As for higher-end features, the i880 supports full Bluetooth for connecting to a headset or sending data to another Bluetooth device. You also get Nextel's Direct Connect walkie-talkie service (including Group Connect, which lets you chat with up to 20 others via PTT at once) and Direct Talk, which gives you out-of-network walkie-talkie chat with another Direct Talk handset at a range of up to six miles. A newer feature is Direct Send, which sends PTT contact information to other compatible Nextel phones. The i880 also supports Nextel's second line service, which allows you to add a second line to the phone with a different phone number--perfect for users who want separate digits for personal and business use.
Though it came a bit late to the camera phone game, the carrier ups the ante with the 2-megapixel shooter on the i880. You can take pictures in seven (yes, seven) resolutions from 96x95 to 1,600x1,200 pixels in either Fine or Normal quality settings. Settings include a flash, a self-timer, and two shutter sounds (there's no silent option), but as on previous Nextel camera phones, picture color effects, brightness adjustments, and white-balance controls are absent. Also, while the camera offers a 4X zoom, there was a couple seconds lag where the display went blank between each zoom setting. Picture quality was quite good with sharp colors and enough light. Our only complaint is smaller objects such as flowers looked somewhat fuzzy.
The i880's video recorder shoots clips in two resolutions (176x144 and 128x96) with sound. Clips meant for multimedia messages are capped at 15 seconds; otherwise you're limited by the amount of available memory. Clips were nothing special, with a grainy, pixelated effect. Once you're done with your snapshots or videos, you can store the files on the phone's 20MB of shared internal memory, but since that's on the low end, you're better off using a MicroSD card. Our test phone came with a 256MB card in the box.
The simple MP3 player on the i880 is comparable to the i580. Though the interface is completely bare bones, it's perfectly serviceable for listening to your tunes. You can choose from three color themes, and we like that the external and internal displays show the artist and song name and elapsed time during playback. Features include shuffle and repeat modes and Rock, Pop, Jazz, Classical, and Bass EQ presets. On the downside, it plays tracks only from TransFlash cards, so you can forget about direct-to-device music transfers, let alone over-the-air downloads. We knocked the i580 for not having external music controls, so they're a welcome touch here.
You can personalize the i880 with a choice of wallpaper and themes. If you don't like what's on the handset already, you can always download more options with the WAP 2.0 wireless Web browser. Alternatively, you get a fair choice of Java (J2ME) applications, including two games (Tetris and World Poker Tour); three demo games (Block Breaker deluxe, Zuma, and Ms. Pac-Man); 1KTV, an on-demand pseudo-TV service; and the Trimble Outdoors and TeleNav 3.8 subscription-based navigation service that takes advantage of the i880's GPS support.
We tested the i880 in San Francisco using Nextel's service. Call quality was very good, with solid voice clarity and volume. Occasionally there was a slight background hiss but it wasn't enough to make us displeased with call quality. Callers reported similar conditions but said they could hear us loud and clear. On the reception side we had no trouble getting a signal and experienced little interference from other electronic devices. Speakerphone calls were up to par as well with very loud volume, and we had no issues when we made calls with a Bluetooth headset. Music quality wasn't exceptional by any means but the stereo speakers are a great touch. Music sounded a tad better over headphones than the external speakers, but the volume was quite loud either way. And for either method,our tracks sounded fine for short stints.
The Motorola i880 promises 4.5 hours of talk time battery life, while our tests showed 5 hours of talk time. According to FCC radiation tests, the i880 has a digital SAR rating of 1.3 watts per kilogram.
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