E-insight

Things to look for when select a cellphone

Many of you will be going on holidays overseas this summer, and consider buying a cellphone, digital camera, mp4 and etcetera. Here I would give you some suggestions in picking a cell phone, as the last gift I can give you before we say goodbye.

The integration of camera, mp3 into cellphone is almost an inevitable procedure of any phone behind the glass display case. Sony Ericsson has just released w610i is one of the delegates of these popular walkman/digital cam phones, though it is not the type of phones I would select.

For professionals, businessmen, many of the functions such as push-email from the highly successful Blackberry, schedule/calendar, notepad, internet and etcetera are equally important to entertainment functions. PDA (personal digital assistants), those that lack the function of mobile phone, but would serve all the above needs are dying out. The future belongs to the decedents of PDA’s, which combines the functions of pocket pc and mobile phone. Such phones are called Smartphones. The obvious choice comes to mind would be an iPhone, which is coming out in just 4 days (June 29th). Other choices includes Blackberry phones, the latest is Blackberry 8300 (Curve), but slightly too expensive both to purchase and to maintain (the service that is).

The secret to Smartphones’ power lies within its integrated firmware, which includes an OS (operation system); so that one can update its software at convenience, e.g. install/uninstall softwares, games. You can do absolutely anything you do on a computer, read pdf books, listen to mp3’s, watch optimized movie clips, play games and ectcetera.

Some popular phones, like Nokia 3250, an excellent smartphone with Symbian 9.0 has a problem that dust can get inside the space under the glass screen. Motorola also have some great phones, the new Razr looks slick, but the drawback is its short battery duration and it’s not a smartphone so that you are limited in installing applications. Some additional aspects you should look out for is that the phone should be at least tri-band or quad-band GSM phone, it specifies the frequency it supports so that it will work in Canada. Other things I would personally look in a phone are the size of its screen, talking time, wifi/Bluetooth support, battery duration (this is most important), signal and its ability to resist dust/water/impact.   

Long story short, buy a phone, buy a smartphone. If the phone was a man, than its OS (symbian/Microsoft/linux) is its brain so that it can accept new applications that would serve other purposes than a simple mobile phone. The screen is its face and the battery duration whos how long it lasts without sleep, haha. Good luck finding your phone.

——————————

E-Insight, 2007