In the market for a new phone

[Flickerdart]

My current phone is a Motorola V635. Go ahead, Google it, I'll wait.

Done laughing? Good. Because it is now my birthday and I'm treating myself to a new one. The following are requirements for such a replacement:

As a phone, it has to make calls. And it has to be good at it. I don't want a phone that you can't pick up without losing reception. I don't want a phone that drops calls like it's hot. Preferably, the phone will also fit a human face to facilitate this primary purpose. It must support Rogers Wireless because they are my provider.
Battery life. My current phone holds a charge for four or five days before the battery dips into the red. If I'm going to upgrade, it needs to do better than that, or at least comparably.
An abundance of free applications. I'm not renewing a contract, so I'll be shelling out full price for the hardware, and don't want to pay additional monies to perform basic tasks.


The following are things that would be nice:

Physical keyboard. Touch screens are nice, but not nice enough.
Music player functionality (preferably with a 3.5 mm jack).
An efficient browser that supports most if not all web standards.
Reasonable size. I don't care if you can slice cheese with it, if it's too wide to fit into my pocket, it's useless.


My budget is to the order of $200-300 CAD. Ready? Go!

[Knaight]

Just get a Morotola that is somewhat more recent. The phone you currently have isn't bad, I've got the same thing (well, its slightly older and slightly worse, but whatever.)

[onthetown]

Your current phone is awesome. If it isn't broken, you don't necessarily need a new one...

My current phone is a simple $40 one that I picked up at the superstore, and I buy minutes for it as I go. It doesn't have anything but the ability to text and make calls, and I love it.

If your current phone doesn't have a music player, treat yourself to an mp3 player or an iPod for your birthday. :smalltongue:

Happy birthday.

[Reinboom]

Not being able to get a phone on contract cheapness makes this a bit difficult.

You should be able to get an HTC Dream for relatively cheap, and it covers everything you would want. The Dream is a bit outdated however but should be better than most phones in that price range. You would also need to purchase a larger SD card if you want more songs.

There's quite a few options for as far as used phones go, for that range.


Your battery life request also makes things a hefty problem if you desire a modern browser, free apps, an mp3 player, and a physical keyboard. :smalleek:

[Flickerdart]

Your battery life request also makes things a hefty problem if you desire a modern browser, free apps, an mp3 player, and a physical keyboard. :smalleek:
Well, not at the same time - a long battery life will, of course, be shortened by running a bunch of things. But while they're not running, the battery should be decent, else when they are running, it will crap out too fast.

[xPANCAKEx]

i love my blackberry bold 9700

avoid the new iphone - its has well documented issues that wont be fixed til the 2nd or 3rd generation at least

[Flickerdart]

Even if the iPhone wasn't terrible, it's just not what I want, pretty much at all.

[Don Julio Anejo]

Even if the iPhone wasn't terrible, it's just not what I want, pretty much at all.
...And ironically enough it's one of the few devices that fits all of your requirements except for the physical keyboard. You can pick up a new iPhone 3G off craigslist for like $250 CAD, 3Gs for slightly more.

[Rawhide]

This does not meet all of your criteria, particularly price when not on a plan, but this is an absolutely awesome phone:

Full review (http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/22/iphone-4-review/)

[Flickerdart]

...And ironically enough it's one of the few devices that fits all of your requirements except for the physical keyboard. You can pick up a new iPhone 3G off craigslist for like $250 CAD, 3Gs for slightly more.
The iPhone is barely shaped like a phone at all, and I've heard some bad things about its dropping of calls. I'm also not sure which networks support it 'round these parts.

[PallElendro]

...Either the Droid, iPhone, or the Blackberry.

[Flickerdart]

...Either the Droid, iPhone, or the Blackberry.
Aren't there more than one of all of those?

[Erloas]

One question is what sort of applications are you actually looking for? Of the thousands of apps for phones, I don't know of any I would actually use. I actually got a decent phone 2 years ago thinking I would do something with it and the most advanced app I think I've used in all that time is the calculator. I could probably make use of a GPS, but a GPS that relies on cell towers (which the majority of them do) is almost entirely useless to me because the times I want GPS is when there is no cell reception.

Then there is the question of what sort of data plan are you looking at? Are you going to make a big deal about paying for the phone and not having a contract and then get some $100/month data plan? And why do you have to keep with Rogers, since if you have a phone already you should be able to sign up with any carrier without a contract, the contract is only there for the discount prices on the phones. And if you are happy with Rogers and don't want to change providers anyway, then why not renew your contract and get a better phone cheaper? I would, even though I'm not too fond of Verizon, because its one of only two choices I have, so its not like I need to be free to switch providers at any time.

[Don Julio Anejo]

1. Any provider that supports GSM supports any phone that relies on a sim card (as opposed to built-in chips locked to a specific provider). In Canada that's Rogers, Bell and Fido.

2. The OP has Rogers so switching a provider is pretty much not an option. In fact, it's probably easier to go back on a deal with the literal devil, all he wants is a soul. Hell, I couldn't even cancel a contract they signed me up for without my knowledge (they basically extended the 1 year I had left to 3 years because the plan I wanted to sign up for was for 3 year contracts only. Needless to say it didn't say that anywhere except for Rogers guides).

3. Apps... Trust me, it only seems like you don't want them. This only holds true until you start using them. Let's see... Here's stuff I use on a regular basis: periodic table, scrabble, crosswords (the only one I paid for and very much worth it, downloads daily crosswords from any or all of about 2 dozen papers + a bunch of weeklies), GPS + maps (awesome for finding nearest Tim Hortons, any address you want, or for that matter anything else), Facebook, Wikipedia, IMDB (although the last 3 can be served by any phone with a browser), TIME Mobile (a dozen or so daily Time articles), Translink (Vancouver's public transit app. What awesome is made of, even if with a dash of lag).

There's another half-dozen which I use less often but nonetheless find extremely useful. Like the Rogers iPhone app that lets me check my usage and pay my bill from the phone.

One thing to keep in mind: unless you go with an iPhone or a Blackberry, many, if not most apps won't be available. Oh, you'll still get all the games or utilities you'll ever need, and probably then some since Droids or HTC's don't have to go through the retarded iTunes store or jailbreaking. However, you'll miss out on a bunch of extremely useful special apps. Like an app for your hockey team, or Time Magazine app... or even a bus schedule app. Sure, they're not necessary, but they're nice to have and extremely useful.

4. Plan. Rogers is a ripoff. I'm paying $68, that's after about $20 in discounts (which is the only thing I was able to negotiate when I wanted to cancel my plan entirely, which I wasn't able to do), all I get is 250 daytime/unlimited evening/weekend minutes, 500MB data, caller ID, 2500 sent/unlimited incoming text messages. No data plan and I'd be paying probably $20-25 less. Switch to Bell and I'd be paying $10 less even after removing my discounts. However, cellular plans in North American in general are a big ripoff, as providers spend too much money to lure people in with subsidized phones and then want to make up for it with impossible to ditch contracts and ostentatious fees. I much rather like the European system, where although you may have to pay $600 for a phone, a new sim card is like $20 at any 7/11 and you're only paying the $15 or so for the service you actually use.

[Erloas]

3. Apps... Trust me, it only seems like you don't want them. This only holds true until you start using them. Let's see... Here's stuff I use on a regular basis: periodic table, scrabble, crosswords (the only one I paid for and very much worth it, downloads daily crosswords from any or all of about 2 dozen papers + a bunch of weeklies), GPS + maps (awesome for finding nearest Tim Hortons, any address you want, or for that matter anything else), Facebook, Wikipedia, IMDB (although the last 3 can be served by any phone with a browser), TIME Mobile (a dozen or so daily Time articles), Translink (Vancouver's public transit app. What awesome is made of, even if with a dash of lag).

Well it is probably different for the OP, but for me, phones don't work at work. The plant is in a bit of a hole and outside of town a bit and no one has reception worth anything. I don't even bring my phone to work. As for stuff like basic games... I have access to those all the time on my various computers... and I never use them there either. I don't know why I would start just because its on a phone. Having lived where I am now for over 20 years my need for maps is not often, and the only time I might need a map I'm probably not in cell range. Well occasionally I go to some big cities where I could put them to use, but it hardly seems worthwhile when thats maybe once or twice a year. I have plenty of time to read news articles at work or at home, I'm never in a place where all I have access to is a phone and at the same time would want to read that sort of thing. Considering my use of social networking lasts maybe 2 minutes a day, thats hardly a selling point. And there are normal GPSs that can do the same thing, the advantage there is a normal GPS works all the time and is something I have to get as its own unit because almost no phone based GPS will do what I want a GPS for (mostly camping and fishing), and the very few that do are exceptionally expensive and require exorbitantly expensive data plans to go with them. (I think its only 1-2 samsungs and blackberries that have true GPS)

And considering I'm already paying $40 a month for internet I don't see why I should spend another $40 a month to get a very basic, very limited version of the internet I can only put to use when I'm not at home and not at work, the two places I spend 95% of my time. Until my home internet and phone internet come as part of the same package, I really doubt I'll ever think about doing any internet related things on a phone. My current phone actually has access to the net and I've used it all of never in 2+ years time.

As an example of someone very much into technology and part of the computer generation but still has absolutely no need for an internet ready phone.

[lesser_minion]

Most batteries use the same chemistry, and are roughly the same size, so you'll probably find battery life dictated entirely by the phone's power consumption.

As far as a web browser is concerned, basically anything included with a smartphone will go at least some way towards meeting your needs.

If you're using Maemo, then you can use Opera or Fennec (IME, attempting to use Midori results in Linus Torvalds responding "signal 11 lol", although that was on my laptop, so your experience may differ).

Symbian phones can use Opera, iPhones have Safari, and Android phones have Chrome. Oh, and Windows Mobile phones can use Exploder.

Apparently Blackberries are not brilliant.