Sharp GX30 Review

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Sharp GX30
★★★★☆
4.0
75.0% of users recommend this
  • Screen Quality

  • Battery Life

  • Features

  • Reception

  • Style

  • Value For Money

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shakytumbleweed's review of Sharp GX30

“This Sharp GX30 is my second Sharp mobile phone, I...”

★★★★★

written by shakytumbleweed on 14/06/2004

Good Points
1 Megapixel digital camera - currently the best camera on any phone on the market.
Ultra high resolution screen - see your 1 megapixel photos in glorious 320x230 dot resolution, 262k colour glory! No squinting!
SD memory cards - Easily share files (music/pictures/video) between phone and PC, and if you purchase a larger memory card you can use the phone as an MP3 player.
Built in flash/torch/disco light (adds impetus to your argument when trying to demonstrate how dance-to-able your new novelty ringtone is after a few shandies (useful for taking the pictures in low light apparently too).
Video capture and playback.
Java
Quadband - use it in pretty much any country.

Bad Points
Limited Bluetooth - can only be used with a hands free/car kit, no communication for sharing numbers or freaking out strangers on the train home from work.
Quite conservative styling.

General Comments
This Sharp GX30 is my second Sharp mobile phone, I previously had a GX-1 which, although it had it's faults, I was very happy with. On the strength of that and the new megapixel camera I decided to plump for another Sharp and I can tell you, I am very pleased I did.



The GX-30 has everything you could want from a camera phone. Starting with the camera - it has a 7 stage digital zoom with 5 different picture sizes, you can select from macro (close-up) or portrait (standard) modes, there is a built in flash that you can change the colour of for different effects and the phone comes with an 8MB SD memory card so you can download the pictures cheaply and easily. On the front of the clamshell there's a smaller LCD screen and for self portraits etc, you can use this as the camera viewfinder. You can also record video clips with sound of up to 400KB (that's around 1 minute 20 seconds on "fine quality", imagine the trouble you can cause!).



As the phone uses SD memory cards you can upgrade the memory capacity easily, I have a 512MB card in mine and use the phone as a MP3 player. I've got about 80 tunes on it at any one time and there's still plenty of space for video clips or photos.



The keypad is excellent and makes light work of texts. Sharp have ironed out a few of the foibles with the texting interface from my old GX-1 too, capitalisation is now just a one-touch affair for instance rather than a 3 second hold button. The T9 dictionary has been updated and now has enough memory to store a large proportion of the words you might use, it's still not up to Nokia's predictive text standard but it is a huge step in the right direction.



The GPRS is quick and efficient and with Vodafone it is very reliable. Never again will you miss a football result or not know what tomorrow's weather is doing. A nice touch also from Vodafone is that if one of your friends doesn't have a picture phone (heaven forbid!) you can send postcards using photos you've taken, straight from the phone to their address.



Add to all this a voice recording function, a calendar, a calculator, 8 different alarms, downloadable Java games and you're getting some idea of just how good this phone is. The flash/torch even helps me get my keys in the door at night when I get home from the pub!



This phone is the complete package - phone, camera, digicam, games platform, MP3 player. I don't know where Sharp are going to improve this phone for the next model but I look forward to seeing it. I would definitely recommend this phone, it is fantastic, you won't be disappointed.

  • Value For Money

  • Battery Life

  • Vodafone

    Reviewers Network

  • 1 - 6 Months

    Time Phone Owned

  • Screen Quality

  • Features

  • Reception

  • Style

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