Replace Your Cellphone

The Sidekick LX has improved its design on a new keyboard that is soft-touch and has a good grip which is easier to use, as well as the bubbly keys. It has one of the better QWERTY keyboards a handy device can offer.

But despite the good keyboard, the trackball is somewhat loose and there are too many programmable buttons.

The Sidekick LX has an improved screen featuring a 65,000-color 400 by 240 pixel widescreen resolution but compared to other mobile devices it still falls short.

Calls on the Sidekick have a static buzz and hollow sound, and you have flip the lid to dial a number. The flipping thing would be fun the first few times you do it, but it becomes a bit annoying.

The good thing is you can manage your contacts through the T-Mobile Website, your address maybe accessed and edited online.

And there are a lot of other contact features in the Sidekick LX, like Bluetooth for a hands free and a good speakerphone. There is also a conference call feature but you have to go through the menu first, and it’s hard to use your phone while driving because the Sidekick LX has no voice dialing.

The Sidekick is a very good phone if messaging is your thing. It is packed with SMS, MMS and instant messaging features that let you keep in touch of your friends.

Messaging is easy because of the wide, full QWERTY keyboard you can type out the words in a breeze, no more waiting for the cursor to change place to type another character. The keyboard is so comfortable and the “@” symbol can be typed without using the shift-key.

On the multimedia side the Sidekick lacks a lot. Because the phone doesn’t have any real 3G features some video contents and over the air music stores are just a dream. But the Sidekick has a good real music player and because of the excellent input options you have good control with your music.

The web browser relies on EDGE network for data which makes it slower compared to other mobile devices. And the trackball wouldn’t offer any help because you have to flick forever like using a track-wheel. There is a MySpace client specially designed for the Sidekick, though.

Accessories that come with the phone include a stereo headphone, a micro SD card to store your music and photos, but 128MB might not be that good these days. Included also is a USB cord which you can use to hook up the Sidekick with your PC to upload, download or charge the battery.

A carrying case is also included which is good, because fewer devices would come with their own carrying case.

There are many mobile devices which can offer far more than the Sidekick can give, but the fact that the keyboard and the screen of the Sidekick has improved, or that messaging is at par, with other mobile devices the Sidekick, still is ahead in the wake of competition.