Pantech Impact P7000 Review

Introduction:

Sometimes it’s difficult trying to go about a new way of designing a phone without being considered too one sided with a specific form factor. Fortunately for Pantech, it seems like they are always reinventing themselves with each handset they put out – but they do focus on the texting crowd mostly. The Pantech Impact P7000 brings forth the side-opening clamshell form factor with a unique twist in its touch-sensitive keypad and OLED display – all the while packing a QWERTY keyboard. Sure its exterior looks like it can attract prying eyes, but does it have what it takes to be a usable texting device?

The package contains:
•    Pantech Impact
•    Charger
•    User Guide
•    Quick Start Guide

Design:

We’re glad to see Pantech steering away from the traditional mold with the Impact – it’s refreshing to see a clamshell handset that takes a slightly different approach. Being a considerably hefty looking phone by itself from afar, you’ll see its inclusion of a QWERTY make it seem a bit more tolerable. We like how the plastic blue material, which does attract smudges, mixes well with the subtle chrome border that outlines the phone. There’s even a nice looking textured pattern surrounding the nearly dark face of the phone. Corners are rounded and the slick touch of the material hugs your hand with ease. Construction feels solid with the accompanying weight of the phone (4.49 oz). Almost bearing an overall size similar to the LG enV3, there’s no problem tucking it away in your pockets except for the slight bulge it may make.
 


You can compare the Pantech Impact P7000 with many other phones using our Size Visualization Tool.

The first and foremost thing to catch your eye when you power on the device is its miniscule 1.5” OLED display with its trance like blue color tones – displaying the time, date, and status of the phone. Luckily it’s bright enough to see in almost any lighting condition, including in direct sunlight, with clarity being of no issue at all viewing angles. Even the completely touch sensitive buttons below the screen come to life – it gives of that TRON look from a distance. Undoubtedly some may despise the use of touch sensitive buttons, but we liked the responsiveness of it and the accompanied haptic feedback. The microSD slot is tucked away under a plastic flap located on the bottom edge while the proprietary charging port is found on the top. The 2-megapixel camera is solely located on the rear, while removing the plastic back cover gives you access to the battery and SIM card slot.




The uniformity of the handset is intact when you open it up to reveal the QWERTY keyboard and 2.6” LCD screen which has a resolution of 400x240 and support for 262k colors. If you considered the external OLED screen cool, then you’ll be impressed like us with the amount of detail and luscious colors that jump out. The speaker phone is found on both sides of the display and underneath the reflective surface of the screen. Unlike the Pantech Reveal’s tiny buttons of the QWERTY, the Impact’s keys are well sized for anyone to feel out without making mistakes whenever speed typing. We even found the placement of the circular directional pad to be appropriate and easily accessed with the right thumb. Buttons on the QWERTY are close to one another, somewhat flush to the surface, and stiff feeling at first. We’re happy to say that heavy text messengers will like the usability of the QWERTY.

Software/Features:

Thanks to the detailed screen, the software running on the Pantech Impact looks much better than the one found on the Reveal. Navigating through the phone is a simple procedure thanks to the basic layout of icons on the main menu – there’s a smooth transition effect when going from the home screen to the main menu. It’s quick, straightforward, and just about anyone can move around the phone without much aid. There’s a decent mix of personalization options to give it a different look like the homescreen layout, menu type, color theme, and font style. With the external OLED display, you can only choose a handful of different clocks with minimal functions to navigate on the phone.



Sending a text message will pose no problem for the Pantech Impact – it’s basically the same way we’ve seen recently on other AT&T phones. On top of composing a message with the QWERTY, you can close it up and rely on the touch sensitive numeric keypad for a traditional way of texting. Instant messaging friends can easily be accomplished by using either AIM, Windows Live Messenger, or Yahoo! Messenger. Exiting back to the home screen will still keep you logged into the service. Finally, the email application included allows for just about any provider to be used on the Impact. Other than selecting one from the available list, you simply input your email address and password to get your mail on the phone. Depending on your provider, it may require you to place additional information like the server addresses before it is completely set up. We’re happy to see the Impact make such a splash when it comes to its messaging experience.


 
Third party software support is the same on the Pantech Impact – some useful while others you may never use. Some of these include Mobile Banking, MobiTV, My-Cast Weather, Yellow Pages mobile, and Loopt to name a few. For people on the go, AT&T Navigator is loaded for location based services and get you to a destination in a timely manner. As usual, standard tools like the calculator, world clock, timer, stopwatch, and alarms are all available for your disposal.



We weren’t hoping for a lot out of the 2-megapixel camera, but it did manage to produce sharp images with decent detail. You really couldn’t overlook the overcast tones in color – making it appear darker in all lighting conditions. Upon pressing the dedicated camera button to launch the application, which can only be done when the QWERTY is exposed, we found the placement of the lens to be awkward because your hand had a tendency of covering it. The interface is uncluttered and offers a decent mix of options for taking photos. It doesn’t produce the best quality, but it’s more than tolerable to look at.





Shooting videos on the Impact is best reserved for MMS use primarily due to its choppy capture when set to the maximum resolution of 320 x 240. There’s a noticeable amount of blurring when there are fast moving objects being recorded – plus the jerky movements that occur make it difficult to make things out. Colors would gradually change tones depending on the lighting conditions you record at. Sound from the recorded video had a decent tone to it – which was more than audible to make out words. As a whole, the Impact doesn’t do justice when it comes to recording videos on the handset.

We’re treated to the same updated music player that we saw on the Pantech Reveal – although it still looks a bit ordinary by our standards. It’ll display the album cover, album name, artist, song title, and estimated time. The navigational pad is associated to the on-screen controls to pause/play, reverse, and forward a song. Sound from the speaker phone produced some rich tones; making it extremely clear and audible without any crackling. Sadly, Pantech hasn't included headphones in the box (or at least an adapter to convert the proprietary port to 3.5mm), which we consider rather inappropriate. Rummaging through the options, you can discover tailored equalizer settings to best suit your genre of music. When exiting back to the home screen, the mini player will be displayed – allowing you continuous playback without a pause.

The Pantech Impact delivers a good video watching experience thanks to its quality internal display. We were able to play two movie trailers, coded in MPEG-4 at 320 x 240 and H.264 at 320 x 136, without any hiccups in speed. The video flowed seamlessly through its entirety with a steady frame rate and no slowdown. With the aid of the vibrant speaker phone, sound from the video was reproduced meticulously without any lapse in quality. We’re glad to see the Impact provides a decent video watching experience that’s sure to please most movie buffs.



Taking the handset to other countries for voice calls won't be an issue with it's quad-band GSM capability (850/900/18000/1900 Mhz). For data use, the dual-band UMTS support (850/1900 Mhz) is sufficient enough to get good connections here domestically.

There is roughly 80MB of shared memory available if you plan on saving media directly on the device. To support that, it can accept microSD cards up to 16GB in capacity.

If we continue to see Opera Mini serving as the web browser of choice on feature phones like the Impact, there will be no doubt about the outcome. Complex sites likes ours loaded hastily under 30 seconds to a zoomed out view. When you do zoom in, text and pictures are rendered closely to what you see on a desktop computer. Scrolling was steady and we find the overall experience satisfying on the Impact.

Performance:

Listening to our callers proved to be the most difficult because of the constant static noise on our end that drowned the conversation. Although voices did sound clear for the most part, without any hints of being muffled, we still had to fight the noticeable static noise in the background. On the other end, our callers stated that out voice was natural in tone. Switching to the speaker phone, we were once greeted to the same noise we experience on our end. It didn’t cause too much problems comprehending out callers because the vibrant speakers provided some audible sounds.

During our testing, the Impact held up well in retaining signal strength with solid bars at any given time in the greater Philadelphia area. The Impact was not plagued by any service issues or dropped calls.

The Pantech Impact went above and beyond the rated levels for talk time from the manufacturer – we managed to place a phone call for 6 hours. We would suspect the proximity sensor being a driving factor in exceeding the level. Pantech has the phone rated for 5 hours of talk and 336 hours of standby.

Conclusion:

Pantech hits the mark with the Impact for a text messaging oriented handset that’ll make short work out of sending lengthy messages. With its unique look, thanks to the OLED display and touch sensitive keypad, it’ll instantly capture the gaze of many around this phone. If you overlook its shortcomings in the photo/video area, you’ll find that it makes a huge impact with Pantech’s offerings for being yet another well-balanced messaging phone.

Pantech Impact P7000 Video Review: