Kyocera Wild Card / Reviews

Ive had this Wildcard for over a year now.. Ive replaced it 2 times.. when the Yahoo/AOL instant messaging stopped working.. They sent me a refurbished one.. and the instant messaging went out after a few months .. AGAIN. Virgin Mobile isnt bad.. though for the past 6 months.. Ive been getting maybe 6 out of 10 picture-mails.. Shady reliability.. When the competition's rates are growing more and more appealing.. Im not even going to replace it.. Im going to switch to Walmart's much better plan...

its ok,both screens are very small an could have easily been bigger.

Has a very toyish feel.

the hinges break very easy just from using the phone(opening an closing)

small keys but i have big hands,might not be a problem for all.

the camera is shockingly good outdoors or in well lite area's,but gets very grain in dark places.

i dont know if this is a problem with all phones,but mine would randomly shut off,or if you even slightly tap it,it would shut off.

also volume is very low when the phone is closed,vibrate is also weak.

its a good starter phone or 1st qwerty keyboard phone.

Highly recommend upgrading too X-tc

The Virgin Mobile Wildcard is a great phone if all you do is text message. It has a great keyboard and I can type really fast on it. However, there is no media player, data services are slow, the camera isn't great and both the internal and external screens are small. The call quality wasn't anything to write home about, but it was fine. If you're a heavy texter who doesn't do much else, this is the phone for you. If you need lots of special features however, look elsewhere.

I picked this phone, knowing it's limitations. It worked for me. I'm not a texter, but I wanted a Qwerty keyboard. I thought I wanted web access, and can have it if I'm in a pinch, but rarely use it. Virgin's coverage is spotty. On major routes you'll get something. Get a ways out and you'll cut out.

With the pay-as-you-go, it is an inexpensive phone. cheapest plans I've found for my usage pattern. I use it for travel, and when trying to meet someone somewhere. I've found it's not good to use when trying to meet people for a hike, because we're usually out of my coverage area.

And if all else fails, you can play Tetris on the phone.

Camera is annoying because you can't see the full image that you just shot, when looking through the camera. The whole image will show up when you scroll through your saved images.

I've had this thing about a year and a half, and it seems to have started using more battery than before. I just keep a charger in the car, at the office, and at home.

It was the best deal I could find for my needs. Virgin seems to be less predatory than the other pay-as-you-go plans.

I bought this phone for my son who absolutely loves it. I've actually put my own phone on the side to use his instead!! The sound quality is excellent. Not a single dropped call. The images on the screen are nearly as good as our computer monitor! The full keyboard is easy to use. With all the extras that are available from Virgin, why get locked into a monthl contract! Highly recommend for anyone who wants a full service phone with internet access, camera and music player! Good alternative to the iPhone for about a third of the price!

Hinge gave out after 5 months, can't get repair service from Kyrocera or Virgin Mobil.

I've had this phone for about a year and it's been decent but not much more than that. I only use the phone for talking and texting, I never bought the additional email/web access so I can't comment on that. The phone is cute and I like the rounded edges and chrome and black front. It's a bit heavy and seemed a little clunky at first but I've gotten used to it. The qwerty keyboard has a good feel to the keys, they have a little "click" when you press them. Another plus is the easy to navigate menus, the phone was a breeze to figure out. The battery life has been fine for me, I usually have to charge it once every few days however sometimes inexplicably it runs out of juice the same day I charged it. Not sure why this happens but it's only once a month or so so I'm not too bothered by it.

I have only a few complaints, one is that the screen on the inside is really tiny, there's room for it to be so much bigger! Also the speaker is quite poor and even with the ringtone on the highest setting it's very quiet and I miss quite a few calls because of it. Lastly the camera is nothing short of abysmal! The pictures are grainy and tiny, very poor quality.

All in all this is a nice entry level phone if you want some features (like the QWERTY keyboard) of a smart phone but don't need all the bells and whistles and don't need everything to be top of the line.

I tried to e-mail them for questions, and they don't answer you, or they put you off for weeks! I would never buy a cell phone from them. I have never encountered such a horrible company.

This was my second Virgin Mobile phone, my first was the Cyclops. So upgrading to this phone made me happy. Anyway, to the review.....

1.The Phone

First of all the phone itself is pretty sturdy, save the back battery cover that everyone says is loose, which really is. It kind of feels like it'll come right off, especially when the phone is open and the user is texting or gaming or just pressing the keys for the sake of pressing it. Upon opening the phone the user will find out that the hinge is very strong, no chance of it like accidentally falling apart or swinging open on its own.

Second the buttons on the front of the phone is pretty flush with the body of the phone, making it slightly hard to press (especially the "ok" button smack in the center of the directional keypad). Also the six keys (three on each side of the directional keypad) might be a little hard to press, but it's not too bad.

The number pad keys are pretty small as well, but texting on them using T9 isn't a pain or anything. They just kind of lack the "tactile-ness".

Call quality isn't bad at all, the Sprint network that VM utilizes has not dropped any of my calls yet.

2. Phone Functions

First off, texting on this phone is THE experience for VM customers who like to text, but find it increasingly a big pain because of narrow vertical screens. Well this one changes everything. The inner screen (160x128) is "wide" so writing/reading texts is much much better. Typing on the keyboard inside is also a joy (besides the "b" key, which is placed on the right hand side of the space bar.) The large spacebar and the dedicated "enter" button help make paragraphing texts easier, and the numerous symbol keys enables the user to easily put out the symbols that are desired (not to mention smilies!).

Also, there is a dedicated menu button (right beside the "sym" key, it's in the shape of a piece of mail) in which in which you can customize the things you want (such as, caculator, inbox, ringtones), this dedicated menu button helps the user to access the phone functions that he wants quickly.

The email capability is especially convenient if the user is away from a computer and desperately needs to check or compose email. Using the keyboard to write emails is extremely handy, and the rate of opening/sending emails costs the same as a text. The only con is that there's no gmail. If they let you send or receive emails from gmail, this phone would be amazing. So far VM only lets the user add accounts from Yahoo, AOL, AIM, Comcast, Earthlink, Juno, Netzero, and Verizon.

Instant messaging is also good, honestly, I don't really use it too much because I hardly IM, but of the times I used it, it's a handy and good application on the phone. VM charges one text per message sent/received. At this point only AIM and Yahoo Messenger are provided. The user can only sign on to one chat client at a time, though three different statuses can be chosen (Available, Busy, Invisible), but custom status messages are not allowed, which is a bummer.

For the Headliner application, it's a tool to use to check up on favorite music artists, however, subscription to this application costs $2.49 a month after a 14 day trial period, of which I chose not to use.

Other handy functions such as voice memo, scheduler, alarm clock, tip calculator, calculator, timer, stopwatch, and flashlight are bundled together under "tools" in the menu. What I personally like about the flashlight is that the I can turn it on when the phone is closed by holding down the "back" button. This is convenient when a flashlight is desperately in need.

The speakerphone of the camera is pretty good, though the speakers could be a little bit louder. The speakerphone can be used both when the phone is closed or open.

3. The Camera

Picture quality isn't stellar, but it's much more improved over the Cyclops. In dark lighting situations the pictures can become very noisy, and the picture colors are a little dead. But the camera is handy, and the pictures are viewable at least. The user doesn't have to upload it to "MyPix"; using the "Send picture message" function, he/she can type in his/her email and conveniently send the message and later on save it to the computer.

4. The end.

Overall I believe this phone is a pretty good buy, if you're a heavy texter or IMer, this phone is just for you, as long as you use their messaging packs. Call quality (as mentioned before) is pretty normal, and although I'm sure this phone could have been improved on in some ways, it gets the job done.

I recently purchased my Virgin Mobile Wildcard phone on Black Friday for 40$

Having owned this phone for a few weeks and having no problems with it whatsoever, I have to say this is a sturdy, reliable phone.

The two lcd screens are convenient, but not the same quality. The exterior display is slightly smaller than the internal display and you can only play games on the internal display.

Making calls is simple, I found everything about the external display and keys to be average and had basically no problems using it. I will, however, say that everything on the exterior is small, so you have to pay close attention while handling calls, and the speaker phone is difficult to access.

I was somewhat disappointed with the picture quality on this phone. With a 1.3mp camera and built in flash, I was expecting better picture quality than my old phone's vga camera. Unfortunately the flash doesn't much help, and the 1.3mp resolution only makes the. image size larger, not clearer. On a scale of 1-10 I give the camera a 7 basically.

Texting is easy and perhaps the best feature of this phone. The text messages are inexpensive and its VERY easy to send and receive them.

Finally, the battery life is great. I can go about 3 days without having to recharge the phone, it does flicker a random "Hello" screen sometimes, regardless, I simply cannot complain.

Overall I'd say this phone is good for texting, web browsing, and sending picture messages. I didn't care for the call interface as it was usable, but difficult to get used to. I currently see this phone retailed at approximately 90$ If you can get it cheaper than that, then I'd reccommend it. However, Virgin Mobile just released a their new "Shuttle," phone for 100$ The difference is only 10$ and I'd pick the Shuttle only for its comparable price.