Nokia 1112: Back to the Basics
I wrote before that I usually go through cycles of having high-end phones and then coming back to basic ones. Well, it seems right now I’m in the basic part of that cycle, and perhaps I’ll stick to this for quite some time.
I arrived home the other night with a flat cellphone battery. My SmartPhone (vintage, with Microsoft Smartphone 2002 software) apparently died while I was driving home, and I didn’t realize this until yesterday morning. So when I charged the phone, I went through the usual boot-up sequence, entered my PIN and just left the phone on the table to charge. But as I checked on it, the screen said I had to input my PIN again, as the first try was an error. I keyed my code in correctly (and carefully) but the phone suddenly said my SIM card had been blocked! I had to key in my PIN unblocking key (PUK) before I could use the SIM again.
SIM Blocked!
Horror of horrors, I lost the PUK slip years ago, when I first purchased the prepaid SIM card I’d been using. Those things were designed to get lost, since they’re really thin and small. And my mobile provider wouldn’t give me the PUK–I don’t think they really disclose that to prepaid users (maybe they don’t even have records).
So I ran off to the nearby mall to see if anyone can unlock my SIM, to no avail. I decided, instead, to check out the latest phone models if I found one to my liking. I was set to buy the cheapest, but reliable, model. A couple of my siblings own the Nokia 1100, which I thought was pretty decent for a very basic phone–it did just what you would expect from a mobile phone: calling and texting. It even lasts a week on a single charge (my brother found this useful when we had a week-long blackout because of a storm).
Basic or Higher Model?
I was also thinking of getting a Motorola L7 (SLVR), but it cost about five times my tentative budget. I could have opted for zero-percent installments on my credit card, but opted against it. After all, I’m no longer such a cellphone junkie like I used to be a couple of years ago, when I had to have the latest and greatest in cellphone technology. Also, after almost a year dealing with the Smartphone’s interface, I opted for something simpler.
So I got what I originally came for: a basic model. And instead of the 1100, which was a dated model, anyway, I got the Nokia 1112, for the equivalent of $45 with prepaid SIM.
Motorola Phones Give off Most Radiation
If you put stock in the cell phones give people cancer claims, then you might want to not buy a Motorola.
Motorola managed to score the top eight spots in a list compiled by Cnet of phones with high radiation levels, as tested by the FCC. Tje phones are all given SAR levels, which measures the quantity of radio frequencey energy absorbed by the body per kilogram of organic tissue.
Most of the phones are nearly a decade old, but a two month old C290 made the cut, and at the top of the list is the SLVR L6 which comes it a at SAR level of 1.58W/kg, nearing the maximum of 1.6W/kg.
Motorola’s Slim SLVR L7 Review
Mobile Burn is talking about the SLVR L7 from Motorola.
While it took a year’s worth of time and a name change to get to us, the Motorola SLVR L7 has finally arrived in most world markets. First introduced as the SLVR V8 back at 3GSM 2005 and later renamed to the L7, the SLVR was designed to do to the candy bar form factor what the Motorola RAZR V3 did to the clamshell. It appears to be working to some extent, too, since we are starting to see a fair number of SLVR-like devices coming out of Asia.
The Quad-band GSM/GPRS SLVR L7 has gone through a number of specification changes since its initial introduction, as well. The L7 is, as I mentioned, no longer a triband device, and no longer supports EDGE. People who have been following the device for a long time (or are reading old web pages) might notice other discrepancies, as well.
They basically say that this is not the phone to use for its camera abilities as it does not have a decent camera, and does not include a flash, but otherwise its a pretty decent phone thus earning a highly recommended rating.
VK Mobile’s VK5000 EDGE
A new phone from VK Mobile was showed off at CeBit 2006. The VK5000 is a very tiny tri-band GSM/EDGE handset with a pretty big feature set.
Coming in an insanely small size, the VK5000 EDGE measures 3.6″ x 2.0″ x .4″ which makes it slightly wider than Motorola’s SLVR L7, but its a little shorter and thinner to make up for it.
Mobile Burn has the details on the features of the phone.
Instead of the typical LCD display, the VK5000 uses a new OLED display with a 128×160 resolution and the ability to show 260k colors. Like other OLED displays we’ve seen, it has a barely perceptible refresh that often becomes obvious in photos, just as you would see when photographing a television. You’ll notice that the bottom half of the display has deeper colors in the example on the next page. While it lacks a memory card slot of any kind, the VK5000 has an amazing 1GB of internal flash storage built-in. That’s great news since the VK5000 has a 1.3 megapixel camera and the ability to play MP3, AAC, AAC+, and eAAC+ music files, as well as record video at 15fps.
Motorola SLVR L6 Review
Pocket-lint reviews the SLVR L6, a very slim handset from Motorola that not only looks god, but it has some decent features. Very much like the L7, except even smaller, and with a few less features, the L6 is an interesting feature, but will people buy it without all the cool features of the L7 and other such cell phones.
The L6 is the slimmest handset available on the market right now, and unless you want a phone that will snap every time you press a button too vigorously while texting it’s hard to see where it could shed any further micrometers. This handset is seriously thin, 10.9mm! Although it’s still quite wide and slightly taller than an iPod.
What isn’t hard to spot is the L6’s lineage, as it’s a doppelganger for the L7 we’ve looked at previously. It fits in just below it in the brand’s line up, loosing a few extra millimetres and a couple of features on the way. It’s the RAZR V3 and V3i all over again – these handsets are darn close to each other in almost every respect!
For their final rating the phone manages to earn a seven out of a possible ten, as points were taken off for only having a VGA camera and lacking a MP3 player.
Motorola SLVR L7 Review
Pocket-Lint takes a look at the SLVR L7 from Motorola. I find it slightly amusing that it is called the L7 because as a child, I used to make that symbol to mean that someone was “square” or uncool, and now to find it gracing a new iTunes phone that looks cool, I think L7 will have its meaning changed.
the SLVR is incredibly slim – 11.5mm slim in fact and this means you can happily tuck it in a trouser pocket without every girl you talk thinking you’ve got other things on your mind.
Like the RAZR before it, the top of the phone is flush flat and the keypad made from aluminium. Improved from the RAZR however, is the slightly raised numbers and this does help locate them when you’re texting without really looking. As before the phone glows in that Tron-like state whenever you start pressing buttons.
In the end though the reviewers at Pocket-Lint were not too impressed as iTunes support was left out for the European model, and a VGA camera, just isn’t what they’d expect from a phone that is trying to be the next RAZR and so it earns itself a slightly above average 6/10.
Motorola’s SLVR L7 Now Available from Cingular
Thanks to Engadget who had the scoop on this. It looks like the SLVR L7 from Motorola is now available from Cingular. It is an iTunes phone, which means you can play all your favorite songs on it, as long as you don’t mind limiting all your favorites to 100 or less songs.
It features a VGA camera, 262K TFT color display and comes pre-installed with a 512MB MicroSD card, built-in stereo speakers, and includes an EMU to 3.5mm headset adapter. Available for $199 with 2-year contract and yes, it still has the 100-song limit that helped make the ROKR E1 so wildly successful.
Head on over to Cingular’s Website to check it out.
VK Mobile Introduce Worlds Thinnest Handset, the VK2000
Mobile Burn has the details on a cell phone that is only a third of an inch thick. The VK2000 is going to be one of the thinnest, if not the thinnest handset.
Measuring in at only 8.8mm (0.34″) thin, the VK2000 undercuts the Motorola SLVR by almost 3mm. Weighing in at only 49g (1.72oz), VK claims that this is the thinnest and lightest handset in the world. With dimensions like these, I am not one to argue with that claim.
While small, the VK2000 lacks many of the features users have come to expect from handsets today. Absent from the list is a camera and Bluetooth, though the VK2000 does come equipped with a quad band radio. EMS and SMS messaging are supported, and the VK2000 includes a 65k color display.
New Motorola Handsets to Lose EDGE Capability
I have been hearing more and more about how Motorola cell phones are loosing EDGE compatibility, but I don’t think it is that big of a deal, as it does not meet the quality standards for Motorola anyways.
Some of Motorola’s up and coming handsets will be loosing EDGE compatibility, as Motorola revises the specifications for some of the company’s new high-end releases.
Handsets affected by the changes include models from the design-orientated series such as the SLVR and the PEBL, and the Linux based E895 and A910. These handsets will be launched as GPRS-only devices.
The changes come in the interest of stability. A Motorola spokesperson explained that the chipset included in the high-end handsets is not able to meet the company’s quality standards in its EDGE implementation. At this late stage of product development, it is too late for Motorola to swap chipsets, and so they have chosen to simply disable the EDGE support.
(hat tip to Mobile Burn for the info)
EDGE Disappears From High End Motorolas
Phonescoop has an interesting news bit about EDGE disappearing from Motorola phones:
Motorola has been quietly revising the specs on many of the high end models they’ve announced but haven’t yet released. Well publicized phones including new design models such as the PEBL and SLVR, as well as the E895 and A910 will no longer launch with EDGE data. They will be GPRS only. A Motorola spokesperson explained that the chipset Motorola choose for their top of the line models does not have a stable EDGE implementation, and does not meet Motorola’s quality standards. It is too late for Motorola to swap out chips, so the company has been forced to disable EDGE on the new phones despite their high end placement in their lineup.
|
Categories
- 3G
- Apple
- Article
- Articles
- Audiovox
- BlackBerry
- Camera Phone
- Hacks
- HTC
- Kyocera
- LG
- Motorola
- News
- Nokia
- Palm
- Panasonic
- Pantech
- Reviews
- Sagem
- Samsung
- Sanyo
- Sharp
- Siemens
- Sony Ericsson
- Telco
- Tips and Tricks
- Tools
- Toshiba
Recent Posts
- Postpaid versus Prepaid
- Nokia 5200 XpressMusic
- Cellphone Scandals
- BlackBerry 8830 World Edition
- Prepaid Lines, Budget Friendly
Related Blogs
E-mail Subscription
