Alcatel 380 Blue

The Alcatel 380 Blue is a good looking phone, released for general sale ion the second quarter of 2010. It is a 2G dual band phone, cheap and with very few frills and features. It’s an ideal first phone or if you just want a standard basic phone that does what you want and when you want with ease.

Slightly heavier than some of its predecessors, the Alcatel 380 blue weighs in at 90g. It’s not the slimmest phone on the block either with dimensions of 91 x 45 x 19.2mm. However, it is a fairly easy phone to handle and use and is small enough to be carried in a purse or pocket without any trouble.

What We Like

The Alcatel 380 Blue is a slider phone with a physical alphanumeric keyboard that slides out from the bottom. Surprisingly, considering the keyboard is hidden, the front of the phone is not taken up entirely with the screen. Instead only half of it is, the rest being utilised by large navigation buttons.

The screen itself is a 1.8” TFT 65K screen with a resolution of 128 x 160 pixels. It does produce a very colourful clear display though and is easy on the eye and for reading texts.  The keyboard is a standard alphanumerical one, normal sized keys, but, because it is a slider phone there is perhaps a little less room for manoeuvre around the keys.

The Alcatel 380 Blue has an internal phone memory of 2mb and room for 800 entries in the internal phone book, There is no room for expanding the memory but this should be a sufficient amount to handle the capabilities of the phone. 

Connection options are either GSM or GPRS, with a WAP 2.0 browser but is really only suitable for downloading MP3 music to use as ringtones. However, the limited amount of memory available makes it difficult to download very much and, as Wi-Fi is not an option, quite expensive as well/ There is a 0.

3MP VGA camera on the Alcatel 380 but there are no added extras such as autofocus and flash. Video recording is not an option either.  Communication is via phone call, SMS or MMS. Bluetooth is available on the phone making it easy to connect your phone to your computer or other Bluetooth device.

What We Don't Like

Additional applications on the Alcatel 380 are an FM radio with RDS function included, an MP3 and WMA media player and the usual standard applications such as clock, alarm clock, calculator and organiser. It comes in a range of colour choices, lilac, neon blue and turquoise blue.

Conclusion

The Alcatel 380 Blue is available as both a Pay As You Go phone or on a variety of contracts. A fully charged battery gives a respectable 350 hours of standby time and an excellent 7 hours of talk time.  It is a good value for money phone, aimed with its colours more at the female population. It is a sturdy and reliable but virtually featureless phone that is built for everyday use.