Motorola L7 SLVR Review

Connectivity (Rating: 3 of 5):

A miniUSB port is available, which is also used for the charger and the headphones. Besides that, there are no other ports. For connecting and synchronizing with a PC you need to use the software that the manufacturer provides with the phone. Without any software whatsoever the phone is recognized as a mass storage device with most modern operating systems and files can be transferred directly from the computer to the microSD card. The phone can be charged through the USB cable as well while connected to the computer, which may keep you from carrying a charger.

Using Bluetooth we easily connected a wireless headset (Jabra BT250) and there were no problems using voice commands and dialing through the headset. There were no problems transferring pictures to another phone neither.

Internet (Rating: 3 of 5):

The phone has the standard WAP2.0 browser, and the connection goes through GPRS class 10. Sadly, the much faster EDGE standard is not supported, which would have been a good improvement in regards to its predecessor. The settings of the network are fairly easy made, and you have the option of saving settings for a number of different networks, so that when you change the SIM card, you will not need to change all settings.

Camera (Rating: 2.5 of 5):

Camera

The camera is located on the upper back of the phone, and it is hard to cover it with your hand while holding the phone. Under the lens are the signs “vga” and “4x zoom” which is digital. The camera can be turned on using the buttons on the left and right sides, which start the video recorder or the camera.  Through the camera menu the saved videos/pictures can be reached. An additional setting for the white balance is available and a self-timer as well which is accompanied by sounds.

The quality if expectedly low, but enough for multimedia messages, such as the size of the clips can be limited to both suitable for MMS and “Maximum” which is by no means an option limited by the available memory and an “endless” video cannot be recorded. On our tests the maximum length was 40 to 80 seconds with a size of the file around 480 KB. Maybe the buffer of the phone is not enough for larger files.

Fluorescent lamp

Low light

Indoor

The pictures are with the typical for such cameras quality, where they are always slightly blurred and soft. The colors are not natural and the yellow overwhelms when there is not enough light. On the pictures taken on poor lighting there is lots of noise, which is clearly seen on indoors pictures.

Outdoor

Short video clips can be recorded, such as their maximum resolution is QCIF 174x144. The quality is on the expected low level, but is enough for multimedia messages. Sadly, the resolution is way too low and watching them on a PC is pointless.

Music (Rating: 4 of 5): 

The phone we tested was with the standard MP3 player and didn't include the iTunes player, which is used with the Motorola ROKR and SLVR L7, which was launched with Cingular in the US. It is supposed that when the V3i is made available by Cingular, it will have the iTunes player as well.
The MP3 player is the standard one for Motorola, which allows you to create playlists and arrange music into them. A great advantage is that the phone supports multitasking and the music can be put in the background, while the phone is being used and the menu is being accessed. MP3 files are supported, which can also be used as ringtones. Besides that in the Java applications there is another player (Music Digital Player) which supports more options, such as sorting by an artist/album/genre.

Digital Audio Player

Software (Rating: 3.5 of 5):

The support for JAVA MIDP2.0 gives you the option of adding different applications and games, created for that platform. Included with the phone different application are available, depending on the market of purchase. In our case besides the music player, a few games were included - Crazy and Rebels. The application “Safe” allows you to save different passwords and account numbers, protected by a password. The loading of the Java is medium in speed and you may have to wait when loading larger applications.