Phone with an always-readable LCD screen? Does it exist?

V

Valencia

New member
I'm upgrading from my old Samsung R225 with monochrome screen. It has no fancy features, but one of the things I always loved about it was that the screen was always visible - both indoors and outside in bright light. All new recent phones have color screens which depend on a backlight to display anything. Thus, if the backlight isn't on, you don't see anything on the screen.

I am a bit compulsive and I like to check my phone often to see if i've missed a call (i don't always have my phone on me). On my old R225 all I had to do was glance over and read the screen. However with all these new phones, I have to press a button to activate the LCD so I can read it. This gets annoying very very fast.

Basically what i'm looking for is a phone, I don't care if its candybar or clamshell, that has a screen, either internal or external, that is always on and visible without me having to push anything. I don't need it to be color, I just need to be able to see it. All I really care about it displaying is the time, and incomming calls, and if i've had a missed call or txt message. Having it visible outdoors in bright light would also be great. I also need it to take very good pictures, 2MP+ would be great, and have bluetooth. Other than that, I don't need any fancy mp3 features or PDA functions. Oh, and the slimmer the better. I don't like thick phones that stick out of my pocket.

Can anyone recommend some phones?

Edit: I just thought of something. A good alternative would be a phone that could sound some kind of chime or melody every couple of minutes to let me know that i've had a missed call would also be great. My current Samsung can be made to play a tone every 2 minutes when I have an unread text message, but no such option for a missed call
 
...am not into camera's and the likes on mobiles (don't really see the point), but, the BlackBerry 8700g seems to be a good screen outdoors. People comment on the 8100 too, having a good screen outdoors. Not what you're looking for, but, I just wanted to comment...
 
which carrier are you wanting to go with? Those specs are hard to come by. A phone with a camera but with a screen that is always on. Hmmmmmm cant really think of any that come to mind color screens that are good enough for a 2+ megapixel camera has to be backlit and the sun always drownds out the backlight. Also are you looking for something you would get a discount on going with a contract or a phone that you would pay full price for over seas or online?
 
Not looking for a contract. I know the main screen can never be always on, however I've seen pictures of some Nokia bar phones that somehow are able to display the time in monochrome when the backlight is off. The other option is to have a clamshell with an external screen. The external screen doesn't have to be color - actually i'd prefer it not to be color. OLED external screen would be great. It just always has to display its info, especially missed calls.
 
The Pebl seems to have the same shape and thickness of my friends V330 - in other words, its WAY too fat and sticks out of my jeans pockets way too much. Any recommendations that are thinner?
 
You can also just get a moible which has a LED light to indicate if there was en event on your phone. This way you don't need to look at the screen unless there is something noticeable.
 
I had a pebl for about a month its the perfect phone for what you want, if you think it is too fat then you have an extreme standard on phone thickness, its about as think as your gonna get for a clamshell phone without going to like a razr or something, or are you a girl(not trying to offend you, I just know some girls wear pretty tight jeans)?
 
i really doubt you would be interested in it but the nokia 6620 does the missed calls, vm, etc. it goes to a screensaver and under the time, it displays # of missed calls, vm, etc....n you don't need to push anythin
 
Nope not a girl, but the V330 is too bulky for my tastes, and the PEBL seems to be the same thickness. Also, I wasn't aware that the PEBL had a 2MP camera?
 
check out the K series from SE
i had a K700i. Had all that you were talking about minus a 'good' camera. It had a camera, but it was rather dry.
After the screensaver goes away, there's a clock that shows up. If you don't put it on 'powersave' mode, the clock stays there. When it does, you can see if you've got messages, and missed calls. That being said, there IS a powersave mode because the battery for the K700 isn't very good. If you have it in powersave mode, all you do is push the volume button. and you'll see the clock for a few seconds. It's up to you. Great function. I loved that phone. I'm thinking that since the K800 is still a 'K' series phone, it might still have that feature.

~LB
 
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