_music_center the only thing it fails to mention is that if you’d like the ring tone to be a certain part of your song, you should probably get yourself a program that can help you with doing that. Anyways, back to my review. I love the qwerty keyboard that it comes with. Since this is my first ever cellphone, I don’t exactly have high expectations for this keyboard. I find when the keys are lit up, my thumbs go too far to the right and hit the other key beside it. this is because my eyes think the key is further right in order to avoid the other character seen on the same key. However, it’s not hard to get used to. I also love the case I got for it. The case I got from Bell was a deep metallic blue. I find the case actually makes the phone look better than it does without the case! xD
Overall I would give this phone an 8 out of 10. 80%… not too bad. I’m being rushed off the computer. Sorry for the long review. Consider yourself lucky, since I would have written more if I could have.
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Nicholas Reply:
November 17th, 2009 at 9:45 pm
Actually, I’ve tried everything to convert a mp3 to avi, then that avi to 3g2. Don’t do it. It really doesn’t work, because the phone for some reason does not pick up the song when using it as a ringtone. It reverts back to using the original ringtone. Then I moved the file onto the phone. Not only does the phone reject to delete them (yeah, I tried twice) but now when I try using them, it’s completely silent. The video ringtone options sucks badly, and even if you decide to record music via camcorder, you can only record like 20 seconds of it.
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so i’m thinking of getting this phone sometime next week… i plan on using it mainly for texting and picture-taking. it it difficult to load pictures onto the computer once the phone memory is used up? are there any problems with recieving or sending text messages? i like the red and white version but i don’t need all those menu icons, is it possible to get rid of those? thanks, – Aly
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bell prepaid, at 20$, to have, 5 hours of unlimited call oh yours choice, unlimited text message, and 30cent/minute first two minute, and after 5 cent minute, rock, and is better then virgin mobile. Also bell have the white and red version which, virgin mobile dont have, and it is only 130$ with bell, it really rock, and it is a great phone, so pick bell
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I wanted to buy this phone but now i am not sure reading these comments about the short battery life. Can any one request any other phones similar to the samsung vice from bell. I am really looking for:
- full keyboard
- slide or flip version
- good quality
- newer design
thanks
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I’ve had this phone for about 3 weeks now and I find the alarm is terrible. It goes off randomly, it will be set for 10am and at 8:45 it starts going off saying its 10 am. I took it back and they exchanged it for another one, and the same thing is happening! I have to go back again. I also find the battery life isn’t the greatest either, and I also have problems with reception when I’m inside my university. Overall this phone is garbage and I will going back for the second time today to get a completely different phone
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This Phone Is Alright… Not the best for texting..Because when you send a text message..sometimes you will get it back like someone is mocking me..but its really just your message coming back to you.. and the message does not deliver to the other person.. so if u like texting this isnt the really best phone for it..
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i’ve had the vice for about 2 months now the battery life is AMAZING but i just cant figure out how to get my pictures from my phone to my computer does anyone know how to do that?
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