When I bought this phone recently, the Sprint salesman said, "the only thing that this phone can't do is fly." He's right.Major features on this phone (aside from good ol' features like "it makes phone calls"):
-The phone doubles as an MP3 Player, which works very well (the phone includes stero headphones along with a hands free microphone. The cool thing about the headphone/microphone setup is that the microphone is the part that plugs into the phone, and then the headphones plug into the microphone: which means you can use any headphones you want with a standard sized headphone jack like that you'd find in an iPod or similar. Not only does that allow you to hear your music clearer, but you can also hear conversations better.
-The phone has a built in FM transmitter. Ignore the reviewers who said that they're transmitter didn't work: either they got a defective phone or they have no idea what they're doing. It's worked fine for me: in fact, used on my home stereo, I can be on the opposite side of the room. I particularly enjoy this feature because I don't own a car: I'm a member of Zipcar (zipcar.com) car sharing so now I don't have to bring CDs with me as I'm changing from car to car I just have to have my phone with me, which I would anyway.
-The phone has a Micro SD card slot for memory expansion. The phone includes a 64MB card (the largest card to be included with a phone) but it'd be wise to purchase a larger card eventually. Th card can be used for MP3s, photos, videos, files, etc. Also included with the phone is an adapter so that you can fit the micro SD card into a standard memory card slot. Files from the micro SD card can easily be transferred into albums and files on the phone. The phone comes with a USB cable which enables you to either use the phone as a modem, or to use the micro SD card as a flash drive this is an awesome feature because it essentially makes the phone in a portable hard drive.
-The phone has a 1.3 megapixel camera/video camera. Not only can you take short 30 second videos to send (either to another phone, email address, etc...) but you can also shoot 'long videos' which can basically be as long as the micro SD card will allow before it's memory gets filled. There is also a flash included on the phone (the camera has many other standard features too, such as the ability to shoot black and white, sepia, negative, etc...) for being a camera on a phone, the photos that it takes are pretty sharp!
-The Phone has Sprint's PowerVision capabilities you can watch live TV, check your email, browse the internet, check the weather, news, get maps and directions, etc... The Power Vision is much faster than Sprint's standared Vision services. You can of course also send and receive video and picture mail.
-Along with those major features the phone includes a slew other more standard features such as calandar, voice memos, alarms, Bluetooth capabilities, a music composer which allows you to create your own rings, etc, and a million other things.
Overall, this is a great phone that can do pretty much anything for you. The best thing is that all these features fit in a phone that has a shell that's smaller than the popular Razor phone (as far as overall dimensions go it's not quite as thin as the Razor, but close).
You can't go wrong with this phone.
Buy LG LX550 / LX-550 / LX-550 Sprint Fusic Power VisionSM Phone Now
I got this phone in early September 2006 and paid $100 more for it than it costs now. Both my husband and I got the same phone. His phone may rate as high as a 2 or 3 but I'm giving mine a 1. I'm already on my second one. I have a lot of problems with the phone "echoing." Everything I say gets repeated back to me and I can't hear the other person. Sprint told me it was a problem with the phone and gave me a different one... but now my 30-day exchange period is up and this one is even worse than the first. It doesn't happen on every call, but it happens often enough to be extremely annoying.Other problems -BATTERY LIFE GETS A NEGATIVE 10. My battery is often completely dead after 1-2 hours of standby, non-roaming use. I've been stranded without a phone DOZENS of times. I charge it up all night, leave the house with it fully charged in the morning, maybe make one two minute phone call, and it powers off with a dead battery within 2 hours. I also have a tremendous problem with it constantly saying "Data Call in Progress." This is obviously what is running the battery down every day, but no one at Sprint can tell me what is making that happen and I'm not running any applications or making any data calls. I try dialing out, and I can't it says Data Call In Progress. I try in vain to find anything that is running or making a data call, power off, pull out the battery, start back up -and it still says Data Call in Progress. Then my phone powers off because the battery is dead. I've been trying to find a car charger and an extended life battery, but neither are available at my local Sprint store, on the Sprint website, or on Amazon as far as I can tell.
Camera -I bought this phone because I wanted a megapixel camera and this seemed like it would be a good one. Every picture, however, is horrible. Much worse than the crappy old phone I had before that had a low resolution camera. Colors are distorted and you practically need to mount the phone on a tripod to get a steady shot (not that you can actually do that).
Music -It's very annoying that the Sprint Music store launches every single time you want to play a song. Also, the Sprint music player can't play MP3s that you load from your computer. You can only play those through a separate part of the phone, and then it only works if the phone is OPEN. You also have to advance to the next song yourself because there is no play list of your own songs. It works fine for the songs you buy through the Sprint store, however.
FM Transmitter -I've tried three phones now (my first one, my current one, and my husband's Fusic) -in three different vehicles, and the FM Transmitter didn't work at all in any of them. The guy at the Sprint store told me that is common, his wife's doesn't work either. Apparently you will have better luck if your car has an antenna built into the face plate inside the car, or it would possibly work if you wanted to stick it in the back window closer to the antenna.
Vision WHAT A HUGE RIP-OFF. My previous plan, which I used with my old phone that broke in half, included Vision for free. I didn't change my plan at all, I just changed our two phones -so imagine my surprise when I found out that I was now being billed an extra $50 a month for Vision. I called them and they said my plan included regular Vision and this phone doesn't work with regular Vision so they automatically "upgraded" me to Power Vision Ultimate for $25 per line. Information that would have been useful for them to share with me before I bought this phone. There are some cool features with the Sprint On Demand, such as movie listings and Mapquest locations on your phone, but the few times I've actually needed to use those services, the Sprint network has been down and unable to connect. Plus $25 per line per month for Power Vision and that doesn't even include text messaging??
Alarm you can't change the interval of the Snooze. You could do this in my old phone and it was very handy.
Receiving Calls I'm not sure if this a problem with the Sprint network or with this phone, but half the time, these dumb phones don't ring. My husband and I have tested it (because it causes many an argument when you call someone ten times and they don't answer and then you found out the phone never rang). We have tried it out at home. Both phones turned on, both show a full signal, both have the ringer volume on... but we try calling them, either from a landline or from the other phone, and it goes straight into voicemail and never rings at all. Then the voicemail indicator goes off and you have the message, but the phone never rang and nothing shows up in the missed call log. That's happened when other people have tried to call me too, from other wireless networks. The phone just goes straight to voicemail. This doesn't happen all the time either, but I bet it's at least 30-40% of the time.
Overall, I'm extremely disappointed and not at all happy to be stuck in yet another two year contract with a crappy, useless phone that is never there when I really need it. Either the battery is dead, I can't call out because it's stuck in some mysterious data call mode, or the stupid thing just doesn't ring or register my calls. However, at least if you buy it now, you'll save $100 over what I paid for it.
Read Best Reviews of LG LX550 / LX-550 / LX-550 Sprint Fusic Power VisionSM Phone Here
the phone is awesome. if you go to newegg.com you can even get a gig of memory for just over 40 bucks. the transmitter is a little tricky at first, what with finding an empty station that will accept the incoming transmission clearly. over all a great phone. send and receives calls even when no signal bars are showing, as long as service symbol is on display. definitely worth the money they are asking for it.Want LG LX550 / LX-550 / LX-550 Sprint Fusic Power VisionSM Phone Discount?
I'll qualify my remarks-the first Fusic that I purchased had to be replaced after 2 days because it wouldn't ring when the number was dialed. My local Sprint store replaced it with no problems. This review is for the 2nd phone, which functions as it should.The call clarity is exceptional. It's hard to tell you're using a cell phone. Reception is great even in marginal areas.
The FM transmitter works well. I have a Subaru with the radio antenna built into the rear window and the FM transmitter sends signal to it with no problem as long as the phone is on the dashboard. If I try to put the phone in my pocket or below line-of-sight of the antenna it doesn't work.
The phone is fairly small and the buttons on the side are easy to press when talking on it. The case is also slick which can make it a little difficult to hold. However I always keep my cell phones in a leather case, so that problem is alleviated.
The menu system is easy to navigate. The music player takes a little getting used to, but once you figure out the controls it's simple to use.
Overall I'm very satisfied with the phone. LG has a real winner with this one.
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