Saturday, February 02, 2008

Darn it...

Back from my recent trip to Austin and I noticed that my Nokia cell phone (6102) had started making a "clicking noise" when I flipped it open and close.

Upon closer inspection I found that a crack had developed in the plastic that wraps the hinge.

The phone still works for now, but the hinge seems noticeably looser. 

With a hat-tip to to Jim Thompson, I feel FAIL coming on!

So I have been browsing Cingular AT&T Wireless's phone selection and reading the reviews for the past two weeks.

I think I may head over to the local store and do some hand's on work also.

Both of the girls have the Samsung Sync.  They seem to be very happy with it and I do like the slightly rubberized feel of the keypad.  However, Alvis has managed to bust her front-screen by tossing it in her purse loose.  Something got jostled and when it hit the screen, it cracked.   Phone still works, but she doesn't have the cute little display on the front anymore.  Both girls also got it (mostly for the cool factor) so they could listen to music on it.  However, after working hard to get their playlists copied over, I've never seen them using it to listen to music.  They have reverted back to their iPods.

I've checked and it appears the stock is still out on this model.

Samsung has a similar model, the A437, but the reviews I have found haven't been very positive.

I really like the Nokia's having had many in the past (in a good way), but I don't like their current designs.

Most of our team-members have Motorola RAZR's but the keypad feels very awkward to me and menu system is a bit unwieldy.  Fortunately, the BlackBerry I have for work is great.

I've almost decided against another flip-phone for now.  I'd like something a bit more durable.  And definitely no "sliders".

I'm considering the Samsung A727 which seems thin but has decent talk-time and a large screen.  I might even be able to use the girl's Samsung accessories we have already picked up with it, saving the additional (hidden) cost of re-accessorizing a new cell-phone model.

And, to make it worse, I can usually get a better deal from the on-line store than the local one.  That's great for the budget, but I hate waiting.

And I am so fed-up with these "rebate" promos.  Just take the price off the top at purchase.  AT&T seems to like this, as in many cases, if you use their rebate card in their store, you get an additional discount.  Thus they drive more purchases.  However, while I might buy some accessories, I usually pick those up with the phone, so getting the rebate card 3-4 weeks later is a lost cause as I don't have any other cell-phone needs at that later time.  So I have to go and find a store that it will work at as a debit/gift card.  (One of the previous AT&T rebate cards we got actually got rejected by a few stores, luckily we finally found that the grocery store took it fine....sheesh.)

So begins the hunt.

Darn it.

--Claus

3 comments:

Jim said...

With all due respect and sympathy for your broken phone, I think it would take something like... a photo of your Nokia at the bottom of a toilet for you to achieve true FAILage.

Anonymous said...

I must be one of the few people out there who uses their cell phone only to make and get calls. I don't go online with it (expect to check how much air time I have left) and rarely do text messages and those are incoming from the person I car pool with letting me know he is on his way. The phone I have also allows for custom ring tones, I don't use those. Doesn't even play music (and I don't own and iPod or any other portable MP33 player).

Anonymous said...

Jim: That is pretty darn close. I washed the daughter-unit's cellphone when it got left in a pair of her jeans. I got a dead phone out of it (Go-phone) and she got a new Samsung SYNC for my mistake. That was a painful lesson. Added to that was the fact that we had just loaded it up with minutes and AT&T wouldn't refund the inaccessible minutes unless I bought a new GO phone and ported her existing account/# to the new phone.

Guru: I hear you!

I love the BlackBerry for keeping up during work hours with email and events. I loaded the Google Mobile pack on it and was surprised while in Austin when I was using it with Google Maps to find that GPS location had now been enabled (Maps for Mobile) and I could find my location on Google Maps, live. Cool! I do some web-searches and very light web-browsing. Google Mobile is the only applications that didn't come standard I have found a need to install.

For my personal phone, I do light texting to the Valca girls, but I don't play music or listen to the radio with it (it can do both), I don't use most of any of the applications that are embedded in it. I don't surf the web with it. I hate having the camera feature. Everytime I visit Lavie in the plant, I have to give it up at the security desk so I don't take pictures of their facility. That alone is a real, real big drag. I could just not tell the guard, but I wouldn't want them (or me) to get in trouble if I was spot-checked coming out.

Unfortunately, there just aren't many cellphones offered now that don't come with all these features, and the ones that do are "grandma" phones, in both styling and support.

No thanks, I'll just suffer with the extra features. At least Alvis is entertained with them....