MobilePhone- Choice and functions needed

Tennessee

Tennessee

Joined
Apr 27, 2000
Messages
145
In Uk and the rest of Europe, GSM 900MHz mobilephones are the popular ones, In States, it will be the GSM 1900, or CDMA.
Frequencies aside, what do you guys look for in a mobilephone. For me, it is my 60% urban survival tool. All my contacts are in it. I've also got function like calculator, Voice memo.
How do you guy utilise it?
 
I carry a Motorola digital Star-Tac every day. When I am on the road, sometimes for as much as 6 to 8 weeks at a time it is my only means of voice communications.

That said, my wants are simple. I want the phone to ring when I have a call, and ring on the other end when I make a call. Caller ID, Voice mail, and memory are useful functions, as is the vibrate/ring function. There is often enough noise that I can't hear the phone ring.

The thing I like the most is it's size. I can clip the holster to my belt and it disappears until I want it. The holster is very well designed. The phone comes out at a touch, but it has never come out by accident, even when I am working (roofing).

I will say this for Motorola. They bounce well. This thing has had the $hit beat out of it for the last 19 - 20 months, and it still works like new. It does not look new, it just works like new.

The biggest problem is that coverage up here "in The Great North Woods" is less than wall to wall. There are a lot of areas up here where there is no service.


Mike

 
I have a Motorola StarTac digital, and have had a couple other Motorolas in the past. I love the fact that it's so small, I can stuff it in a small fanny pack or even my front pocket and not even notice it. On the downside, I'm not happy with the batteries. When I get a battery, it typically works well for a couple months, then seriously loses its power for talk time. The standby time stays relatively constant, but even a short phone call drains just too much of the battery. I would suspect I was just having bad luck, or treating the battery badly or something, but the several other people I know who have Motorola StarTacs all report the exact same battery behavior.

What I'd really like is a phone the size of the StarTac, but has batteries that perform acceptably. Note that I realize a small phone will have small batteries, and less life -- I'm saying even accounting for that the Motorola batteries seem to lose their capacity very quickly.

Joe
 
I'm happy with my Nokia 6160, but the TDMA service is antiquated. I'll probably replace it with a GSM 6190 soon. I considered the Startac too, but the short (compared to the Nokia) standby time was the factor (48 hours for the compact Li ion battery vs. 8 days for the standard Li ion battery). Charging the thing every couple of days was getting to be a drag. The Startac really is compact; my girlfriend's used to slip into a pocket really easily, and the clip holster is well designed. However, she lost that phone and decided that she didn't want to pay above the service charges for a new phone and ended up with a Nokia 5190. I always felt that the Startac was too flat to hold comfortably anyway.

Back to topic: I want a phone that delivers clear signals and holds a long charge. The ergonomics of the phone are important too. although flip-style phones have more coolness value, I don't find the shape to be comfortable. That being said, the phone needs to be compact enough to slip into a pocket. Being able to hold a reasonable amount of phone numbers and ease of accessing them is necessary as well. I'll store other info on my PDA rather than have a "SUV" phone.
 



Joe,

What are you using for a battery? I am using a pair of Li ion standard capacity main batteries, pretty much trouble free. I got a second battery when I got the phone. I had to replace my #2. battery about 6 months ago when the little clip that locks it into the phone broke. My dealer sent it back to Motorola and gave me a new one. Aside from that problem My batteries seem fine.

Back and forth between Vermont and NYC I go from an analog system into a digital system. That makes a tremendous difference in battery life. I can carry the phone 18 hours and make a half dozed calls in a day (45 - 60 minutes total talk time) and have a battery that still shows 4 bars on FCN 4 meter. on an analog system I would be well into my second battery by then.

Normally I turn off the phone at night, remove the old battery and put it in the desk charger, take a full charged battery and put it in the phone. Next morning the fresh charged battery becomes my spare, and so on.

The thing that really saves my butt around home is that I am in and out of the car all the time, and I have a mobile charger. The batteries recharge so fast that it almost always shows a full charge.

Maybe I'm asking less of the batteries than you guys are but I've got no problem with them at all.


Mike
 
The Nokia Communicator (made famous br The Saint) is indeed a handy tool, The 9110 model have more feature. I think it is good in Europe, in America, unless your area is cover by GSM, this baby can't really work.

 
MNH --

I use the slim lithion batteries, and I also have the large backstrap battery. My buddies all use the slim lithion -- all Motorola manufactured. We all have the same problem with short talk time, after a few months. However, speaking for myself and at least one of my buddies, we don't spend much time in cars, and so don't have the phone constantly charging like you do.

Joe
 
Hey,
I thought I'd throw in a plug for Sprint PCS and the Samsung model 8500. It's a dual band web ready flip style phone. The feautures I like the best are 3 alarms, calender feature with multiple scheduler per day, and voice activated dialing. It is about the same size as the str-tac, but thicker and does not offer a holster. (Best Buy offers a "Swivel Clip" belt clip and car mount as well).

Deciding factors on this phone:
SIZE
ALARMS (3)
Web browser (fun and informative)
Calender mode
Scheduler
Voice activated dialing

I do not use a PDA and wanted a phone that would serve as a scheduler as well as alarm clock, the 8500 is great overall!

John A Franklin
 
Out of curiosity, how much extra does the web browsing feature cost? I'm not asking about the phone, it seems most phone have browsers built in these days. I mean the web service from your cell provider.

Joe
 
In Seattle (and I'm not sure where else), AT&T has come out with this service called "Pocket Net," which is free internet browsing via "pocket net ready" phones. I got an Ericsson R280LX, and although it's not as small as some of the tiny little phones out there, I like it just fine.

~Mitch

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