AusS2000

Sony Z1010.

Ok, so it's not out yet but that's what I'm waiting for.

If you need a phone today I'd say get the cheapy. 3G is here and any of the non-3G high end phones are a bit of a waste.

My current (and for the last 3 years) phone is a Siemens SL45. It's a decent phone with MP3 player (I use a 128Mb MMC card). Great for when I'm cycling during business hours.

The things I need from my next phone are decent data through put (for when I'm travelling with a laptop), BlueTooth (for connection to said laptop and wireless headset), and MP3 (cause I like to listen to music on flights and whilst cycling/walking). The only phone I know of with all this is the Z1010.

If I lost my phone tomorrow I'd pick up a cheap Nokia or Sony Ericsson.

Blackie

I would go Digital (GSM 900/1800) for several reasons over Analog (CDMA). I won't go into detail here but unless you live in the bush or in a regional area where the GSM network is really bad, there is no real benefit with CDMA unless you factor in the cheaper call rates such as the mobile to landline deals that Orange are offering right now.

Digital offers you the flexibility to swap over your sim card to a different digital phone (something which I do often) and allows all the benefits of web surfing (although limited to WAP or GPRS) and generally offer a wider range of models to choose from, including all the new fangled colour screens and cameras. It offers better connectivity with email, data transfer, Bluetooth, etc. although we haven't even fully utilised the current abilities that GSM (2G) has to offer and terribly overpriced. In Japan, I could send email and receive email straight to my phone for the cost of A$0.01 each transaction.

In terms of tech and features, the latest GSM digital phones are probably as good as they will get, and some older models are even better.

The Sony Ericsson Z1010 seems to be the "complete" mobile phone using the 3G network though release date is sketchy at best. I wouldn't hold your breath AusS2000. The 3G technology does certainly look like the mutt's nuts but the handsets available at the moment are still premature and way too big and clumsy.

Wait for the next generation of 3G handsets in around 12 months (new releases should be announced during the CeBIT show in Hannover in March next year) and we should see a huge increase in uptake. Then things such as video calls (where the other person needs to have this feature on their 3G phone as well), voice read emails, etc. will start making sense when the masses have access to it.

I for one however, would prefer my surroundings and location to remain anonymous to the caller... Been in too many situations where I would have incriminated myself to my missus if she knew my real whereabouts

hlau

After much nagging from my girlfriend, I finally gave in and got those video phones from Three. They had a pretty good deal up until last week. You get two handsets for the price of one. To make the calculation simple, total bill works out to be $768 for two handsets for 24 months and that includes a total of around 45 minutes of video talk / month, plus free call to any orange phones 24hrs/day. (limited to 10minutes and unlimited redial)

Overall the network from Hutchinson is still very immature. 3G coverage is limited to metropolitan areas in Sydney and Melbourne. Even for simple voice calls (2G), there is probably 3X more drop outs compared to GSM. The other services they are offering includes daily Stock market summary, New clips, Weather, Phone games. For a 120secs clip, download time can range from 5secs to 10secs+. For the first 3 months of joining, there is unlimited free usage of these services, which is more an icing on the cake than necessity.

Overall impression of the 3G from Hutchison is not very good. They rolled it out too early and the network is not yet very stable. (Think they want to beat Telstra in rolling it out) Furthermore, the power consumption of these phones are horrendous. I am still keeping my Nokia 8250 for work and other important things and the 3G phone is more for mucking around.

If you travel around a bit during the day and use your phone frequently, I suggest stick with GSM for another 12 months before considering a 3G.

AusS2000

hlau - did you ever do anything about WiFi connections at your place?

I just upgraded to AirPort Extreme (802.11g) and get 54Mbps now. Great improvement for network stuff but doesn't make a difference for internet as your service is the weakest link in that chain.

Very nice though.

hlau

Aus, There has been a bit of roller coaster ride for my journey to broadband + WiFi.

Initially I was thinking of getting ASDL but then our place has an alarm system that is hooked to the phone line and the salesperson said they'd need to send a technician to put in a filter for the alarm system. So I said forget it and might as well go all the way to cable.

Then my computer started playing up (old PII 300) and I've been swapping parts with another falling apart PII, to see if I can pull together a working one. No luck, so I finally picked up a P4 today.

Once I've got this thing up and running, next thing is to give Optus a call.

Did u say you have a set of cable modem / gateway / access pt / router +/- PCI wifi cards?

AusS2000

LOL, I now have 2 x access points, 1 x accesspoint/cable router and 1 x WiFi PC Card spare. And I can get you a PCI card pretty cheap too when you're ready.

At this point it's all just taking up space (which is preciously short at present).

jing

Do you use Apple Auss2000??


A guy here just recently purchased a sony ericsson t610 and a bluetooth headset ... have to say the headset is much better then the old handsfree set makes you feel like you can move about and roam around while you are on the phone ....

AusS2000

Yep, loads of Macs of all vintages. My latest is a G4 PowerBook and I'm very happy with it.

Got to see the new G5 at Apple a couple of weeks back. That is one serious machine.

jing

Yeah but im not too sure on the styling?

it looks more like a pc now i reckon ... have you seen
www.alienware.com ???

the computers on that site are styling!!!

AusS2000

Yeah, it's abit strange. Like they are saying 'As if we'd make a computer out of moulded multi-colour plastic! How last millenia.'