This topic will bring back good and some not so good memories from years gone by.
I saw the image above on replacebase.co.uk (great site for all your mobile and console spares and repairs) and it got me thinking about my history of mobile phones, the ones I've owned and loved and the ones I wish I never saw.
There have always been bad decisions to be made by someone about something, hairstyles, clothes and of course technology, in this case the mobile phone. Over the years there really has been quite a few stinkers and I'm pretty sure I owned 1 or 2 of them. This led me to think about each device I have owned since the beginning.
You never forget your first, mine was a Philips BT Cellnet C12. Rubber buttons, teeny tiny green LCD screen and an AERIAL!!
I have tried to compile a full list of all the mobiles I have owned and have come up with 20. It will become obvious while reading the list how the number can be quite high considering the average time you own a mobile now could be between 18-24 months for contracts and possibly longer for PAYG. If you want to know more about each phone click the name to get a full tech-spec and some pictures.
1. Philips BT Cellnet C12
My first mobile phone, my first taste of that phone call/SMS freedom. No more did I have to wait in at a certain time for my friends to call the house phone, I could text them on the way.
This phone was pretty popular, sweet curved top and a removable aerial.
The screen was a green LCD with very little ability to impress.
Who didn't have one? This was an iconic mobile from Nokia, it had the fancy ringtones, covers you could change (I had a case that resembled the Matrix phone), no aerial and of course Snake.
The rugged, tough body Nokia, again with covers you could change. This time it was shock resistant and dust/splash proof. I spent most of the time taking the cover off & putting it back on and chucking around, you know, to test it.
My first small phone and flip phone. I remember the adverts really played this up and made it look awesome, in reality it looked more like a digital washing machine, pants!
Despite being a Sony phone as far as I remember the audio quality wasn't all that great, nothing like the walkman phones. The coolest feature on here was the ability to record your own ringtone, we recorded someone in class saying "Help, let me out!" stuck it in a cupboard and rang it when the teacher was back in the room, classic.
Another teeny mobile but absolute class. It had the changeable covers and flashing lights. In fact I liked this so much I bought one on eBay a few years ago to use in secure buildings where camera phones are frowned upon, very handy. This was the first time I started some hacking on phones. I had this plugged into the PC via a serial cable and had some software to unlock and create my own ringtones and even change the image from my service provider to whatever I wanted, it did have it limitations though given the screen was pretty small and monochrome.
This was my first mobile to have 3G, it was huge and awful. You could buy new games and ringtones on it though which was pretty cool at the time, however they were pretty awful once you tried them out. I was pretty glad to get rid of this behemoth.
The amazing media smartphone of it's time. This thing could do so much and it even had expandable storage via a Sony memory stick, I was proud to shove my 128MB card in there to really pack out the number of songs and movies. The option to remove the keyboard was pretty cool and the added stylus made photo editing and browsing a breeze. Pretty slow though.
Sticking with SonyE' I traded down to this swanky little number. Not a lot to say, you could compose your own tones and download some pretty realistic polyphonic tones - my choice was Darude Sandstorm.
My 2nd Samsung and it's another slip/clam phone. I don't know why I chose this, it just seemed cool at the time, it had a front facing camera which always took photos in my pocket and you could mess about with photos after taking them. Apart from that it may as well have been a colour version of the first Samsung I had.
Back to Nokia and onto a slider this time. This phone was a pretty good stepping stone towards better versions to follow. I did manage to smash the screen once and repaired it myself which was pretty easy.
I thought this was quite a tasty little phone, it felt quite business like using it. I really liked that the camera was covered when not in use, kept it in good condition.
13. Nokia N95
I would have to say that the N95 is responsible for knocking the 3210 down a peg or two. It had that cool slider form factor, both ways. One way revealed the keyboard and the other some very handy multimedia buttons, it also opened the media player. This was also a Nokia I had fun hacking, I remember an app for downloading YouTube videos direct and another to take advantage of the accelerometer. The camera was pretty awesome as well and again had the option of closing the cover to protect the lens.
I owned this for all of 3 days I think, it was pure rubbish. As far as I remember the OS was awful, the screen was crap and most of the time it didn't seem to want to do what you wanted it to do. It was sold rather promptly (for a profit) on eBay.
The beginning of an era. The iPhone really did change the way we look at our mobile devices. They certainly weren't the first to try but they were the first to get it right. My only gripe was that it wasn't 3G compatible.
The website for this phone had it all, unfortunately the actual device did not. I'm not a huge fan of Android, I never hide that fact but this was really poor, every time I tried a new app it crashed, to uninstall the crashed app required me to reset, remove battery, stand on one leg, it was rubbish. And the chin on it was pretty useless as well.
I never really got the whole Blackberry thing, the last time I had a full keyboard was the P900 and that wasn't exactly necessary. I got this just to give it a whirl. Took me a while to get to grips with the typing, even today I can't do it that well. This one had the rollerball, quite temperamental but overall pretty fast.
Quite a solid phone this one with the slide out keyboard, worked really well apart form the wi-fi would always drop out and at the time I lived in the country so signal was pretty poo anyway, this lasted about a month I'd say, again sold on eBay with a little profit again.
Quality. I knew I waited off while the 3G and the 3GS were released for a reason. It was because this was waiting for me. The most solid phone I have owned I would say. Still to this day both front and back are still intact and it lives on as a music hub in the house.
The only reason I moved on from the 4 was to get the 5. Nice to finally get a larger screen and with a thinner bezel you can't complain. Great camera on this one, so good I leave my compact in the drawer now. Biggest problem - battery! Living in London kills it as well. I have a Mophie juice pack and I easily get through 2 charges a day.
21. ???
Who knows what will be next.
There is a hell of a lot of competition out there now, certainly some thing stat grab my attention. I must say a larger screen is more appealing and the idea of it being waterproof is a winner.
The Samsung Galaxy S5 looks like a plaster so that's a no. The Sony Xperia Z2 has caught my eye, the screen looks amazing, the camera can do more than what I need it do and it is water/dust proof. One problem is the OS - Android. I'm tied into Apple now, iOS simply does everything you want. Beyond all the flashy fancy things an Android phone can do it is still, in my opinion, a second rate OS. If the iPhone6 comes out this September though and it is missing something big to keep me you may find me sliding to the dark side.
Do you remember your first phone? Do you want to remember it? Let me know your best and your worst.
NPH
