Alcatel One Touch 511 Review

Overall Rating

The most important are;
1. Clear speaker phone's voice, and sufficient mic sound quality.
2. Recording button; I always use it to pick up dictated address description, phone numbers or important notes during call, I don't have to leave my car's steering wheel and go like crazy searching for anything to record a note from a caller.
3. In-call visible call duration counter and adjustable audible beep (I set it to beep every 20 sec)
4. Small size, fits in any pocket comfortably.
5. Long Battery time (Lithium only) 2days of hard use or 3 days of light use)
6. Powerful signal reception
7. ARABIC language support.
8. Alarm sound and ringing sound can be VERY HIGH and brisk, and can hear it in any noise environment.

Others;
Durable, exchangeable cover, cheap, robust menu response, easy menu navigation, clear screen with adjustable contrast and illumination levels (0,1,2), cool analogue clock face instead of digital numbers clock, displaying 2 locations' timing simultaneously (useful when travelling abroad or when your beloved ones are travelling)

1. Voice memo recording duration is too short; max 15 seconds per memo even if I have enough memory for longer recordings. So, I may have to divide a single note during a phone call on several voice memos and loose some details.
2. Searching in menu is not good; searching only by the first letter (e.g., M), and I have to drill through the whole letter group through manual scroll to reach the desired name (Ma... , Mc..., Md..., Me....... ... Mo, M , M A.. etc) I'm missing the Nokia easy sequential letter search, where I can just type contact's initials.
3. Voice dialing is not reliable at all; unless you have broken fingers and can't type, then you probably wont use it, because you'll have to repeat name over and over until you reach the exact tone, speed and voice [finger print].
4. No infra red
5. No GPRS
6. Buttons are hard to press
7. Ring tones are so bad and limited. Composed tones come out as equally as artificial and bad as stored tones, and there are only 2 of them.
8. Amber yellow screen is not as comfortable as green one.
9. Letters are very small (bad news for senior guys who need glasses to read).
10. Games are AWFUL (but I don't mind and I don't play).
11. Nickel batteries don't last long, and when battery is half full you can't use speaker.

Alcatel 511 delivers what it promises; a MOBILE (small, can carry everywhere comfortably) PHONE (powerful reception picks signal almost anywhere and all the supporting function that make your call a pleasurable experience), but it's not an arcade game, a juke box or anything else to get the attraction of others.
While driving I can make calls while my hands on the steering wheel, and after the call I have all the information I needed from a call recorded as voice memos.
It's a rugged and a hard working slave that doesn't look nice on the outside