Verizon G’zOne Boulder – improved Casio rugged phone
For:
Support for V Cast Music with Rhapsody, VZ Navigator, and V Cast Video; electronic compass, Push-To-Talk, 1.3-megapixel camera, EV-DO Rev. A network support; military certified to withstand extreme temperatures, solar radiation, shock, water, vibration, dust, immersion, fog, salt, and humidity.
Against:
Mediocre call quality with echo and static; clunky music player interface.
The Whiz Kid Speaks:
The Verizon G’zOne Boulder is based on CDMA2000 1X technology and supports dual-band of CDMA 850/1900. It has a micro-SD expansion slot that accepts up to 8GB cards.
The advanced features are WAP push, BREW platform, WAP 2.0 protocol support, Web browser, integrated digital compass, push-to-talk, T9 Intelligent Typing, E-911 compliant, and EV-DO Rev. A network support.
1.2-inch monochrome external display sits on the front lid, while 2-inches internal display has 240×320 pixels resolution that supports 16-bit (65,000) colors. The supported digital video formats are H.264, H.263 with AMR audio, and MPEG4. The Boulder supports audio formats of MP3, AMR, and AAC.
1.3-megapixel camera features self-timer and flash. The image storage resolution options are 160×120, 320×240, 640×480, and 1280×960. The video recording resolution is 176×144 pixels (QCIF).
800mAH lithium ion battery has a life of 207 minutes talk time and 212 hours of idle standby time.
Razzle Dazzle:
The Verizon G’zOne Boulder has folder type design. It is 3.9 inches tall, 0.9 inch thick, and 2 inches wide and weighs 4.9 ounces. There is round external display on the lid that gives sports stopwatch look to the Boulder phone instead of a fashionable appearance. The phone is covered with hard plastic chassis and rubberized bumpers. The charging and micro-SD card slots are covered with tight rubber covers. The battery cover is secured with locking mechanism.
Inside Dope:
The rugged handsets are not new for the United States cell phone market. The Casio has aimed its G’zOne series for tough cell phones with military specifications. Its first model was Type-V that features EVO and megapixel camera and lacks Bluetooth. In contrast, second model – Type-S features Bluetooth and VGA camera without EV-DO. Verizon and Casio finally settled down to launch – the G’zOne Boulder that features 1.3-megapixel camera, push-to-talk, Bluetooth, EV-Do, and V Cast Music. It costs $129.99 with two-year contract. The Verizon G’zOne Boulder is MIL-STD-810F military certified to withstand extreme temperatures, solar radiation, shock, water, vibration, dust, immersion, fog, salt, and humidity. However, its call quality was mediocre and it is bulkier than other cell phones in its class. We throw the Boulder on the floor and dunk it in water mug for few minutes, but there was not bad effect on the phone. If you need a tough handset with Verizon Wireless, you can check – Verizon G’zOne Boulder.
Design
The camera lens with flashlight/flash sits above the round external display on the lid. You will find the command key, volume rocker, and push-to-talk on the left spine; while micro-SD card slot is on the right side. When the Verizon G’zOne Boulder phone is closed, you can press and hold the command key to switch between stopwatch, countdown timer and compass switch. It also acts as voice command key when phone is opened. You can flip open the phone to access internal display and alphanumeric keypad. All the
Display
1.2 inches monochrome external display is round in shape and sits on the lid. It shows signal strength, battery life, caller ID, and date/time. The external display also shows stopwatch, countdown timer, electronic compass, and music player; but you cannot use it as self-portrait viewfinder. You can customize the clock format for the external display.
2 inches LCD display of the Verizon G’zOne Boulder supports 65,000 colors. It exhibits appealing screen with legible fonts and bright tones. We like that menus can be arranged in Grid style and in default tab-style as well. You can customize the contrast, dial fonts, clock format, and backlight time.
Navigation Array and Keyboard
The navigation array sits underneath the display and includes two soft keys, speakerphone key, camera/camcorder button, four-way toggle with center OK button, Send key, Clear button, and Power/End key. You can press and hold the speakerphone key to use it as a flashlight switch. You can customize the up, down, and left arrows with user-defined shortcuts, but the right arrow opens My Shortcuts menu that contains four customizable shortcuts. The alphanumeric keypad has well-spaced, but tiny keys. You will get a tactile feedback on using these keys.
Phonebook and PIM features
The Verizon G’zOne Boulder can store 500 contacts in its phonebook. Each entry contains two email addresses and four phone numbers. You can organize these contacts into caller groups and pair them with one alert-tone, ring-tone and a photo for caller ID. The basic feature set includes a notepad, a world clock, a countdown timer, a stopwatch, a calculator, a calendar, an alarm clock, a speakerphone, text and multimedia messages, and a vibrate mode.
Advanced Highlights
The advanced highlights are EV-DO Rev. A support, Web emails including AOL Mail, Yahoo! Mail, and Windows Live Mail; Web browser, voice command, Bluetooth, voice dialing, and a voice recorder. The traveling features are flashlight and electronic compass. The onboard Bluetooth supports profiles of object exchange for phone book access, dial-up networking, hands-free calling, AVRCP, vCard and A2DP. The Boulder is also compatible with Field Force Manager – resource management tool that allows locating and monitoring mobile field workers.
Verizon Services
The Verizon G’zOne Boulder also has Verizon VZ Navigator – located based navigation service, and Verizon Push-To-Talk network support. Verizon has also included V Cast Music with Rhapsody to download music tracks and V Cast Video for streaming video content via Verizon partners.
Music Player
The music player of the Verizon G’zOne Boulder is tied with the Verizon’s V Cast Music interface, so it may take some seconds to start up. It features on-the-fly play-list creation.
Camera
1.3-megapixel camera of the Verizon G’zOne Boulder features self-timer, flash, and video recording. The still capture options are six color effects, five white balance presets, shutter sound on/off, and four resolutions. You can record the videos limited for MMS and longer in normal mode. We captured few pictures and video clips for testing. The overall photo quality was good. The pictures appeared bright with sharp colors and fine details. However, the low light pictures were not so good. The video quality was average.
Games and Personalization
You can personalize the Verizon G’zOne Boulder with available alert sounds, display themes, alert sounds, wallpapers, and more. We are disappointed that the Boulder does not come with any games. You can download the more options and games through Verizon Get It Now service.
Call Quality
We made few calls through the Verizon G’zOne Boulder via Verizon Wireless service. The overall sound quality was below average. We received crackled sound at our end with echo and static. The callers also had difficulty to hear us and they could tell we were talking via a cell phone. The speakerphone call quality was also worse with muffled sounds.
Music and Video Quality
We played some music tracks transferred via SD cards. The overall music quality was mediocre. The sound was tiny and lacks bass. We recommend using the headset to get better sound quality. The streaming video quality of V Cast Videos was jerky and pixelated due to low resolution display. However, the 3G and EV-DO Rev. A speeds were the best and there was no buffering time at all.
Battery Life
The battery life of the Verizon G’zOne Boulder is 3.56 hours of talk time and 2.6 days of idle standby time. Its digital SAR is 1.04 watts per kg in accordance with the FCC radiation tests.
Verdict:
If you need a rough-and-tumble cell phone with good multimedia features and do not mind mediocre call quality, then buy – Verizon G’zOne Boulder.
