Samsung SCH-U550 Review

Software and Features:

By default, the Main Menu is categorized into Get it Now, Messaging, Contacts, Recent Calls, and Settings & Tools. Even though there are only two themes included (Classic and Pastel), the Pastel theme allows for three viewing modes (Tab, List, and Grid), and the List and Grid mode allows you to choose from two different layouts (Messaging or Personalizing). Using the Pastel theme and Tab mode, you have the familiar Verizon UI, but using a more pleasing color scheme. When changing to the List mode, all the menu choices are shown in a list from top to bottom, while the Grid mode shows all 9 icons on a 3x3 grid. The extra icons, when choosing the Messaging layout, are for My Ringtones, E-Mail, VZ Navigator, and Mobile IM, and for the Personalizing layout the icons change to My Picture, Games, and VCast music. We are glad to see that Verizon is now allowing more choices and viewing customizations of the phone’s main menu, yet it still has a way to go to equal that of menu designs used by other carries. One other note is that the U550 does not come with the Living Wallpaper feature that is used by the Gleam and FlipShot, so you’ll have to use a wallpaper of your own, or one of the defaults.


The Phonebook remains unchanged and is identical to the Gleam and FlipShot, with up to 500 Contacts being able to be stored, each with their Name, Mobile 1, Home, Work, E-Mail 1, Group, Picture, Ringtone, Mobile 2, Fax, E-Mail 2, and Notes. After a contact is saved, you can assign them to one of 999 speed-dial locations.


Having an integrated 1.3MP Camera is pretty standard among entry-level phones, and the U550 is no exception. Image quality is lacking, with poor color saturation and soft edges. However, we do feel that the U550 takes better images than the LG VX8350, since it does not suffer from the purple fringing and poor auto white balance that plagues the VX8350. There is also no flash for the camera, which makes taking pictures in low light nearly impossible. You should only look at using the camera for taking quick images while on the go. It will by no means replace your standard digital camera, and my no means comes close to images taken by the V9m, Maxx Ve, and Voyager.

Camera Settings:

• Color Effects: Normal, B&W, Antique, Negative, Aqua, Green
• White Balance: Auto, Sunny, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent
• Memory: Phone, Card
• Auto Name: On, Off
• Preview Mode: Full Screen, Standard Screen
• ISO: Auto, 100, 200, 400
• Metering: Average, Center, Spot
• Icon Display: Display All, Partial, Guidelines, No icon
• Sound Effects: Ready Sound, Shutter Sound
• Night Shot: On, Off
• Self Timer: 3 sec, 5 sec 10 sec off
• Quality: Fine, Normal, Economy
• Resolution: 1280x960, 1024x768, 640x480, 320x240, 160x120, 128x96
• Multishot: Series, Divided

Unfortunately, the music player uses the same outdated interface that is used by most other Verizon phones. Playback quality is not as good as the Gleam or FlipShot, due to there being only one speaker that is located on the back, which somewhat muffles the sound. We do not understand why Samsung would replace the two stereo speakers on the front of the U540 with only one mono speaker on the back of the U550. Music played though it is not as loud as other phones, and does not seem to produce as good sound quality. Located on the front are the touch-sensitive music control buttons for rewind, play/pause, and fast-forward. They only light up red when they are touched, and it can be rather difficult to find them in the first place. A better idea would be to have them stay on while listening to music, so they are easier to see. There is also the option to connect a Stereo Bluetooth Headset to the U550 using the A2DP and AVRCP profiles.

Other software features include Mobile Web 2.0, VCast Music downloads, VCast Video streaming, and VZ Navigator for GPS guided directions. You can also download a wide variety of games and other application using Get it Now. The only problem that we encountered (just like with the FlipShot) was when using the Mobile Web program and going to large HTML sites, such as PhoneArena.com. The page would stop partway during download and display an “out of memory” error message, causing us to either restart the browser, or to view the page without any graphics. When going to smaller sites (Google) or WAP pages, the browser was able to work without problem.