techiehenry

I sold the Alcatel mobile phone I bought to replace the Sony Ericsson K800i that I lost a few months ago, after I found out that the Samsung D600 that my wife thought to be defective is working once I cleared the address book memory. Apparently after a few months of use, that mobile phone of 2 years is showing intermittent restarts and freezes, causing me to miss SMS messages and some calls.

Looking for an inexpensive phone that I can use to replace it, I chanced upon a phone by LG that seems to be the most inexpensive 3G phone currently in the market.

The LG KU250 was the winning proposal for the 3G For All programme started by the GSM Association. The 3G for All programme’s aim is to produce an affordable 3G handset “that would bring 3G multimedia services and mobile internet access to a mass-market user base around the world”.

If you’re wondering how affordable a 3G phone like this can be, I got it for less than Php5000 (open line, no free prepaid SIM included) from Mega Cellular Network Inc.’s SM San Lazaro shop.

What does a Php5000 3G phone has in store? Read further:
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I lost my phone — yet again. I was going home from work two days ago and I had a lot to carry with me that I never noticed that I dropped the phone in the taxi as I left. I only found out about it a few hours afterwards, as I took my family shopping and thought that I left my phone at home.

Last night I went out looking for a replacement. I can’t spend on something expensive right now — we have to tighten our pockets for something we’re planning for starting a few months ago. So I went out looking for a really cheap one. I did find one as I roam the shops at SM San Lazaro. Much to my amusement, the features outweigh the price by a large margin.

I got the E801 for Php2990 at Wellcom. It’s got dedicated music buttons like those ones from Nokia, and it supports MicroSD memory cards. It doesn’t have a camera though, but I would prefer it that way as I have our trusty digicam already. The phone can be used as a flash drive when a memory card is present, as it can be connected to a computer through a USB port.

The screen is a bit smallish at 128×128 pixels (64K CSTN), but the text is legible enough. Ringtones are loud, and can use MP3s and MIDI files (though I don’t see why I can’t use the music in the MicroSD card as my ringtone). The keypad will take me some time to get used to as the keys are flat (which makes it easier to make mistakes when composing SMS).

The phone actually comes in black and white colors. I would have chosen the white one to match my Macbook, but the unit given to me looks like the white parts would turn yellowish in a short span of time, so I resorted to getting the black model.

Honestly, this reminds me of Motorola phones. The fonts used in the screen looks the same, and the connectors use the USB standard.

I hope this phone would last long with me.

This video says it all:

It doesn’t have 3G. It has a farily ordinary 2 Megapixel camera. It doesn’t have Java support. It doesn’t have removable memory card support.

But it has a very attractive touch screen interface. It’s got a pretty display. It has a hard drive built-in. The overall package looks elegant. It supports external applications through Safari. It supports iTunes.

Oh, so much love and hate has been generated by this product ever since it was introduced early this year at MacWorld. Yet the final verdict as to whether this product is a success or a bust will be known a few days from now — June 29, 6pm.

Picture from a patent application filed by Sony Ericsson:

Actually, it reminds me of some Korean company’s phone design.

Nevertheless, it’s a welcome addition to the collection of phones in Sony Ericsson’s stable.