Slashdot Mirror

To summarize the article:

T-Mobile has great hardware on their hands. But this phone could have been so much more... if... and only if...
They had used apple's Iphone software... and since the software wasn't designed by Apple, but instead by big bad microsoft, it sucks!

Personally, I am getting sick of the argument that everything that Apple does is the work of God. While I admit, the Iphone introduced some better concepts in UI, it still has no SDK, is locked, and will be bricked by apple if you try to unlock it. It is a closed platform that is strongly controlled by the almighty Apple.

Had Apple released the Shadow with Windows Mobile, the author of this article would have found some way to justify Apples actions.

If you just take the free phones your provider offers, then games won't be that great. But if you get a decent phone and have a decent provider there are plenty of free games. There are ports of Doom, Wolfenstein 3D, and Frozen Bubble. There are also free or cheap emulators for the Genesis, the NES, and the SNES.

When I purchased the "new" WRT54G, version 5, I expected a router that would at least have better performance than my old, reliable Pentium-II firewall running Windows 2003 and Routing and Remote Services.

Boy was I wrong. Many sites, such as: http://www.tmobile.com/ http://www.realtor.com/ and http://www.gamespot.com/ all had great difficulty loading. It turns out a **LOT** of other people are having the same problem with the Version 5 WRT54G.

My longstanding issue was finally escalated to Linksys Customer Support (you will be escalated to Customer support after dealing with Technical support). At Customer Support, they RMA'd my v5 router, and replaced it with a v4 router. I demanded that they replace it with a v4 router, and I noted that a *LOT* of people on this bulletin board are having the EXACT same problem.

I have literally spent hours trying to solve this problem on the v5 router. As soon as I plugged the v4 router in, my problems were solved!

Of course, Linksys being a company that enjoys wasting their customers' time by not even admitting a problem, you will be forced to pay for shipping charges. No matter that the item is clearly flawed by engineering defects to begin with. I will never, ever, consider buying a Linksys in the future. What a mistake I made thinking they were a premium brand. The fact that they are going to sell a version that finally works as it should, under a different model number and at a higher price, rather than fix the WRT54G Version 5 tells me that they are not interested in providing a quality product. I hope their strategy blows up in their face!

64kbps is the technical limit of vanilla GPRS. However, T-Mobile is pretty far along with their EDGE rollout in most metro areas - here in Atlanta I have to go outside the perimeter before I lose EDGE coverage. Real-world transfer rates are in the 80-100kbps range almost everywhere I've checked where I have more than one bar. Check this forum for user's reports.

AFAIK T-Mobile is waiting for the deployment to be completed before they begin marketing the service, but there's not going to be any additional charges for it beyond what they charge for GPRS today. They have just begun to sell the v330, which has EDGE support (I use an unlocked v551).

As far as T-Mobile's coverage, I will note that the higher-frequency band (they're on 1800 or 1900MHz in the US, Cingular uses 850) does cause the signal to drop out sooner inside buildings than Cingular's - for some reason it happens a lot in supermarkets - due to faster attenuation of higher-frequency signals. But other than that, I don't have problems in metro areas. Rural/suburban areas are a different story, I've heard...

as some have pointed out, convergence seems inevitable and the way we live today seems to go in that direction. as i've been saying all along, however, the US phone market is *not* quite ready for such devices because of a) price and b) lifestyle. lifestyle is what makes these devices HUGE in korea and japan. mass transportation, on-the-go lifestyle, dicates that these devices be made. as a previous poster said, unless you want to carry a utility belt with 3-4 devices on it as you ride the subway to work, well, wouldn't it be better if you had one device that did them decently? i can't find the darn links but from what my family in korea have said, the devices you guys are "wanting" ie 2-3 megapixel camera phones, pda and most of all, a intuitive UI, well, they already exist. heck, even t-mobile's http://www.tmobile.com/products/images.asp?phoneid =220751&class=phonesamsung d415 has been available in korea for 2 years already! as to whether or not the US market warms up to them? time will tell...

You are confusing the features of the provider with the features of the phone. Voicemail is something done by the provider and has NOTHING to do with the type of the phone. And if you don't like flip-phones, a 30 second trip to ATT could show you that there is Sony-Ericson T637. Other providers offer similar and more "brick-like" phones. (ie. TMobile with Nokia 6010, Samsung R225m, etc.)

Don't confuse your lack of research with lack of offerings.

You are confusing the features of the provider with the features of the phone. Voicemail is something done by the provider and has NOTHING to do with the type of the phone. And if you don't like flip-phones, a 30 second trip to ATT could show you that there is Sony-Ericson T637. Other providers offer similar and more "brick-like" phones. (ie. TMobile with Nokia 6010, Samsung R225m, etc.)

Don't confuse your lack of research with lack of offerings.

Try playing it sometime and use your communication/data device..you'll see a big "Sony-Ericson" logo plastered on the top of the screen..not to mention that it actually looks like a Sony Ericson Phone

Does she have local dialup numbers in nearly all parts of the US?

It seems a fair number of dialup ISPs anymore are little more than resellers of access that's provided nationwide by a handful of companies. The last time I fired up a dialup connection, MaGlobe (a prepaid dialup ISP I used as a backup) had numbers damn near everywhere.

(On more recent trips I've taken, I've used free net access through my cellphone. The speed is comparable to dialup, and you don't get stuck paying hotel-phone charges (charges of $1-$2 per call, even for local calls, are not uncommon). It's a bit of an unadvertised feature of T-Mobile's service, but it kicks ass.)

I just wanted to point out the obvious (but apparently not so obvious for many) that almost all of the mobile providers offer phones without some degree of features such as cameras, MP3 players, and the kitchen sink. It makes me wonder if anyone's actively looking for one...

T-Mobile - Nokia 6010
Cingular - Nokia 3595
AT&T Wireless - Nokia 2260
Alltel - Nokia 3585i
Verizon Wireless - Nokia 3589i

OK - now perhaps you're one of those who feels that color screens are over the top for mobile phones... so what to do? Why not look around on eBay?

With that said, I wholeheartedly appreciate the trend of adding features to phones.

Rotary phones "just worked." Why did they even bother adding that newfangled touchtone button dialing or even eliminate operator-connected calling? They always "just worked." The reason: progress.

I love Caller ID and SMS... they're infinitely useful and convenient. Sure... features like Push-to-talk and loud ringtones are annoying... but only when they're blantantly misused or inappropriate... like for personal conversations and in classrooms, respectively.

I just had to say this because I really dislike comments like "just give me a phone that works" because if telephone tech never evolved and never incorporated any new features, we'd all be using AMPS. We've come a long way from the days of car phones. And I, for one, LOVE being able to check my eMail on my 3650. Granted, network reliability should be paramount, but I've never had any lingering issues with my T-Mo service.

I guess I'm less spiteful of the industry than I used to be.

This just like to me that if I rob a bank, driving a Buick

PS - I'm switching from Comcast. This is end for me. Of course my other broadband choise is Qwest (aka QWorst) so out of the fry-pan and into the fire!!!!

We chose the Motorola V66 phones because of their triband functionality.

After activating the TMobile Worldclass service (free to activate) I have traveled to Europe without a problem. I switch to the local band, and I'm on in most cases. Only once have I had to call local customer service.

There is a list available online. I do know that my triband does NOT work in Japan. But you can actually rent a phone from Tmobile if needs be. Since you mentioned Japan as a destination, this might present a problem for you.

All I can say right now is that every cell phone I've ever owned (and I do live in the US) has had a SIM card. T-Mobile (formerly VoiceStream, until they were bought out by the German company of the same name) uses them in their phones, and I've seen a number of people swapping out SIM cards so that they could make use of someone else's phone (and have access to their phonebook).

As well, (they used to, don't know if they still do now, and I'm not quite sober enough to actually go visit their site) they offered tri-band GSM phones (900/1800/1900MHz), so (in theory) they would work worldwide. I don't know if you could stick another provider's SIM card into the phone and it would work, as I've never had the opportunity to test such things, nor have I heard any experiences with trying it.

If it's more than $200 as a ballpark figure, I don't care. $450 for a phone is utterly stupid, especially when Danger's Sidekick (available from T-Mobile and others) is $249 - and has similar functionality to the Treo 600. Note that even the Treo 300 costs $100 more.

If Handspring dropped their prices in line with the competition they would actually sell a significant volume of their products.

I already have a Sprint phone but it isn't a PDA so I can't even get trade in credit. So what is the price to *me*?

I've always been confused by these discounts and how they apply to existing customers - the small print always says something like "only valid new service activation", implying that I have to not be a customer to get the best deal. I have more incentive to jump networks when I upgrade if this is how they reward customer loyalty.

And even at $450 for this, the $299 Sidekick (on the T-Mobile network) is looking like a better and better deal all the time. As soon as mobile numbers become portable here in the US, I'll have no reason left to not switch networks..

"The Association said an upgrade to the A5/2 encryption algorithm, available since July 2002, addresses the security weaknesses highlighted by the Israelis."

I have a Danger Hiptop / T-Mobile Sidekick and I don't think it's 5 years behind Japanese phones. It has a real keyboard, which is not as important in Japan, but is important here if you actually want to do e-mail or web searches or IM. Yes, it can do SMS if you can find one of the other 3 people in the US who can use it, but it also does AOL IM and thus you can talk to just about anybody. It's also $40/mo for unlimited data, plus more phone minutes that I can use (though if you yammer you will probably want to upgrade to the $60 plan).

Drawbacks: grayscale screen instead of color. Although it's done in Java, the SDK is not open -- blame Deutchse Telekom, though, not the US industry, for that one.

I think the device fares quite well compared to Japan's Java-enabled color phones, because it has a real keyboard and real applications that are useful. If I want to play Tetris in color, I'd get a game boy.

And yes, it has Beatnik 12-voice polyphonic ringtones that sound great.

I have used every brand of PDA over the years, from the Newton 110 on. This is why I can say with absolute certainty that the Sidekick (made by Danger and offered through T-Mobile) is the best yet. Always-on internet makes synching a thing of the past, and the browser and IM client are honestly useful. The always-on internet is truely a big, huge, happy addition to the PDA concept, an addition that indeed transforms the things into something unique, useful, and even important.

With the promise of Danger pushing over-the-air software updates to the device, and the upcoming developer kit, I am honestly thrilled to own the thing, knowing the the very device I already own witll get more exciting and useful as time passes.

I'm getting one today, only because Catherine Zeta-Jones has painstakingly assessed which mobile network has the widest range of coverage with the largest amount of redundant systems in case of outages.

...and she can assumedly stop time.

The short of it is, Starbucks has practically nothing to do with TMobile's WiFi access. The managers and employees know next to nothing about the Internet access except for the fact that it exists, and that if customers want to use the access they should call up Tmobile. That's it, so don't jump down Starbucks throat over this.

Why Tmobile can't simply change their channel is beyond me; I imagine that nobody at Tmobile with any technical knowledge has been alerted to this yet.