Mobile Phone Woes

A bit of a rant about my mobile. I have a Nokia 6230 which I’ve had for over 1 year now. I’m desperate to get a new one because it’s now not the latest and greatest gadget – it’s been superseded by the 6230i and everyone has one. I don’t feel like I’m ahead of the pack now…

So, a few months ago, upon listening to Richard Giles talking to Ignacio, the chief designer at Motorola on the Gadget Lounge (Podcast Link here), I fell in love with the PEBL and immediately got onto Ebay and bought an import (I still haven’t found it in the stores here). I thought it would be the best phone ever – so beautiful and functional, and a bit feminine – not a blokes phone at all. I thought I could handle the reduced functionality from my 6230 because I don’t use a lot of the features like the MP3 player etc. Boy, was I wrong…

Unfortunately I think coming from a Nokia, you’re stuck with a Nokia, and similarly with other brands. Once you are used to an operating system of a phone I think you’re stuck with it – good or bad. I just could not get used to the Motorola and even though I absolutely loved the look and feel of the PEBL, the operating system is a dog!! So, after two weeks of using it, I put it back in it’s box and went back to my old 6230 – maybe I will try and sell it again on eBay.

Here is a few things I loved* and hated about the PEBL

Loved

• The beautiful shape – it felt great to hold it
• The touchy feely cover
• The active flip – it flips open with the touch of one finger
• The size and weight
• The outside screen

Hated

• Not polyphonic ring tones – I didn’t think that would bother me but they were very ordinary
• The Screen Quality
• Difficult to get to the calendar – I’m so used to it on the Nokia that I could not get used to it on the Motorola and the Calendar is my most used feature of my phone – I don’t keep a diary other than in my phone.
• Predictive Text Input hard to use – one of those things that you would probably like if you were a Motorola user, but I was far too slow with it.
• Really bad battery life – I really had to charge it every day becuase it had a habit of cutting off calls if the battery was low

I could go on for ages listing the bad stuff… but it was a lesson for me. I will not buy another phone now until I can see something that is really vastly improved from my 6230 – and I can’t even see that the new Nokia’s have anything that fantastic in them. Of course I would love a HTC Wizard but they are a bit bulky and a bit blokey – I still like to have a phone with a bit of a girly touch (I have a diamante J attached to my 6230 to give it a bit more of the feminine touch).

Anyway, I would love some feedback – do you have a phone that you can suggest as the perfect phone – great looks, great to hold and fantastic functionality? Please let me know… I don’t know how long I can hold out before I have to have another gadget fix…

* You may notice in my rantings that I either “Love” or “Hate” – there is usually no middle ground on things that I am passionate about… unless of course I just don’t care…