Easyfone Prime-A1 GSM SIM-Free Flip Mobile Phone for Elderly, Unlocked Senior Phones with HD Dual-Screen, Big Button, Basic Mobile Phone with SOS Button, Charing Dock (Black)

As my parents have problems remembering how to use a smartphone I decided I'd get them one of these retro "feature phones". I've still got working pre-smartphone day phones but these are aimed at the elderly so all the fonts look bigger as well as have bigger buttons.Build quality is cheap plastic with a half rubber face front/back and the coloured menus are pretty much what you'd expect from a retro phone. It's an OK design. I'm glad the SOS button looks discrete unlike most other phones of this type and have doesn't stick out like a sore thumb as if it's labelling the user as disabled/handicapped.The SOS button is enabled by default and can be disabled too. Holding it for a few seconds will activate it, playing back an alarm sound, sends out an SMS and also tries to call the number you've set up. It's quite customisable so you can disable the alarm sound, edit the automated SMS message too. The button can be used when the phone both flipped open or not.Other buttons can also be customised to launch different apps such as if the user finds it too difficult to remember how to go into a menu.Obviously you can't expect many features but this supports wireless headsets, has a built-in LED to use as a torch with a dedicated button for it. It actually comes with 2 games and a few other built-in apps you'd usually find on pre-smartphones such as a PIM. There's a FM radio too which is very clear and doesn't require earphones to use as an antenna to work.Expects a micro SIM (the square size kind) and also has room for a micro SD card to store photos with. Yes, it has a camera but again, it's as poor as pre-smartphones, a very poor quality 2MP retro camera so you'll be very unlikely to use it. It could have been better.The phone charges by USB and takes 3 hours to fully charge but doesn't come with an adaptor. It does come with 2 batteries though so as far as battery endurance is concerned, at least you won't have to look for a replacement soon. Battery left can be confusing because it looks like signal strength. Unfortunately a full charge can't even last a day.Also, every time you take out the battery or it runs out, you will have to setup the date and time again which is probably a minor annoyance. Or even better, let it auto-update by network time. It would have been good if the last known date and time was saved into memory so that next time you recharge you set up less.I think it would have been useful there were some more advanced (optional) features for the person setting up the phone. For example if you could edit all your contacts, store them on the card or just plug it into a computer to edit them instead of doing it the retro way of manually putting contacts in one by one. It wasn't exactly quick to type names in on retro phones.So the Easyfone has all the features you'd expect from a retro phone but, with an added SOS button and extra large font size to make it easier to read. However when you have a phone that's close to the price of a low end smartphone of £53 you kind of expect some more features to make this phone easier to setup and better hardware. Especially when there are other senior "feature phones" that are available at half the price. Battery life is biggest reason why I gave it such a low rating.GREAT- Big font on screen and buttons.- External screen shows minimal but useful info such as caller, date/time.- A subtle SOS button that doesn't label the user as handicapped.- SOS button can be disabled or customised.- FM radio doesn't require earphones to act as antenna.- Other buttons can be customised too.- Dedicated button for the built-in torch light.- Uses micro USB for charging.- Has Chinese display/input support (for those interested).NOT SO GREAT- Horrendous battery life, can't even last a day on full charge!- Cheap build.- No power adaptor included.- Could have a better camera at this price of £53.- Could have more features to make setting up easier.- Have to set date and time every time battery gone.

This phone is clearly designed for people with failing eyesight/hearing/mental capacity, and if you don't have at least one of these conditions, you're likely to find it frustrating to use. Ironically, despite this apparent design aim, I found its functioning counter-intuitive, and the manual is very little help.The box I received contained two batteries. I don't know if this is standard. The one I tried first did not charge properly; it charged once or twice, but then one day it ran out of charge, despite having been charged (with the charging indicator showing) for several hours that day and also on the previous day. I have now switched to the second battery and that seems fine.Whereas my previous phone had up-/down-/left-/right- arrow keys, this phone has only up- & down- arrow keys. There are keys on the left and right side of the keypad which sometimes function as left- & right- arrow keys, but sometimes do not.The manual bears only a passing acquaintance with the phone. For instance, it says "When the charger is connected to the phone, <a plug symbol> is displayed briefly and <plug symbol with a line through it> when it is disconnected".Well, it isn't. When it is connected, the battery symbol with a sequence of illuminating bars is displayed.The manual refers to a "mains adaptor". There is no mains adaptor supplied. This may be because the adaptor shown in the diagram is a (European-type?) two-pin plug, useless in the UK unless you have a suitable adaptor.When a text message is displayed, the text is large, with a large gap between lines. This is good if your vision is bad, but it is frustrating if your vision is normal because only a very small amount of text is displayed at any one time. As far as I can see there is no way to increase this amount; there are two text size settings, "standard" and "large"; the one I have just described is the default, which is "standard".Say you are writing a text message, and you want to enter a special character. To do this you press the "*" key. You are presented with a 5-by-5 grid (in fact there is a sixth row off the bottom of the screen, but there is no indication of this on the display). If you want to use a special character in the first column of the grid, that's fine; you just press the OK key. But if you want, say, a character in the third column, there is no way to move the cursor to this column. (The keys which sometimes function as left/right arrow keys do not work on this screen.) After a couple of minutes experimentation I found that what you do is use the up/down keys to select the required row, then key in the number corresponding to the column containing the special character you want - eg, to select a character in the third column, you must press the "3" key. Naturally, the manual does not tell you this.I bought this phone because I just wanted something as small as possible. If I had known then what I know now, I would have avoided phones with the word "senior" anywhere in the blurb, and I certainly wouldn't have bought this one.

Bought for my 74 yr old Dad who is not too tch-savvy at all and had been using a nokia 'mobile stone' as i called it, the old 3310's i think it was called.. It did the job for making calls and receiving but finally gave up the ghost. I wanted a fone that was easy to use with larger buttons and a little bigger in size as Dad tends to get a little shakey with fiddly things. He adores this fone!. I did program it for him and put in everybody's numbers, he likes the fact you can add a picture of the person calling and so he knows straight away if he wants to answer.. very handy when it comes to my wicked step-'monster' calling!. The fone surprisingly comes with an extra battery but Dad did mention he has to charge it every night so maybe thats why, i don't see an issue if you always remember to stick one on charge, the second battery comes with a little holder so the battery does not have to be in the fone to be charged. All in all i think its a great buy! the majority of all the so-called latest and 'amazing' fones don't come with all the accessories that this one did!. It also has a long strap designed so you can loop it thru the fone and wear it hanging from your neck, i guess this could be handy to know its always on you, it also has the ICE feature and a gps tracking thing (sorry not too techy myself but it can track a person), really some amazing safety features). It has a camera, not overly grea t bt good enough, can connect to internet and radio too. I received a sim with it too, a charging cradle and usb cable,, really good quality all round reliable little pack. I would love to thank the company, its not often i'm so impressed with a product but this one is more than okay. I have a very happy Father and that makes me happy. if you are looking for a straight forward fone with some added bonus safety features this is the one. Would definitely recommend.