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Motorola Renew Side

Motorola Renew

Ben Patterson from Yahoo Tech: Buzz up!on Yahoo!I have to say, it’s been years since I bothered to test a handset as basic as the Renew. Then again, it’s not every day I get to review a cell phone made out of recycled water bottles.

Announced during CES and available now on T-Mobile ($9.99 with a two-year contract, or $59.99 without), the three-ounce Renew is not exactly, how shall I say … packed with features.

No Bluetooth. No GPS. No video player. No camera. Wi-Fi? Please. Oh, by the way—2002 called, and it wants its 1.6-inch, 128 by 128-pixel display back.

That said, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a greener handset than the Renew, starting with its brown cardboard package (made from post-consumer recycled paper) and ending with its plastic, green-and-black casing, which is both molded out of recycled water bottles—there’s a first—and also “entirely recyclable,” according to Motorola.

And while the Renew’s features are indeed basic—just a bare-bones WAP browser and MP3 player, a few low-tech games, a basic calendar and address book—Motorola clearly took pains to get the basics right.

Example: Call quality on the CrystalTalk-enabled Renew is notably impressive, with callers sounding loud—way loud, actually, especially over the speakerphone—and clear. I didn’t notice any echoing or drop-outs during my tests, although your mileage may vary depending on local coverage (and I’ve certainly heard my share of complaints from T-Mobile subscribers). Moto promises a whopping nine hours of talk time on a single charge, and yes—the Renew works with T-Mobile’s MyFaves plan (good for unlimited calling to any five friends).

Specs:

POWERUSAGE TIME (CONTINUOUS)*up to approx. 9 hours

STANDBY TIME*up to approx. 18 days

MESSAGINGMULTIMEDIA MESSAGING (MMS)2TEXT MESSAGING (SMS)2Store up to 500 SMS text messages

FORM FACTORCandy bar

MATERIALS AND FINISHPost-consumer recycled plastic

REMOVABLE MEMORY1up to 2 GB removable memory

ANTENNA TYPEInternal

GSMNETWORKS2Dual Band GSM 850/1900

CONNECTIVITYDATA ACCESS4GPRS Class 10


CONNECTOR TYPEMini USB port

MUSIC AND VIDEOMUSIC ENABLED3MUSIC PLAYERMP3

ACCESSORY COMPATIBILITYHEADSET JACK2.5 mm