It's tough to argue with a phone that costs a penny, and the Samsung Chrono certainly makes a convincing case for one. It looks nice, it sounds good on voice calls, it has Bluetooth, and it's easy to use and dial numbers on. As long as you don't need a camera or a music player, the Chrono is a decent cheap cell phone for U.S. Cellular customers. But if we were signing a two-year contract, we'd probably spend a few dollars up front and get something significantly better.
Design and Call Quality
The Samsung Chrono measures 3.7 by 1.8 by 0.7 inches (HWD) and weighs 3.1 ounces. It's made of an attractive, slate-colored, glossy plastic with rounded edges and a solid feel. The microUSB charger port features a small sliding door; this is vastly preferable to the usual port covers that hang off the side. The right side also features a camera shortcut button, while the left side contains a pair of raised volume buttons that are easy to press. The Chrono's light weight and decent size when unfolded makes it comfortable to hold during long conversations, although it's a little narrow for those with larger hands. The hinge mechanism opens smoothly with one hand and is reasonably sturdy, although you can get it to flex if you push the top edge hard enough.
The external 1-inch passive-matrix color display looks a little faded, but it's otherwise easy to read and informative. Inside, the 2-inch active-matrix display sports 176-by-220-pixel resolution, which seems rather low these days. Fonts looked blocky, and menu icons were blurry. Beneath the screen, five generously sized function keys surround a five-way control pad. The numeric keypad features large, grippy membrane keys that are very comfortable to dial numbers on.
The Chrono is a dual-band 1xRTT (850/1900 MHz) device with no Wi-Fi. Voice quality was solid, especially given the phone's small size. Callers sounded slightly thin through the earpiece, as if they were speaking through an AM radio, but everyone sounded clear and there was plenty of gain available. Callers said I sounded fine through the microphone, and reception was also solid. Ringtones were nice and loud. Calls sounded fine through an Aliph Jawbone Icon Bluetooth headset ($99, 4 stars). The Nuance-powered voice dialing worked well over Bluetooth. The speakerphone sounded smooth, but it could have been a touch louder for use outdoors. Battery life was average at 5 hours and 11 minutes of talk time.
Apps, Camera, and Conclusions
Samsung's low-end feature phones are generally pretty simple to use. The Myriad 6.2 Web browser is okay for WAP sites, but it's sluggish, and pages took forever to load over the 2G data connection. One weird design point: the EasyEdge icon takes you to a separate grid of nine icons with some basic apps, including AccuWeather, a demo of Namco's Pac-Man, and mSpot Radio. There's also a separate Tone Room for purchasing ringtones and wallpapers. There are no e-mail and IM clients, which is no big loss given the lack of a QWERTY keyboard.
Multimedia-wise, there's virtually nothing here. There's no music player, video player, or camcorder. There's 51MB of free internal memory, but no memory card slot; you can only send photos as picture messages or save them as wallpaper. It doesn't matter, since the VGA camera is essentially useless, as any photos you take with it will only fill up about one fourth of the average laptop screen. I know the Chrono costs one cent, but plenty of free phones have 1.3 and 2-megapixel sensors that are at least good enough for casual shots, so there's really no excuse. Samsung throws in what appears to be a set of wired stereo earbuds, but they're actually for hands-free use only. Don't lose these, since the microUSB headphone jack will make finding replacements a pain.
If you want a free flip phone, the Samsung Chrono will do the job nicely. But given how even the cheapest monthly plan can add up to almost $1,000 over the course of a two-year contract, we can't help but think that an extra few bucks are worth it up front. The LG Wine II UN430 ($39.99, 3.5 stars) is our current Editors' Choice; it looks sleek, has a larger and sharper screen, faster 3G data speeds, a music player, a memory card slot, and sounds great on voice calls. If you're the texting type, the Samsung Messager Touch SCH-R630 ($29.99, 3 stars) and the Motorola Grasp (Free, 3.5 stars) offer quality QWERTY keyboards, and the Messager Touch has a 2.6-inch touch screen, though the Chrono edges them both out on voice quality.
Benchmarks
Continuous talk time: 5 hours 11 minutes
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