martinjy.com — Martin Young’s blog

My mobile phone history

I’m heading out for a new mobile phone this weekend so I’ve been thinking about what I want in my next phone. It’s pretty straightforward: small, lightweight, at least 2.0mp camera. That’s it. I’ve decided I don’t need any of the organiser/email/music/5mp camera stuff (which makes it tough to buy a new phone, as that’s what most of them have).

Anyway, during my research I came across mobile-review.com, which includes a whole heap of old phones too. It made me remember the best phone I’ve owned to date - the Ericsson T39m. That thing was awesome back in about 2001. Then I found my first phone, the Ericsson GA628, and my second, another Ericsson. So I thought it would be fun to list them here.

Phone #1, 1998, Ericsson GA628

Mum and Dad bought me this for my birthday in 1998, even though I had stuff all money and could hardly pay the bills. One bill in particular stands out - I called a girl I’d met at the pub I worked at and we talked for around 10 minutes but I forgot to hang up. I realised my mistake around 50 minutes later. Result: a $200+ bill that month, as I recall.

Standby time: 41hrs (mine had the smaller battery)
Weight: 217g
Size: 130 x 49 x 23

Phone #2, 1999, Ericsson T18s

For no particular reason other than to satisfy my must-upgrade cravings I swapped the phone over at the end of the 12mth contract to this thing. It was a bit lighter and smaller (thanks to the flip) and had much better battery life.

Standby time: 100hrs
Weight: 146g
Size: 105 x 49 x 24

Phone #3, 2001, Ericsson T39m

This thing was awesome. Smaller and lighter again than the T18 and with a monstrous battery life, I loved this phone and wish I still had it. You can still get them on eBay, but no camera and GSM-only means they’re almost useless. Shame.

Standby time: 300hrs
Weight: 86g
Size: 96 x 50 x 18

Phone #4, 2004, Samsung N361

I’ve still got this in its original box in a cupboard somewhere. It was OK, the fanciest feature was the colour screen but I reckon this is when the manufacturers really started trying to outdo each other by loading the phones up with all sorts of extra crap that the average user doesn’t really need. The menu system took ages to get used to, and note that the size and weight aren’t much different to the T39 but the battery life is 30% worse. That’s due to the colour screen, I guess.

Standby time: 216hrs
Weight: 75g
Size: 102 x 42 x 19

Phone #5, 2006, Sony Ericsson K608i

The current phone. Again note the specs against the T39. Sure, the 608i has 3G and a camera but I can easily live without both of those things. When you stack this up against the T39 it doesn’t seem as though the overall mobile phone experience for the average user has progressed much since 2001. I know I can do all sorts of things with this phone that the T39 couldn’t do, and it has a colour screen etc etc but how much of that fancy stuff do I actually NEED?

Standby time: 290hrs
Weight: 100g
Size: 105 x 45 x 19

So, to the new phone. I don’t want anything heavier or larger than my current phone and I’ve decided that I don’t need a “converged” camera/phone, I don’t want a flip phone and I don’t need the music player capability.

On 3 Mobile that leaves me with the W880i (103×46x9, 71g, 2.0mp, 170hrs) but on the $29 cap it’ll be an extra $18 per month in handset repayments, which I don’t want.

Virgin have a few 2G Samsung phones on their $30 cap that might fit the bill: U100 (105×50x6, 57g, 3.2mp, 185hrs), U700 (102×50x12, 86g, 3.2mp, 270hrs) and D900i (104×51x13, 85g, 3.2mp, 270hrs), and the Nokia 5310 (104×45x10, 70g, 2.0mp, 300hrs).

Looks like I’m going back to 2G. Mmmmmmmm ………. regression.