Review of the Motorola PEBL

The Motorola PEBL is a stylish, if a tad impractical, phone offered by Fido. It is the first phone from Motorola that I’ve tested since the days of the P280/V60 that possesses Motorola’s excellent audio and RF qualities.
The little speaker used for the speakerphone is also used for the ringer, which like virtually all phones on the market these days can play MP3 files. There aren’t a lot of loud ringtones available on the phone, but some are at least loud enough to suffice. Fortunately the vibrator is quite strong and if you set the phone to ring and vibrate simultaneously, you can at least feel the phone, even if you can’t hear it.



Ugh! The keypad on the PEBL (like the similar one found on the RAZR) is an excellent example of functionality taking a backseat to looks. The design is arguable no worse than a standard flush design, and so long as you are careful where you place your fingers you shouldn’t have too much trouble. However, like flush keypad designs it suffers from being nearly impossible to use without paying careful attention to it. In addition, because the digits aren’t horizontally aligned, shifting your thumb over from any of the middle keys (2, 5, or 8) will put it right in the middle of two of the outer keys.



The 4-way cursor pad is a more traditional design, but it’s really tiny and it’s difficult to feel where your thumb is at any given time. While it isn’t the worst 4-way pad I’ve ever tried, it certainly comes close.
I’ve often said that if a phone had solid core functionality that I’d love it no matter how poorly it did everything else. The PEBL is just such a phone. It has excellent RF and audio qualities while offering very little extra and a horrific keypad. The PEBL is clearly designed to be a fashion phone, but with good core functionality in there too, it’s certainly a great fashion phone.



The problem is how Fido prices this model. If bought outright the price of $350 is just way too much for what you get. On the other hand, Fido really discounts the price if you are willing to sign with a 2 or 3 year contract. On a 2 year contract the price drops dramatically to only $100, which actually makes it only $35 more than a bottom-end Nokia 6061. On a 3 year contract the price drops to $50. So, if you are willing to sign a contract, the price is not bad, but if you prefer month-to-month or pre-paid, the PEBL is a bit pricy.