Customer Rating:  
Summary: Absolutely hate this piece of junk
Comment: How do I hate thee? Let me count the ways........
1. The noise it makes when turning it on and off.
2. In order to use the phone, I have to be standing outside in a area completely devoid of trees, buildings, power lines, even cars. If it is a cloudy day or raining, forget using it.
3. The stupid PTT button on the side is in the way.
4. Ringtones installed on the phone - where did they find that awful stuff?
I had a Nextel and switched to Cingular when my children moved out of state so it wouldn't cost them to call me from their Cingular phones. Needless to say, we don't talk much because my phone doesn't work unless I'm standing in the middle of an empty field or parking lot. I am planning on going back to Nextel. Oh, I've only had the phone for two months.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Issues with this model
Comment: I'd like to echo some of the comments of others.
What I like:
The large number keys make dialing easier than other phones I've used. I like the look of the phone and its size. It fits nicely in my hand and in the pouch of my purse. The sound quality is good and the range is pretty good, too. I rarely find myself in a place where there's no service.
What I don't like:
The PTT button is placed where my thumb goes when I flip the phone open, and so I almost always hit it, which means I have to cancel the request almost every time I use the phone. The battery status indicator is difficult to read, and is pretty much worthless to me.
This particular phone has two major issues that bug me a lot. It loses connection to the tower, and messages often arrive a week or so late. I went back to the store after a week of this, and was told I needed to bring in the box that the phone came in. By the time I found the box, the trial period was over, so I'm just living with these problems, but I would not buy another one because of it.
My recommendation:
If you buy this phone, keep the box. You might need it if a replacement becomes necessary.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A bad choice.
Comment: As another reviewer said, the LG CU400 makes earsplitting noises every time you turn it on or off. The first time my mother heard it, we were in the car and thank God nobody else was on the road or we would have crashed. She was so startled by it. The sound is a CLEAR deal-breaker and I wish I could crack this phone in half most of the time. Oh, and its battery! Runs out of Power in no time at all.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Very Good Basic Phone, With 2 Problems
Comment: I have owned the LG CU400 for about one month. Both the call quality and the reception are very good. Battery life is acceptable, although I should note that I use the phone only for calls - - no internet, no Push to Talk and no Bluetooth. The speaker phone is on the tinny side but acceptable - - about what one would expect for a phone of this size.
I have, however, encountered two problems:
1. While the battery life is acceptable, I encountered a problem with the battery strength indicator. The battery strength indicator on every cell phone I previously owned showed that the battery strength gradually declined as I used the phone, thereby giving reasonable advance notice when the battery needed recharging. This is not the case with the indicator in the CU400. The first CU400 I owned showed that the battery was fully charged (3 bars) until a relatively short time before it turned itself off because the battery was too low. Specifically, on one occasion when I timed it, the indicator went from 3 bars to 2 bars five or six days after a charge. After only 10 additional hours on standby with no calls at all, the phone turned off because of a low battery.
Thinking the indicator was defective, I returned the phone to the AT&T store and received a new replacement. The indicator on the replacement phone operates slightly, but not significantly, better. The first phone had Cingular markings and the second had AT&T markings, so I doubt that the two phones came from the same manufacturing batch. It seems that this is an inherent problem with the phone. If you buy one of these, I definitely recommend immediately charging the battery when the indicator goes from 3 to 2 bars and buying a car charger, if you spend any appreciable amount of time in a car. The car charger does not come with the phone.
2. When the phone is powered on or off, it makes an annoyingly loud and harsh noise. My wife nearly jumped out her skin the first time I turned the phone off while standing next to her. The noise cannot be changed to another tone, but it can be turned off by putting the phone on vibrate or by turning the ringer volume all the way down. Of course, if I were to do either of these and forget to turn the volume back up after the phone is turned on again, I will not hear the phone ring. I complained to AT&T, which advised that the phone makes this noise because it is a "3G" phone and that the noise is supposed to replicate the sound of a "jet." All I can say is that I have been around airports for quite a while and the noise sounds nothing like a "jet" to me. The closest thing I can compare the sound to is the noise a vacuum toilet on a cruise ship makes when the toilet is flushed. It is really hard to imagine that a major US corporation would put such an intrusive sound in its cell phone and not give the user any option to replace the sound with another.
In summary, the CU400 is a very good basic phone, provided you don't mind listening to the sound of a toilet flushing when you turn it on and off and you also don't mind either frequently charging or running the risk that the battery will unexpectedly run out of juice
Customer Rating:
Summary: Lousy phone
Comment: This has got to be the Yugo of all cell phones. The loud start up noise is one item, the inability to download ringtones, or much else for that matter, and the lousy service. Our Nokia phones worked just fine on Cingular (this week AT&T, next week ???) but this one can't seem to hold a signal to save it's sad little soul. You'd be better off with a pair of tin cans and some kite string. Cheaper by far and considerably more reliable.
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