Tech drooling continues

[tinyjo]

I'm still obsessing about the Treo 650. Rumour has it that it will be being offered on the Orange network only again (like the 600 was). Unfortunately, rumour doesn't tell us what the price is. On eXpansys, the price seems to be 594.95 Sim free or "With Vodafone Connection From: £359.95". Probably because it's still pre-release it doesn't list what the price next to the individual Vodafone contracts so I don't know how expensive a contract you'd have to get to get it at that price. The thing is, ever since we had our bad experience switching to O2 and then discovering that their reception in our house was pretty bad (in the old house), I'm nervous of switching away from Vodafone. On the other hand, something about eXpansys make me nervous too. Have any of you ever bought anything from them? Were they OK?

Also, while browsing for more news today, I came across this: the Group Sense Xplore M28 GSM/GPRS phone. It runs PalmOS 5.4 and has a phone keyboard but it looks like it might do graffiti. It comes with expansion card slots and a camera, like the Treo but the screen is a lot smaller and less good. I've also managed to find much less information on it because it's only officially released in SE Asia. I don't know. I'm tempted because it's a much better price and I do very little data entry on my current phone so I wouldn't feel the loss of the keyboard to heavily I don't think. On the other hand, the screen is an issue. I feel annoyingly like if I could see it to test it out I would probably go for it, given the price difference is so strong and I actually like the fact that it's more phone like, but without a chance to look at the screen and try out the input, I'm nervous about the idea of jumping.

I am indecisive, so, as always, I decide to make a poll! Yay for polls. Advise me, oh mighty friends list!

[Poll #434313]

Comments

[white_hart]

I've never really been to East Oxford, so I'm not sure what Orange coverage is like in your area. My advice would be to invite an Orange user round and check their reception in your house before making a decision, though.

Central Oxford-wise, I've only ever had a problem in the basement of Borders.

[karen2205]

You should wait till it's properly out and then look again at the cheapest place to buy it.

I'm an Orange person, ISTR difficulties with my evil device inside College buildings, but not much beyond that. I've not been in East Oxford.

[shepline.livejournal.com]

Err... hi. I've just friended you ^__^

Why? Well, after a brief peruse through your userinfo and website homepage you seem kind of intersting. Although actually the thought process seemed to go something like this...

+ fill out Jo's little polly thing
+ check results of last question. karen2205 answered the same as me
+ username of karen2205 is similar to existing friend rachel2205
+ userinfo reveals a number of interests in common, including but not exclusively, Radio 4, Mornington Crescent, and cooking...
+ website also reveals that karen2205 has the same birthday as me - that explains the 2205 reference
+ decide to add said journaler (I liked comment about difference between journals and weblogs!) on the grounds that any friend of tinyjo can't be bad... *grins*

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

I should but I'm not good at waiting :) Also, my best window for getting it from the US is next month because a friend is out there visiting. After that, it gets more fiddly, although not impossible, if I pick that plan.

I'm not sure about the reception in your house

[jinty]

but I always used to get good receiption at the other end of Campbell Road (also on Orange).

The reception *inside* my house in East Avenue is dreadful, but the reception in the street outside is fine. Make what you will from that!

[shepline.livejournal.com]

I answered the poll by changing "house" for "work" seeings as I work in East Oxford. I also ticked Vodafone even though I'm actually on OneTel (but they work on the same network!). The only network I've had real problems with in and around Oxford was O2 neé Cellnet, which was abismal!

And actually, Orange were not good in my current house in Bicester even though Vodafone is brilliant.

...not that any of this is going to be any use to you... *grinss*

[truecatachresis.livejournal.com]

If you wanted to test Orange reception, I could borrow a couple of work phones and bring them round yours some time. I've had no problems with Orange reception, except in your old house and Jeremy and Damien's sometimes.

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

Ooh, good idea!

[truecatachresis.livejournal.com]

It'll have to wait until after my holiday, as I can't really take a couple of phones away for over a week, but if you want to invite us over for dinner or something one evening the week after next, I'll bring some phones round

alternatives

[vinaigrettegirl.livejournal.com]

On a totally different note: Blackberry?

'II has one; nice screen and keyboard; does everything you'd want unless you must have a phone avec a camera; and his comment re the Today Programme's story reporting that it's addictive was a cynical "Hey, I've been there and come out the other side".

He's on Voda; O2 was better in West Oxford, but both networks seem fine here in the frozen North. I think some problems with Orange are very highly localised.

I can vouch for their (Orange) downloadable ringtones as The Very Best Quality Polyphonics Ever.

Re: alternatives

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

Blackberries don't run PalmOS though, which is an absolute requirement for me as I have a couple of programs I really love which don't run on the other phone/organisers operating systems. Thanks for the suggestion though.