Motorola Motofone F3 Review

I bought the Motorola Motofone after being introduced to it by this post on my friend Nick Baum‘s blog. For as long as I remember, I’ve been reading about how phones keep getting more and more complicated. Yet many people want their phone to do only one thing: make calls. The trick was getting a phone that was usable and friendly at the same time. When Motorola finally came out with the Motofone, it appeared that they had achieved just that. The only problem was that the phone was only available in India! Fortunately for me, I’ve been in India for the last 3.5 months. So I decided to buy one (or two), and write a hands-on review for it. Well, after writing a single-spaced narrative that spanned 3 pages and finding myself only half way through the things I wanted to say about this phone, my friend Nick came to the rescue with a list of questions for me to answer. So I’ll just break my unnaturally long essay into pieces and post the review in interview format-.

Update 2007-03-07: Cross-posted on nickbaum.com

Update 2007-03-27: For those of you looking for a manual of this phone, I found two, in English. Motofone Draft Manual [pdf] is one, and Motofone Digital Manual [pdf] is another. The latter doesn’t contain the list of ‘advanced’ codes.

Without further delay, the brand new Motorola Motofone F3:

Nick: How is the packaging, the new user experience? What’s included in the box?

Me: The phone came in a cylindrical container, aka a tube. Opening the box revealed inside the device itself (without any protective plastic bag/screen cover), a battery in a nylon bag, the back cover of the device, a charger, a user’s manual (in Telugu, Kannada and English), and the standard warranty papers. The package is a standard cardboard tube with plastic tops, which makes it feel a bit cheap. However the finish is good, and if it’s sitting on a table it looks better than expected, so it might actually work in places other than India, like Europe or even the US. Most phones come in solid & glossy cardboard boxes with the phone securely tucked away in polystyrene or a plastic casing, but the Motofone’s case is different enough that it might get away with it.

Nick: Tell me about the physical design of the phone. How does it feel?

Me: The phone is extremely light. The face is completely flush, with no nicks or grooves for dirt to get into (not even around the screen, which is simply a transparent piece of plastic as far as the outer shell goes). Even the keys are completely flat, which I love. I read somewhere that the phone was built for the weather in countries like India, where there’s a lot of rain and dirt in the air. I have not tested the rain claim, but I will take Motorola’s word for it. As for the dirt, the only place I can see dirt getting into is the speaker, but even that seems hard. Everything else is either completely flat or sealed with rubber. There’s still tactile feedback through the protruding rubber lines above and below the buttons. Both the buttons and the click wheel in the middle feel very natural. The clickable area is quite large, and you can easily feel the button being pressed.

The only input slot is the charger/headphone jack, which is smaller than any other charger jack I’ve seen. However, the fit of the plug is extremely snug in the phone (it will not fall off if you dangle the phone from the cord, but at the same time it does not require much strength to push it in/take it out), and it seems that it uses the same plug for headphones, which I have not tested. The thickness of the phone is about the same as an Apple Remote.

Nick: How about performance? In practice, how long is the battery life? How is reception?

Me: Motorola claims 300h of stand-by battery life which, for the less mathematically inclined, translates to 12 days. That might be true if you turn on the phone, leave it on a table and never touch it or receive any calls. The screen consumes absolutely no power when it’s not changing the contents of the display, so on stand by the only power drain is the signal reception and updating the time every 60 seconds. However, I would not expect the battery to last anything more than 5 days under any circumstances where the phone is actually being used. I did let the battery run down completely, but I did get a solid 4 days of constant use from it before the 5-segment battery indicator dropped to a single line (just barely dropped below 2, where the last line can easily go for another day).

As far as reception goes, I only have one word: outstanding. I’ve been using this phone for 2 weeks, and I still have not seen the reception indicator fall below the full 5 lines (and no, reception is not generally this good in my area). In line with this, the excellent speakerphone is a feature I did not expect. Voice clarity on this device is up to par with any phone I’ve ever tried, including land lines. I have no problems understanding anything anyone says to me on this phone.

Nick: How does the screen perform in different light conditions? How does it compare to regular screens?

Me: The screen is definitely the most innovative power saving feature of the device. I already knew that the E-ink technology used for the screen requires no power to keep the screen on, but it’s a different feeling when you take out the battery without turning the phone off, and the screen keeps displaying the last characters on it! (Yes, it does reset without any trace when you turn it back on). The contrast is excellent and the characters are clearly visible in any light condition from any angle (unless there’s complete darkness).

This being said, it’s not all rosy. The character display is exactly like the old 16-segment LCD displays of yesteryear. 2 rows of 6 characters, that’s it. What’s even worse, only the first row is used for actual alphanumeric characters, which makes reading messages a big pain. I do believe there’s a valid reason for doing this (read on about the user interface), but it doesn’t stop it from being extremely annoying. Also since the characters are constructed from segments, there’s no notion of upper/lower case. You will see an upper case letter or a lower case letter depending on which one will make the most sense when formed by the segments.

Nick: Describe the user interface? Is it immediately intuitive, or does it take getting used to?

Me: The interface is by far the most interesting aspect of the device, even more so than the screen. The phone has a language setting, but not in the traditional sense as none of the menus have any text in them. Instead, any action you might perform on the phone and might need some instruction, comes with a voice-over, in the language chosen by the user. As this phone is targeted for the low-income family, there’s a good chance that a user of the phone might not even know how to read. For this reason, I believe the choice to preload the phone with voice messages in the native languages of the region it is being launched in instead of simply having text in different languages is an excellent choice.

The first time I turned on the phone and entered my PIN, I was greeted by a man speaking in a language I did not understand. After a few seconds, the same man said, in English, “For English, press 3”. Since I bought the phone in the Karnataka district of India, the phone comes with 3 pre-set languages: Telugu, Kannada, and English, where the first two are the official languages of the district. These options come up whenever the SIM card is replaced in the phone, which makes sense. Once the language is selected, if you wish to change it you must either change the SIM, or go through the ‘advanced menus’ (read on).

As soon as I pressed 3, the same voice asked me if I wanted voice prompts while using the phone. 1 for Yes, 2 for No. I pressed 1 just out of curiosity. This option is presented to me every time the phone is switched on. Note that wherever I make a note of what the “friendly voice” says, this is always dependent to whether or not voice prompts are enabled. If they’re not, then the voice will never be heard from again (at least not until you turn the phone off and back on).

Since I had just powered on the phone, I was presented with the option for setting the time on the phone (with the voice telling me “Enter time”). After telling it the time and date, I was pretty much done with the setup.

There are exactly 6 menu choices. The menu can be accessed by pressing right or left on the click wheel. Pressing up or down while on standby changes the volume of the phone. The menu itself contains no characters, just icons. The same friendly voice tells you the menu you are on, which you can access by pressing the action key (top left). These choices are (as narrated by the friendly voice): Send a message, Read your messages, Call history, Change ringtone (7 possible pre-defined choices), Set alarm, Change time. Scrolling to the menu you wish to use you can press ‘up’ or ‘action’ and the menu will be selected, where the voice will tell you what you can do (“Write your message” for example).

There are a few other (advanced) options you can mess with: change language, select time format, set voicemail number, keypad tones on/off, auto keypad lock on/off, set SIM pin, SIM pin on/off, restricted calling – phonebook only, prepaid balance display, set balance inquiry number, and the obligatory reset factory settings. All of these options are accessible by pressing *** [3-digit number code] * [action]. These settings obviously require the manual which lists all the 3 digit codes, and are generally the kind of thing you would only set once and then forget about it. I haven’t tried to see if there are any easter eggs in there.

All in all, it took me about 10 minutes to get used to the interface. It did not immediately come to me (I spent a few seconds being utterly confused), but I believe the reason for that was because I’m so used to the standard interfaces that come on every phone. After getting the hang of this one (which was very fast to do so), it became almost second nature.

Nick: How does the address book work?

Me: There’s a phone book button (top right) which takes you directly to the phone book. There is no memory on the phone itself for an address book, so it uses the SIM memory which is limited to 12 characters per contact name, and one number per contact entry. Pressing the phone book button will bring up the phone book, which you can navigate with up/down, or press a letter to jump to that point in the phone book. To scroll through the 6 character limit of the display you must press right. Pressing right multiple times will display the phone number of the contact, and then an option to delete the contact (shown as a trash can, you must press ‘up’ to delete it when the icon is shown). Furthermore, each contact has a number associated to it (the SIM card memory location), which can be used for speed dialing. If an unknown number is on the display, an icon appears above the phone book button which indicates that pressing it will let you add that number to your SIM.

The Call History menu has a memory of the last 15 dialed/received calls (the menu icon indicates whether the number was dialed or received, depending on the direction of the arrow).

Nick: How does text messaging work?

Me: There are two ways you can send a text message. The first way is to start writing a message by using the “Send a message” menu (first choice), then entering the number or going through the phone book. Alternatively, whenever a number or a contact (either through the phone book or through the Call History menu) is visible, a “Send a message” action is available and accessible through the action button, which will take you to the same “Send a message” menu. Writing the message and pressing send will send the message to the number you already selected.

I already mentioned that only the top row is used for text, and that this makes reading messages extremely annoying. However, you do get used to it. If a word is less than 6 characters long, it will definitely be shown in its entirety. I.e. if you receive the message “hi how is california?” then “hi how” would be on the first screen, “is” would be on the second and “california” would span two screens, split at the ‘o’. The reason behind all this, in my opinion, is consistency. Browsing anything (messages, contacts, call history, etc) is a top to bottom action, and reading a message is a left to right action. If the message spanned two lines, it might be a bit more confusing, but the initial confusion might be worth the convenience. On the up side the response time of any action is next to nothing, so reading a message on this phone is NOT considerably slower than on any other phone, provided you’re not using T9 or any other sophisticated input method. The only way a message can be composed is by typing each letter in the standard way. Furthermore, there’s no ‘back’ button in the sense that you can navigate your message. If you make a mistake, you have to erase all the letters from the end of the message to the mistake in order to correct it, and then type everything again.

Nick: What do you like best about the phone?

Me: I’d have to say the large characters that display the time, the visibility of the screen, and the intuitiveness of the interface (after you take 10 minutes to learn it, mainly because we’ve all been conditioned to expect a lot of counter-intuitive interfaces from phones). Oh, and the price. You just can’t beat a $40 price tag on a phone that looks this good.

Also, I was surprised by the alarm. It’s quite loud, annoying, and must have a very well constructed sound loop because when it starts “chirping”, it appears as if the frequency/tone of the sound is slightly randomized, so it’s not a constant beat. Let’s just say it has more success waking me up than most other alarms I’ve tried (with the possible exception of The Matrix soundtrack CD starting at full volume).

Nick: What do you miss most? Is the simplicity a blessing or a curse?

Me: I think what I miss the most is the ability to synchronize my contact list with my mac, and slightly less I miss being able to connect my mac to the internet through the phone from wherever I am. However I still force myself to not carry my bluetooth enabled phone everywhere with me, because I believe having that kind of access to the internet should be reduced. As a computer scientist I spend a LOT of time on the internet as is, and having the ability to connect to the internet from anywhere at any time is just distracting. Feel free to disagree with me on this.

Beyond that, I do not miss the camera, the color screen, or the mp3 capabilities (I even have an iPod that I never use). If anything, I’d say the simplicity is a blessing. I never really used any of those features on my phones for any reasonable purpose, and simply having them there caused me to take ugly photos, waste time with 100px color photos, and suffer through low quality songs. Granted there are a lot of smartphones out there that get a lot of these things right, and maybe it is convenient to some to have a low quality 2MP camera in their pocket at all times. As far as I’m concerned however, if I believe I’ll want to take some photos, I’ll take a real camera. There’s just no way a phone can be designed to do all those things, and at the same time be small, light and usable. It always takes away from the primary purpose of the phone: making calls; which is why I believe the simplicity of this phone is a step in the right direction.

Nick: What are the greatest flaws of the phone? How would you improve it?

Me: I’d have to say the way the screen displays the characters. It seems that e-ink technology is able to create finer text, though I don’t know how that would affect the stand-by battery life (not that it matters much in real-life terms). Reading/Composing messages is troublesome at best, which is a problem concerning a lot of cellular communication now occurs via texting. I realize that a lot of the marketing around the phone is targeted to people who potentially don’t know how to read and/or write, but it’s a mistake to not consider the vast number of people who do and will be using this phone for that purpose. Other than that, I couldn’t be happier with it.

Nick: How popular is the phone in India? How is it marketed?

Me: I have not seen any ads for it, nor have I seen anyone else carry it or use it. That being said, I had a hell of a time finding a unit, as it was out of stock in every shop I went to. On the flip side, one shop owner I chatted up said they only brought 20 units total which sold in a couple of weeks, but they have no plans of bringing more. A few other stores hadn’t even heard of the device. I was finally able to locate a store that was having some stock brought in, and I reserved a device from them. The store attendant seemed to be very curious as to why I would choose a phone that had no features, and kept trying to get me to buy something else. Then again I’m in Mangalore, which is a city of 800,000 people in a country of 1.2 billion, and is also considered by many as a backwater village (i had to go to 4 different computer stores to find a 6-pin to 6-pin firewire cable). It’s extremely likely that Motorola has just not focused any marketing efforts in my parts of India, but I can’t confirm that.

Nick: Would you use this as your primary phone in the US?

Me: Probably. I’ve definitely given up a Nokia 6230 and an Ericsson K700i for this phone. Both of the other phones are turned off and stuck in my closet. That being said, I would not get rid of secondary phone with some more wireless capabilities, because I often find myself needing some mobile access which a simple phone cannot provide. I don’t know if I’d give up a blackberry for it, as I’ve never owned one (re: my comment on the simplicity of the phone).

Update 2007-03-28: Since some people have started adding undocumented key codes to the comments, I’ll try to maintain a complete list here and update it as more undocumented settings codes come up.

To access the advanced settings, press * * * [number code] * [action]

Those are the ‘official’ codes, covered in the manual. Now for the experimental part…
Note: Use these at your own risk, even before these codes were posted here phone numbers were lost from a SIM card because of them, so back up your numbers before you use them!

The following codes work AS IS, i.e. without entering the * around them

That’s it for now! If you find more, post them in the contents, I’ll pick them up and put them here.

Tags: Motofone, Motorola, Review
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394 Responses to “Motorola Motofone F3 Review”

1. 1. Comment by Jon Long
   on 26 Aug 2007 @ 2:07 pm

   [quote comment=”2015″]
   I was wondering, what are the standby times of the readers here?

   [/quote]
   I’ve owned my F3 for 2 months now and the standby times are between 8 and 10 days depending on how many calls I make/receive. I always let the battery drain completely and recharge it fully.

   Has anyone had their F3 unlocked in the U.K?

2. 2. Comment by neenee
   on 27 Aug 2007 @ 9:12 am

   Thanks for your reply Jon Long 🙂

3. 3. Comment by Ian
   on 28 Aug 2007 @ 10:06 pm

   Just got one today (blue) from carphone warehouse (UK) £25 inc £10 loaded worldpay sim, or £50 without, work that out lol! Anyway phone is unlocked so I am using my vodafone sim in it. Very impressed with its simplicity, ringer volume can be very LOUD if desired, only drawback as mentioned in previous posts is the sms alert tone is so quiet that you will certainly not know you have received an sms unless you visably look at your phone, or you are in a quiet room
   Personally I think I like it!…anyone want to buy a Nokia 6200 classic on 3 with TV, slingbox, website access, blah blah blah…oh and a battery life of about 2 days max lol

4. 4. Comment by gabs
   on 1 Sep 2007 @ 7:29 pm

   how do u view your outbox if possible?!

5. 5. Comment by neenee
   on 2 Sep 2007 @ 2:00 am

   If you had searched through the thread, you would have found:

   “the F3 doesn’t save sent messages”.

   Kind regards.

6. 6. Comment by Terry
   on 2 Sep 2007 @ 10:12 pm

   I just bought my F3 from JAG for £4.99p although I did have to put £30 credit on it but with Orange’s £1 credit when registering that makes it a pretty cheap phone. But I’m having problems setting a SIM PIN. When I enter ***300* I get a message – Failed 1-070. Any suggestions?

7. 7. Comment by Terry
   on 3 Sep 2007 @ 1:23 pm

   Problem solved. Just found out I have to set SIM Pin on (***310*) then change Pin using Set SIM Pin (***300*)

8. 8. Comment by djnick
   on 4 Sep 2007 @ 11:46 am

   I know where to get the US Unlocked versions of these, claims it runs 850/1900 band, however how much should one expect to pay? Is $80 too much?

9. 9. Comment by Tarun
   on 5 Sep 2007 @ 10:11 am

   Superb review, so detailed yet so very comprehensive! It is the best review of any product I have ever come across. I bought this phone from Futurebazaar.com (it is the online reseller of the India’s supermarket giant ‘Super Bazar’). I got a great deal. The actual street price of the phone as printed on the package in India is Rs. 1655.00 (~ $41 /GBP 20 /EUR 30). However there was a 3 day discount sale at Futurebazaar.com a few days back. The F3 was priced at Rs. Rs. 1140.00 (~ $28 /GBP 14 /EUR 20)plus there was a SanDisk 1GB pendrive free. So the final effective price of the phone for me (after deducting the cost of pendrive) comes out to be Rs 540 (that is, ~ $13 /GBP 7 /10 EUR). Isn’t that amazing. So it just costed my dirt cheap.

   Its a great phone, great design, light weight, very slim, good voice quality. All in all it makes me feel geek and good!

   However here are a few bad things about it:
   1. No SMS forwarding. This is something very crucial at times, forwarding a text message. And f3 lacks this capability. Its too bad.

   2. Battery life is not that good as claimed. I have recharged the phone 3 times in last 10 days (and have completed the ‘full charge-full discharge’ cycle each time). On top of that the phone doesn’t warn you that its gonna die. Each time it so happened that I checked the phone (already low on battery) and found it switched off.

   3. I found a residual effect of the e-ink. For example after unlocking the keypad, the lock symbol on the screen still ‘glows’ even afterwards for a few minutes. I hope the electrophoretic screen technology used here improves over the coming years and probably we may have colour electropgoretic screens in future as well. That will be interesting!

   4. “SMS received” tone too too faint.

   Final verdict: A good phone for making and receiving phone calls and for occasionally using SMS feature. Alarm is powerful to wake me up even from deepest sleep. I hope the future versions of this phone will have necessary rectifications.

10. 10. Comment by Jorge
    on 13 Sep 2007 @ 1:17 pm

    [quote comment=”1086″]Actually, I just turned it on with no SIM in it at all and it still lit up TelCel so I assume that means it’s locked. Grrr.

    Anyone know how to unlock this sucker?[/quote]

    I read somewhere that you have to put your card in and leave the Phone on for 8+ hours, then “enter sub code” appears. This in unconfirmed

11. 11. Comment by Cat
    on 15 Sep 2007 @ 10:25 pm

    Hi,

    I live in the U.S. and just picked up an unlocked F3 from cellhut.com for use during my trips to Europe… Since I’ll be moving around a lot, I picked up an international prepaid SIM card (travelsim) for it, so I’m wondering…

    I cannot set the phone & SIM card up right now, as it just gives me a “—- [Error icon]” and there’s no signal because it is a GSM900/1800 Mhz phone. I assume that I will be able to set it up upon arriving in Austria, without the need for unlocking codes and whatnot.

    Does anyone have any experience with using this F3 phone with the TravelSIM international prepaid SIM card in Europe? If so, do you think there’s any information I should have available (PIN numbers, etc?) before I can setup and use this SIM card with my F3?

12. 12. Comment by sinagra
    on 17 Sep 2007 @ 3:46 pm

    How do you set the phone so that it keeps ringing when someone calls and does not go to voicemail after several rings? Doesn’t ring long enough to give my wife a chance to find it in her handbag and answer.

13. 13. Comment by LW
    on 17 Sep 2007 @ 9:44 pm

    A friend just bought me an F3c in India, but it doesn’t have a SIM card. I’m in the US and live in a remote area serviced only by Verizon. How can I purchase a SIM card that will work with my provider?

14. 14. Comment by Alexander
    on 18 Sep 2007 @ 8:21 am

    [quote comment=”2059″]A friend just bought me an F3c in India, but it doesn’t have a SIM card. I’m in the US and live in a remote area serviced only by Verizon. How can I purchase a SIM card that will work with my provider?[/quote]

    Well, what I can recommend is to take your phone with you to the local verizon store and ask them if there is something they can do with it. I rather dare doubt (: but still worth a try, I guess…

15. 15. Comment by fahad
    on 19 Sep 2007 @ 11:21 pm

    how to activate call waiting options

16. 16. Comment by domertas
    on 21 Sep 2007 @ 2:28 pm

    I bought this phone in Lithuania (because I live there). It was in a different packaging and it also came with 2 local languages – lithuanian, russian and english. Most of it is the same exept there was an easy-to-remove plastic sticker on the screen. Also, it is mentioned in manual that the phone should not be exposed to any form of humidity. I like this phone very much. it is very easy to use it.

17. 17. Comment by domertas
    on 21 Sep 2007 @ 2:33 pm

    [quote comment=”2063″]I bought this phone in Lithuania (because I live there). It was in a different packaging and it also came with 2 local languages – lithuanian, russian and english. Most of it is the same exept there was an easy-to-remove plastic sticker on the screen. Also, it is mentioned in manual that the phone should not be exposed to any form of humidity. I like this phone very much. it is very easy to use it.[/quote]
    Oh yes, and I forgot to mention, I bought it without any sim card from “Mobili linija” (lith. Mobile Line), so I can connect any network with the card from it.

18. 18. Comment by aaron
    on 23 Sep 2007 @ 10:15 am

    i just got my f3 in the mail, and it keeps flashing odd numbers on the screen. is it changing networks? what’s going on? it also frequently has an out of network symbol on the screen, thought the phone was sold as unlocked… the sim card is from my cell phone plan carrier, and there is excellent coverage here, so it shouldn’t be out of network…

    any help greatly appreciated.

19. 19. Comment by SergeK
    on 25 Sep 2007 @ 5:52 pm

    Does anyone now, how to reflash it to another language?

    I bought one on eBay. Voice prompt in English is OK, but sometime i need read SMS on russian. But there are only dashes instead of russian letters.

20. 20. Comment by neenee
    on 28 Sep 2007 @ 4:21 pm

    This phone can not be flashed. What you buy is what you get.

    I am not even sure there is a Russian version you can buy.

21. 21. Comment by SergeK
    on 29 Sep 2007 @ 4:12 pm

    [quote comment=”domertas”]I bought this phone in Lithuania (because I live there). It was in a different packaging and it also came with 2 local languages – lithuanian, russian and english.[/quote]

    See message 217.

    So there definitly is russian version.

    The only question – how to reflash?

22. 22. Comment by Dave Raeburn
    on 2 Oct 2007 @ 11:05 am

    I think this Motorola F3 is a nifty little phone. It looks like a fully featured phone to other people with its slimline looks and minimalistic design.

    I think its mint.

23. 23. Comment by neenee
    on 3 Oct 2007 @ 9:09 am

    [quote comment=”2069″][quote comment=”domertas”]I bought this phone in Lithuania (because I live there). It was in a different packaging and it also came with 2 local languages – lithuanian, russian and english.[/quote]

    See message 217.

    So there definitly is russian version.

    The only question – how to reflash?[/quote]

    I know there are versions with different language-sets, but those languages are on the phone when you buy it and can not be changed.

    If you want a phone with Russian, buy one that includes that language.

    You might be able to buy the hardware component that houses the software and languages and replace what you have currently by opening the phone, but that’s as close to flashing as you can get.

    Good luck 😉

24. 24. Comment by Jason
    on 5 Oct 2007 @ 7:08 am

    Hi,

    I am on Cingular and just got my F3 moto and am extremely impressed. The only issue I have is that the voicemail icon never appears, even if I have an unheard voicemail.

    Can anyone help with this??

    Thanks!

25. 25. Comment by Hello
    on 8 Oct 2007 @ 7:12 am

    Does anyone know whether this Motofone F3 has call display which supports both name and number on incoming calls? My old Motorola ROKR did not have this newer feature (only shows one) but my current Nokia 6133 does.

26. 26. Comment by Miles-e-piles
    on 16 Oct 2007 @ 5:07 pm

    Just got my Motofone F3 from the UK last week (I live in Ireland). Really like it, wanted a basic phone without all the frills.

    One problem I have encountered is that the clock (time display) seems to go ‘asleep’ when the phone is not in use.

    The clock counter does not progress when the phone is inactive; it can be wrong by a couple of hours, if I haven’t used the phone for that long.

    I have to press a button (any button) to ‘wake’ the phone and refresh the time/display.

    Has anyone else had this problem? or have I just got a damaged/faulty phone?

    Any/all help greatly appreciated. Thanks, Miles-e-piles.

27. 27. Comment by neenee
    on 16 Oct 2007 @ 9:21 pm

    I have had this problem once before, but not in a long while. I am not sure how to reproduce it, as my phone is often not used, I just have it with me to be reachable or to reach others when something is afoot.

    I do not think you have a faulty phone, as mine works without problems apart from that one incident long ago.
    What I do mind a bit however, is that when I turn off the phone and turn it back on, I have to re-enter the time and date. So I keep it on instead of turning it off like I did with my previous phone to save power.

28. 28. Comment by Jay
    on 22 Oct 2007 @ 9:26 pm

    [quote comment=”2076″]Hi,

    I am on Cingular and just got my F3 moto and am extremely impressed. The only issue I have is that the voicemail icon never appears, even if I have an unheard voicemail.

    Can anyone help with this??

    Thanks![/quote]

    Hello,

    I having the same issue no voice mail icon appearing when I have messages that I have not heard on ARR network, also the call waiting does not work which I can live with. Just wondering if anyone found a way to correct this so the icon will display when I have a voice mail?

    Thanks,

    Jay

29. 29. Comment by Dmitry
    on 22 Oct 2007 @ 10:08 pm

    [quote comment=”2074″][quote comment=”2069″][quote comment=”domertas”]I bought this phone in Lithuania (because I live there). It was in a different packaging and it also came with 2 local languages – lithuanian, russian and english.[/quote]

    See message 217.

    So there definitly is russian version.

    The only question – how to reflash?[/quote]

    I know there are versions with different language-sets, but those languages are on the phone when you buy it and can not be changed.

    If you want a phone with Russian, buy one that includes that language.

    You might be able to buy the hardware component that houses the software and languages and replace what you have currently by opening the phone, but that’s as close to flashing as you can get.

    Good luck ;)[/quote]

    I have a version with Russian language, but its only about Russian voice prompts. Received Russian SMSs are not readable – dashes instead of letters.

30. 30. Comment by Sivadev
    on 25 Oct 2007 @ 4:09 am

    Very good review and very informative feedback. As for me, I reside in Malaysia and bought it for 140 ringgit malaysia which is equalent to around USD30. Currently the cheapest phone here. I find it very useful (most people who own phones that have the works; ie 3G, video, camera, MP3, GPS and other ABC or ZYX or #$% still use it for making voice calls most of the time). Very basic, very easy to use but a pain in the neck when SMSing. But Overall I am happy, and due to its slim design, you hardly feel it in your pocket. When i bought it, it came with the phone, charger, earphones (simple but does the job) and a silicone case (the one that is whitish and protects the phone from dirty hands like mine). I will recommended it to anyone (or more precisely to anyone who does not want the ABC or ZYX or #$% functions in a phone)

31. 31. Comment by Trygve
    on 25 Oct 2007 @ 11:50 pm

    “Any way, some one was looking for the headsets, ive got a hold of them here in uganda. they have tyhe same pin a sthe charger.”

    Can you please give me the model number of a headset that will work with the Motofone? I can’t seem to find one with the correct plug.

32. 32. Comment by gary
    on 27 Oct 2007 @ 3:04 am

    Whenever i press the red off button- random numbers appear. How do i change this or turn this off?
    Somebody please help…

33. 33. Comment by Hans
    on 27 Oct 2007 @ 9:20 pm

    [quote comment=”2009″]Hi All. I wonder if anybody found out how to do a couple of things.

    1) How to turn on the “hide number” on call. My previous mobile was a Nokia, and I had the possibility to “obscurate” my phone number on calling other mobiles.[/quote]

    Right now and here in Belgium, Vodafone and Base allow obscure calls initiated by entering the prefix #31# followed by the number. The number does not shows up on the dialed phone/ receiver’s phone bill.
    (However,keep in mind that local laws/providers can prohibit/prevent anonymus calls)

34. 34. Comment by edmund
    on 28 Oct 2007 @ 1:52 pm

    Hi I just have my f3 with contract extension in one of the Polish providers and it’s exactly what I wanted. I have only one problem when changing the time/date. When you set everything as needed and pressed action button the time/date is blinking for a couple of seconds – if then during that short blinking you press action button again the phone crashes, no key is working, impossible to turn off and only the time/date menu icon is visible, however you can’t anything. The only thing I can do is then to remove the battery and turn it on again. Can you check whether yours do the same? Usually you do not change the time/date very often and it’s not serious problem, however anyway it should not crash like that…

35. 35. Comment by neenee
    on 28 Oct 2007 @ 8:17 pm

    I can not reproduce your problem.

36. 36. Comment by neenee
    on 31 Oct 2007 @ 5:41 pm

    Has anyone been able to find a battery-upgrade for the Motofone F3?

    I can ofcourse buy a second genuine battery, but if there’s something with more ‘oomph’ out there, I’d like to try that.

37. 37. Comment by Z
    on 4 Nov 2007 @ 10:22 am

    i see a hidden menu on F3c, it’s right icon after alarm icon, how to unlock it??

38. 38. Comment by neenee
    on 4 Nov 2007 @ 10:13 pm

    You don’t have to unlock anything. Just use the wheel to move right of the alarm menu option. The option right of the Alarm option, is the option to configure your date and time setting.

    It’s not a hidden option at all, at least, not on the F3.

39. 39. Comment by Annette
    on 12 Nov 2007 @ 4:46 am

    Hi, I just bought an F3 in Costa Rica. I had the guy at the store put my SIM card in, he had me entered my PIN and away we go. Then I was changing some things and I got the red X with a circle at the top right and then I somehow got the little padlock on the screen. So I turned the phone off and back on and it is asking me for a PUK code. I have no idea what this is or how to find it and thus am not able to use my phone now. Can anyone help me?

    Thanks.

40. 40. Comment by neenee
    on 12 Nov 2007 @ 8:32 am

    You got a Red X? But the Motofone F3 is monochrome.

    As for the PUK code, you should have gotten that with the sim-card.

41. 41. Comment by Robert
    on 26 Nov 2007 @ 1:54 pm

    Hi, It appears to me that my F3 do not support “tone” dialing?
    Anyone know if it is possible to change some setting (code) to enable “tone” dialing ?

42. 42. Comment by neenee
    on 26 Nov 2007 @ 6:34 pm

    Tone dialing is used by the Motofone F3. Pulse dialing is an outdated standard and is only supported by some phones and services for backwards compatibility.

43. 43. Comment by Rafael
    on 27 Nov 2007 @ 10:07 pm

    Hi, I just bought an F3, I need some help. When I turn on the phone the battery life and the signal stregh appear but after a minute or two it disappear and I don’t know how to see how much battery I have left…

44. 44. Comment by neenee
    on 29 Nov 2007 @ 2:15 pm

    That sounds like a bug, try going back to where you bought it.
    Perhaps you can get a replacement or have it fixed. Probably the former though.

    Good luck 🙂

45. 45. Comment by juanpa
    on 1 Dec 2007 @ 2:36 pm

    Hi everyone! I am very very happy with this ‘geeky’ phone (i even consider it is kinda historic phone, due to the endophoric display!!!). The speaker function is awesome (when in a call, press two times up the action key). I bought it in Colombia for $33.000 (that is about us$16; earphone was not included in the box – cilinder, it is-, and was mandatory to buy a us$5 credit charge for TIGO operator – wich has a *10#[send] number to ask for the remaining credit, wich works just great asigned to the ‘# and coins’ key in the F3).

    Emergency calls can be done without unlocking the phone (only 911 and 112 – this last one is the police number here. 911 does not work in colombia, instead we have 123, but any other number will show the ‘error-X’ – could this be programmable?).

    For the people waiting for important SMS, simply activate the vibrator function.

    All my friends want one, old parents and relatives too -it’s a very pretty-well designed phone.

    Tnx fr the rview!!!

46. 46. Comment by je
    on 4 Dec 2007 @ 10:04 am

    Hi is there a way to make the ringing last longer? The phone diverts to answer phone after three rings, unless I actually happen to have the phone in my hand it isn’t long enough!

47. 47. Comment by neenee
    on 4 Dec 2007 @ 6:27 pm

    Nope, there’s no way to do that. I think it depends on your provider.

48. 48. Comment by Eddie
    on 7 Dec 2007 @ 2:51 pm

    [quote comment=”2088″]Whenever i press the red off button- random numbers appear. How do i change this or turn this off?
    Somebody please help…[/quote]
    I’m having this problem as well. I’m using the phone on the SunCom network in the US and everything seems to be working fine, but this is annoying. When I first power the phone on, SunCom scrolls across the screen and appears when I press the red power button. However, after the phone has been on for a few seconds, pressing the red button displays ‘31049’? Does anyone have any ideas?

49. 49. Comment by neenee
    on 8 Dec 2007 @ 11:11 am

    So, these numbers are not random? They are the same each time?
    Perhaps the number corresponds with some internal code used by the phone to recognise the network. It is a long shot, but as the phone is still working as normal in your case, I think the problem is comparable to a DNS server being down, hence the readable name for a website not being displayed/used. Instead, the IP-address is used. I think the number is comparable to an IP-address.

    Functionality is not altered nor hindered, what you see is just different.

50. 50. Comment by Sly
    on 14 Dec 2007 @ 5:14 pm

    Hi all, thanks for all the great comments! Has anyone in the US had success with using this phone on t-mobile USA network? Thanks!!