Home » Mobile Phone Reviews » Sharp TM100 May 9, 2008

Sharp TM100 Review

First Impressions

I first saw this handset on the Internet and thought shall I shan’t I? I had always wanted a slider type handset, and this became available in the Argos half price sale for just under £75.00 so I decided to go for it. The handset itself is quite big and solid feeling, with just six buttons on the front, the rest of the front being taken up by a really big screen, I have to say the pictures that I’d seen on the internet didn’t do this model any justice at all and I was really impressed both by the build quality and the overall features, especially the quality and clarity to the screen. Overall I felt that this was one classy looking handset, and this reflected in the camera and the overall features.

Sharp TM100

Sizes & Dimensions

Whats In The Box

Sharp TM100 Box

Features

Sharp TM100 Contents

Menu Structure

Pressing the central circular button on the front accesses the menus. The menus are set out in grid form and are set out as so. The menus are easy, smooth and fast to navigate, and they are set out in a logical manner unlike other models I have had where the menus are really bewildering to navigate.

Design

This is a solid and classy looking handset, with an uncluttered looking design. The slider mechanism makes for a handset with a nice sized screen and a fantastically easy to use keypad, while keeping size to a minimum. The keypad when closed features just six buttons that are well spaced and minamalised. On the left hand side of the handset you have a volume rocker button to adjust the speaker volume, you also have a hole to thread a hand strap or neck strap through. On the back you have the inbuilt camera, with a mirror next to it, this enables you to take self-portraits. The right hand side features the camera button and also the irda port. The bottom of the handset is where the usb/charger connector is situated and also the hands free connector. Both are covered by a rubber plug that enables you to keep the dust etc out of the connectors. The front of the handset is finished in a glossy black housing, with silver to the rear and sides.

Sharp TM100 Bottom

The Display

The most noticeable thing about this handset has to be its large 240*320 pixel TFT screen, which features 262k colours. The brightness and indeed clarity on this screen is unlike any other that I personally have seen on a mobile phone, the colours appear vibrant and true and never dull, the display appears totally smooth without any screen pixelation associated with many other handsets. When the phone is in the closed position you have the standby mode, which features a black screensaver with a clock on it, but when you open the slider or have an incoming call the display bursts into life, showing all its vibrant colours. There are a couple of pre loaded pictures which you can use as wallpapers, but these are rather boring and plain, indeed with such a good display why not show it off with your own pictures.

Sharp TM100 Front

The Slider/Keypad

When the handset is closed the keypad lock is automatically set as default, however this can be overridden by pressing and holding down the circular centre button. As soon as you slide the keypad down the handset becomes unlocked and all the handsets functions are made available. The keypad itself is fantastic, you have fairly large sized oblong buttons, which are well spaced and extremely easy to use, this handset is one people with larger fingers would have no trouble whatsoever in using. The backlight to the keys is green and they show up really well and clear in the dark, another bonus. Texting with this phone is the easiest I have ever used, there is T9 which, as of yet I haven’t used as normal texting is so fast and easy as the keypad keeps up with the speed in which you are entering text. You only have six buttons on the actual fascia of the phone, the middle circular button, which is used for entering the menus and selecting the various functions, you then have the two top soft keys which are used to correspond to the on screen prompts and the red end call button and the green call button. Finally on the main fascia you have the dedicated t zone button, which is used to take you directly to t mobiles wap browser. You can answer a call when the slider is closed, or if you prefer you can divert the call to your answering service without opening the slider.

Sharp TM100 Back

Camera

The camera is inbuilt into the handset, it is situated on the back, there is no lens cover, which would have added a nice touch, but the camera lens itself is set into a round bezel, which is then slightly raised from the main body of the phone.

Sharp TM100 Front

There are three quality settings:

Sharp TM100 Photo

There is also a macro facility to take close up shots, as well as a zoom, delay timer and a night mode.There is also a facility for continuous shooting, which will take up to four pictures, but not on the highest setting (640*480).There are also further options whereby you can add frames and stamps to your pictures. There is 6mb storage on the handset, which is not much compared to some handsets but its ample I feel. The only poor thing I can add about the camera is that once you open the slide to take a picture the camera takes a fraction longer than some other phones to focus, but once it does the display acts as the viewfinder enabling you to shoot what you see. The pictures themselves look really good on the cameras screen but when you send them to a computer you notice how well the pictures turn out. Even in a badly lit room without the night mode switched on there is hardly any noise on the pictures, the colours appear a bit richer when took in a poorly lit room but apart from that the quality on this camera in my opinion is fantastic, considering it is not a mega pixel camera. Outside the pictures also come out really well, even on the biggest size, with past camera phones I would set the picture size to medium so that the images appeared sharper, with this cam there isn’t really need to do this at all. The pictures are automatically saved as jpegs as is standard with most camera phones. The handset also allows you to shoot videos, which are then saved in the 3GP file format. Again the video camera has different settings, which allows you to adjust the brightness and quality of the videos you shoot. The videos can be either recorded with or without sound. The video clip that I shot was pretty good quality but this is not a feature that I use very often, indeed if at all.

Sharp TM100 Photo

Messaging

The phone supports MMS and SMS as well as email. The email client I have yet to use but I can say that the MMS worked first and every time with no problems with returned messages etc. The messages were sent in a reasonable time and they all,without exception reached their destination without getting delayed. Accepting MMS didn’t prove to be a problem either, the phone is already set up for MMS so I didn’t have to phone customer services to arrange this, always a pain. The only stipulation is that the handset must be topped up and be registered by making at least one chargeable telephone call before the MMS is activated. SMS again was no problem, the keypad enabled easy texting and it also has the facility of T9 which apparently makes texting a whole lot quicker, but as I have already said I haven’t used this yet as texting is quick with the keypad.SMS were sent and received without any problems, and they all arrived and were sent without any delay.

Battery Life & Signal Strength

The battery is quoted at having a 200 hour standby, I have only had the phone a short while so therefore cannot fully comment but I charged the handset up the first day I had it and so far it has dropped two bars on the battery meter. This I find is good, as I have set up my address book, taken pictures, sent mms and sms, used the phone for calls and have done a small amount of wap browsing, so I should imagine with average use the battery should last a good four days. In the past I have had very poor reception with T Mobile, averaging around one bar signal, this handset however I get three bars, either T mobile have improved their signal or the handset is better at picking up the T mobile signal than the other T Mobile phones I have owned. The call clarity is excellent, with no hissing or crackling and the volume of the earphone is good to, but this can easily be adjusted by using the side rocker switch. I have so far not experienced any dropped calls. The person at the other end who I am talking to has told me that I sound clear, with no distortion or interference.

Ringtones

The TM100 features 40 voice polyphonic ring tones, and while these were loud and clear the choice is absolutely awful, ranging from moon light sonata to swan lake, you can download more via wap and no doubt using the irda so there is hope yet! You can create original ring tones by using the melody editor, as of yet I haven’t used this feature but it seems easy enough to do. It includes such effects as eight different kinds of bass effects, eight different organ effects, eight different pianos, eight chimes, eight guitars, sixteen string effects, sixteen brass effects, twenty-four synth effects and sixteen percussion effects, so there is plenty of scope to get creative, along with these musical effects you also have sounds such as helicopter, gunshot, applause, sea shore sounds and bird songs. You can also change the message alert tones and also the keypad tones, with quite a fair choice for the message tones, more so than the ring tones.

Address Books

The address book is accessed by the circular button on the front and has a capacity to store 500 entries consisting of.

The address book is quick and easy to use and one thing I was impressed with was the speed at which the handset dialled the chosen number. There is a speed dial list for even faster calling which you can add up to nine numbers too. The address book gives you an option to add a photograph to your contacts stored in your address book so when the contact calls, or when you call them their image flashes up on the screen, alternation from a small thumbnail to a full screen image.

Sharp TM100 Earpiece

Other Features

I think I have covered the main points, there are different applications, e.g. a calculator, alarm, organiser and a memo recorder, the one thing is doesn’t have are onboard games. This personally didn’t bother me as I don’t play games on mobiles, but if you so wish you can download games via the mobile internet as the phone features Java, the amount of games that you can store is dependant on how much internal memory the handset has free.

Summary

In my opinion this smart looking handset has all the features that I want in a phone, it has none of the extras that you don’t use, such as a calorie counter or a sound meter, just the basics, which is exactly what I need in a handset. The features that it sports are of excellent quality, in my opinion, what’s the point of adding a camera if it produces pictures of such a poor quality that there is nothing that you can do with them? Or why go to the trouble of adding a camera when some manufacturers add such low quality and inferior screens that the pictures are not displayed in such a manner as to show them off? The main attributes that this handset has are without doubt the quality of the camera and the fantastic smooth screen, the weaknesses being the totally appalling ring tones that come as standard, but this I can live with as the pros far outweigh the cons. The handset feels solid in the hand and not flimsy, it is also weighted correctly so as not to feel too top heavy when the slider is open, a lot of clamshells I feel have the top heavy problem, but this luckily escapes this altogether. At the price I paid (£75.00) I think this handset offers exceptional value, I don’t know if the phone features themselves will keep people entertained for long as it has no MP3 player or radio, but if you are looking for a basic handset with fantastic screen and camera then this could well be the handset for you, I know I wont be changing this phone for a long time.