A (re-)look at the Samsung SGH-i600

I realise that I am in the fortunate position of owning both an HTC HD2 and a Toshiba TG01, two super specc'd and very speedy Windows Mobile smart phones. More on the Tosh later, as I have now upgraded to 6.5.x and it is working beautifully as my portable media player, synchronizing beautifully with my Windows media centre.

Until last week, the HD2 was my actual phone, but, much as I like it, there are a few things which I would prefer to see in it. The first is a longer battery life - with Exchange and Twitter running you are lucky to get through 12 hours of use before a recharge. The second is that, much as I like Swype, the on-screen software inpout panels (SIPs) are much more effective on a resistive screen, and I prefer a harware keyboard anyway. The third is that the HD2, even though it is all screen, is still pretty massive.

I am also someone who is fortunate enough to have 2 SIM cards: one for voice and texts (with minimal data) and one for data alone. So, what was the best way to optimize my devices? Well, it would make sense for me to put the data SIM into the HD2 because with internet connection sharing and the marvellous WiFi router, it would be the easiest for using that connection. I also like that I can take it with me and have its serve independently as a mobile internet device (do people still use the term "MID"?).

The Tosh is still my home browsing device, so that meant I needed a new phone, preferably one with a hardware keyboard, WiFi, HSDPA and also pretty cheap. That's where the Samsung SGH-i600 came in. I manage to snag one on eBay for just under £40. It came announced as SIM-locked to O2, but O2 doesn't really lock their handsets so both the 3 and the Orange SIMs work in it. After doing the basic tests to make sure everything was operational I flashed it from Windows Mobile 5.0 to Windows Mobile 6.1. This is not a particularly difficult procress but definitely requires Windows XP (not Vista or 7) and involves a particular sequence of ROM flashes to allow the progression to higher versions of the OS. Now it has the lovely sliding panels interface and all.

Key programs I've loaded on board in no particular order:

• twikini


• total commander


• facebook


• windows live


• marketplace


• bing


• google maps


• keep recordin'


• live mesh


• myphone


• opera mini 5 beta


• smart piano


• tcpmp


• tempoperfect


• weather watcher


• wm wifi router

Overall I am pretty pleased with the result. The phone serves mainly as a social networking hub and with push email, twitter (via twikini) and facebook all of my bases are covered. This being an older phone the internet connection is HSDPA version 1, but it is fast enough even for browsing using Opera mini.

One thing I will say is that the normal battery is definitely not enough. You will need to use the extended battery if you want to use any kind of connectivity. Thankfully the phone came with a jewel box shaped charger so you are never without an extra. One work of caution though, for reasons entirely incomprehensible to me, Samsung have cables which either charge your phone, or synchronize it, but not both. So you cannot charge the phone with the USB cable that comes with the phone and must use the included wall plug. For people like me who use a single wall wart USB adapter then plug the variety of USB cables in to allow charging of all the different electrical gizmos this is singularly annoying!

My other criticism is that the processor isn't all that quick (certainly conmpared to the two snapdragon devices), so if you are contemplating watching videos encoded in the native QVGA resolition, then you will ve disappointed. Instead, I reencode everything using Windows Media Encoder into the Pocket PC 220x176 profile. This keeps a decent framerate and image quality, with a small file size.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with this arrangeent; my conclusion is that nothing can beat a hardware keyboard at the end of the day!

Multiple personalities

Nearly a month ago I asked myself what to do with my old phone now that my new one had arrived. Well, it turns out there are many merits to tinkering with a device which you don't have to rely on as a primary means of communication. I have long extolled the virtues of Windows Mobile as one of those operating systems where you can change anything from the browser to the UI, from the file explorer you use to the icons which represent the applications. What I hadn't expected, however, was the ability to totally change the OS of some of these phones. For that we have to thank the geniuses at HTC for making their phones so damn hackable, and the even greater geniuses at xda-developers for doing the actual hacking, and sharing the fruits of their labour with us mere mortals.

Their latest efforts extend the life of my old HTC Touch Diamond far beyond what I could rightfully expect, because not only have they tweaked Windows, they have enabled the hardware to run not one but two completely different operating systems. For instance, not only can you dual boot into the latest build of Android on the phone, you can also run Blackberry OS via the Blackberry application suite. I can tell you that exploring both these OSes will provide me with many happy hours of tweaking!

18 months

Wow. I can't believe it has been 18 months since I first received my HTC Touch Diamond. The only reason I know is that upgrade time has swung around again, and I have a new phone. In the last 18 months I have to say that the Diamond has been a real trooper: I have flashed the ROM at least a dozen times, each time falling in love with the interface all over again as something new is discovered.

The last 18 months have seen the unofficial releases of Windows Mobile 6.5, 6.5.1 and 6.5.3, all of which have run on my phone, as well as TouchFlo3D in its various incarnations right up to HTC Sense. Not all the new ROMs were that stable and some were downright buggy, but it was a risk I was willing to take. At the end of the day, the most stable ROM was one still based on 6.1: Gen.Y's really quite wonderful D2 R5 ROM which uses HTC Sense 2.1, and that is the one I've stuck with for the last few months.

So, now that the new phone has arrived, it begs the quesiton, what should I do with my trusty Diamond? I still love the phone because it is so small. Over time, however, the WiFi has ceased to work, which has proven to be quite a big problem as without the SIM it now has no independent connectivity apart from Bluetooth and GPS. Of course when synchronized it can use the PC's pass-through connection, but that is quite limiting. At the moment I have it set up as a 4GB mp3 player, but I am thinking of doing something a little more adventurous with it. Any suggestions?

Odd phone designs #1

The brand 'not specified' in the mobile phones section in eBay is a veritable Burgess shale of hardware designs which may or may not evolve to the big time. I get a weird thrill from having a look to see what the Chinese designers consider a viable look, and while some of them are truly wacky, there are many which are quite clever. Now and then though, the odd phone really catches my eye, and I just had to post this one: a weird amalgamation of the Nokia 8800 Arte and the LG KT610.

In principle, QWERTY phones need to be long to accomodate the keyboard, so it baffles me just a little that whoever drew up the blueprints decided that this phone also needed a hideaway number pad. Mind you I guess it does make for a sleeker look. The added bonus? Gaming keys because this phone also has a SNES emulator built in!

A review of the HTC Touch Diamond

It has now been a week since I upgraded my phone to an HTC Touch Diamond. I’m on Orange and have been using its spiritual predecessor, the SPV M700 (HTC Trinity) for quite a while now, so this review is more to do with how the transition went. I’m very sceptical of upgrades because I realise that technology doesn't move all that quickly, and a new case does not a worthwhile upgrade make. Moreover, most of the time I suspect that the mobile phone operators are out to fleece you. This time was different though, because the iPhone 3G has just been released on O2, and it is a powerful bargaining chip with Orange.

Anyway, after speaking to customer retentions I negotiated an 18-month contract which includes 600 minutes of mobile/land line calls, unlimited text messages and 250MB of data, all for £30 a month. Crucially, it also gives me the unlimited home broadband deal (8Mbps ADSL and an Orangebox) for just £5 a month – a great overall saving which, to be truthful, keeps me loyal to them. I also got the HTC Touch Diamond (or as they call it, the ‘HTC Diamond’) for free. This compares well with other flagship phones which I would have had to pay for otherwise.

So what do I think of it after a week of use? Well, from the outside I must say that it is one of the most beautiful phones I have ever had. I really like the angular shape, the flush screen and the faceted back. It certainly compares favourably with my old HTC Trinity – with the leather case on the Diamond is actually still smaller than the Trinity! In fact it is significantly smaller than the iPhone and the N95 8GB, the much touted competitors of this phone. I can slip it into a pair of tight jeans without gouging myself in the groin.

Such minimalism does come with a few caveats though: the first is that there are much fewer hardware buttons on this phone. Although the traditional windows and OK button are missing, they have been replaced by the home and back keys. Significantly absent, however, are the voice command, recorder and camera buttons. The Trinity also had a fantastic scroll wheel and an extra OK button. I never normally use these buttons as they are designed but reassign them to launch specific programs. For instance, in my Trinity the camera button would launch the communications manager - really helpful for turning WiFi on and off.

There are no such hardware shortcuts in the Diamond, and all of these functions have to be launched instead through the touch screen interface. Although the touch wheel on the front of the device is capable of scrolling in certain programs, it is admittedly not as easy to use as the true wheel on the Trinity. Thankfully, the interface is a wonder to behold – TouchFlo 3D is easily the prettiest interface I have ever seen on any of my phones and combined with a VGA resolution (640x480) everything is in sharp technicolour. I was running Windows Mobile 6.1 with loads of interface tweaks on the Trinity, including the old TouchFlo as seen on the HTC Touch, and while it was a breakthrough at the time, this is so much better and it certainly has that wow factor, even after seven days of use. I get bored of interfaces after about a week, so it is doing well!

I notice that people have complained that the screen is unresponsive or sluggish, but I certainly have not found that to be the case at all. However, I must preface that with the confession that I am also one of those people who loves hacking the phone, and even before properly using my Diamond I had already downloaded and installed the tweaks available from xda-developers. This is not to be underestimated as a resource for optimizing and expanding your phone. The two key programs I installed are the TouchFlo 3D configurator and GSen, a program which enables the use of the accelerometer to rotate the screen.

Interestingly, Orange have decided to eschew any form of customization on the Diamond, and the only sign that it came from Orange is the very discreet logo on the battery case. In fact the Diamond thankfully includes a stock version of Windows Live Messenger, without the Orange (pay-for) customizations. Apart from the built-in apps I loaded on my usual set of must-have programs - Mobipocket, Vito Sound Explorer, TomTom 6, JB Piano, and 1-Calc Lite - as well as a half dozen or so games. I’ve also put Core Player on there for .avi video playback. I've also paired it with my ThinkOutside bluetooth keyboard. Everything works as it did on my Trinity, but seems speedier overall in terms of load times, and TomTom even gets a faster fix on the satellites from a cold boot (20s or so versus nearly 2 minutes on my Trinity).

I have also now set up my Google and Yahoo! email accounts so the phone pulls emails off the servers throughout the day. With web-browsing, RSS feed and weather updates as well, it is just as well that I a lot of data is included in my package! One thing I will add though, is that I have turned off 3G most of the time as it is a real battery sapper, the second major caveat of having such a small size and therefore a small battery. With 2G most of the time, apart from 3G for the odd bit of browsing, I am averaging 16-18 hours of battery life each day. Not great, but also not bad for such a tiny device.

In the end I am surprisingly happy with the HTC Touch Diamond. Many reviewers compare it with the iPhone 3G and the N95 8GB, but both of the latter two devices are more expensive and far larger than the Touch Diamond. In the end, in terms of actual useability, portability, functionality and value for money, I do think the HTC Touch Diamond is a winner!

Ugly duckling

As you are no doubt aware, one of my obsessions is with skinning. Series 60, thank goodness, is surprisingly easy to skin, although I think that Series 60 2nd Ed. FP. 1 is incompatible with Carbide UI, the current software Nokia provides to create a new theme for your phone. Thankfully there are loads of premade skins out there, and I have been tinkering with some of them.

On the left we have the default S60 skin - ugh! Then in the middle, the green screens are the music edition skin, and on the right the blue N-series skin. It does make you wonder why, if the OS is capable of producing lovely anti-aliased and colourful icons, the default skin looks like it came out of the 8-bit era.

Wolf in sheep's clothing: Customize a Nokia 6230 to an 8800 Sirocco

All this talk about Nokias and mobile phones has got me thinking. My last "dumb" phone was a Nokia 6230, but I really like the looks and sounds of the Nokia 8800 Sirocco edition, with its Brian Eno created ringtones. So, is it possible recreate some of that in my old phone?

The version of Series 40 used by the Nokia 6230 is not very customizeable, but the important changes can be made. First of all, grab the Sirocco wallpapers (you will need to scroll down a bit) and resize them in the graphic progam of your choice to 128 x 128 pixels. Transfer them to your phone and apply one of them. Then, get the Sirocco ring tones and do the same.

Voila! A 6230 which sounds and looks (if you squint from a distance!) like an 8800. Plus, you get the all important MMC expansion slot, so sorely missing in the more expensive phone.

Old phones as a fashion statement

The title of this post could really go either way, you could see the carrying of an old phone, and to me that means something from the early naughties, as a statement against rampant consumerism, or you could read it as carrying an old phone whose original purpose was as a fashion statement.

Nowadays, the fashion segment in phones is well established; just look at the Nokia 7xxx range, or Ted Baker and Mandarina Duck's recent foray into the style segment. This overlaps somewhat with the premium handset segment occupied by the likes of the Nokia 8xxx series, and brands like Prada, Giorgio Armani and Porsche Design. Back in the early 2000s however, when the fashion segment was but a glint in Nokia's eye, Siemens took up the mantle and came up with the idea of a fashion line of phones with 4 models to be released with the spring/summer and autumn/winter seasons. These were the Xelibris, numbered 1 to 8 but no higher since they were cancelled after 2 seasons.

Like the now well established Nokia 7xxx series, the Xelibris were not ashamed to try out new form-factors with little regard for useability. I particularly like the Xelibri 8 with it's looped lanyard ring, and its very organic bulbous shape. I am sure that if your intention was to get people talking when you whip out your phone, then one of these phones should do the trick!

Me personally? I'd rather go for one of the Nokia 8xxx series, especially the truly exquisite 8855, quite possibily one of the most gorgeous Nokia phones of all time!

Feature Packs and S60

Looking at this picture taken off the S60 website. As I suspected, the feature packs simply add functionality witout breaking application compatibility, and the chief advantage of feature pack 2 over the original is HTML small screen rendering.

No great shakes there. At least I know that feature packs are not really a consideration when it comes to a particular device's compatibility with software specific to an S60 edition.

Tweedledum or Tweedledee

Well, after some deliberation I have narrowed the choice down to two different phones. I excluded S60 1st Edition straight off, mainly because it doesn’t support themeing, except via a rather convoluted 3rd party solution, and even then only half-heartedly. And it is totally against my principles to go for something up to date like S60 3rd Edition, which basically leaves S60 2nd Edition.

Windows Mobile is fairly simple as far as the internal classification of OSes goes; ignoring the division between the touchscreen and non-touchscreen variants, you don’t tend to have subdivisions. The one exception I can think of is the difference between Pocket PC 2003 and 2003 Second Edition, the chief discriminator being the ability to rotate the screen to landscape within the OS. S60 divides itself into a number of “feature packs”, S60 2nd Edition being divided into the original and FPs 1, 2 and 3. A cursory glance tells me that these changes to S60 track either changes to S60 itself (as in the difference between the original and FP1, both of which are based on Symbian 7.0s), or changes to the core OS (as in the change from FP1 to FP2 where Symbian went from 7.0s to 8.0a).

What this means in practice is not entirely clear to me, but going through the software available out there, installation seems to depend principally on the edition of the OS, and less so on feature packs, as one might expect. There also appears to be a fairly big jump between S60 1st and 2nd Editions and the 3rd Edition, in that software seems to be compatible between the 1st and 2nd, but needs to be rewritten for the 3rd. It also appears that unlike Windows Mobile, third party products have to have some kind of digital signature. While this pretty much guarantees some quality, this tactic also locks tinkerers out of the ecosystem, which is reflected in the relative paucity of third party apps, especially freeware, out there for S60 compared with Windows Mobile and Palm.

Given that preamble, the decision ended up being between two models of phone: the Nokia 6600 (Symbian OS 7.0s, S60 2nd Edition) and the Nokia 6260 (Symbian OS 7.0s, S60 2nd Edition Feature Pack 1). Intriguingly, neither of these phones have stereo output for mp3 playback, although the radio in the Nokia 6260 may well be. The screens for these phones is also pretty small, only 176 x 208, which is even smaller than my MPx200’s 176 x 220. The main advantage of the 6600 is that it takes full size MMC cards while the 6260 only takes RS-MMC, but the 6260 has a faster processor (123MHz vs. 104MHz) and more RAM (11MB vs. 9MB). I’ve heard that S60 has a much reduced requirement when compared with Windows Mobile, but these values are bordering on ridiculous, and I am not sure whether the 19MHz and 2MB improvements will make any difference whatsoever.

So, the decision then comes down to price, and once again, it is interesting to see that the older 6600 fetches nearly the same price as the 6260. I guess the 6600 must have been very popular, because there is a shed load of them on eBay, and they go for just under £40 now. In contrast, the 6260 is a rarer model, and sells for just over £40. It suggests to me that the 6600 is still in much demand. Indeed, accessories for the 6600 abound still, including all manner of fascias and cases. Reviews have also been fairly positive (this is going back some 4 years now) of the 6600, and less so of the 6260.

In the end though, I think I prefer the flip and fold form-factor of the 6260, so it may well be my choice.

Pastures new

I’ve not posted on this blog for a while, but that does not mean that I haven’t been on the usual quest for all things gadgety and last gen. My most recent acquisition is a Tapwave Zodiac 2, fast becoming one of my all-time favourite toys, particularly once it has been pimped and loaded up with games and software. My must-have accessory? The PalmOne WiFi SD card enables access to the internet and email. If only modern PDAs were as beautifully constructed and had dual SD slots!

The motivation for this post, however, is that I think it is time to explore pastures new. As you can see, I am largely biased towards Windows CE devices in their Handheld PC, CE.Net and Windows Mobile incarnations, with some interest in Palm as well. If, however, you look at the raw number of devices out there, the dominant OS is none of the above – it is Symbian, or more specifically the Series 60 incarnation.

A friend of mine recently upgraded his phone from a HTC Alpine (it is coming my way for a tweak, so stay tuned…) which he absolutely hates because of its propensity for crashing, and his new mobile is a Nokia N95. I often get asked about PDAs in general, but must admit that my experience with Nokia devices ends with Series 40, and my last “dumb” phone, a 6230.

Series 60 is currently up to 3rd Edition Feature Pack 1, and the N95 is the jewel in the crown at the moment, although shortly to be overtaken by the N81(s) and N95 8GB. This constant “upgrading” is a feature of the business model of mobile phone companies, as compared to say PDA manufacturers, and ensures that customers continually pay for the latest and greatest.

So, in terms of pastures new, I am therefore going to explore series 60 by getting hold of an older phone. I haven’t decided yet whether to go for a 1st or 2nd Edition device, or which feature pack would be most appropriate, but something from 2003 would appeal to me basically so I can compare it to my amazing Motorola MPx200 which dates from that era. Is it equally easy to modernize? It will also give me a chance to see how the Symbian and Series 60 operating system works.

A dedicated Skype phone

After a few fits and starts, Phillips will finally be making their VOIP841 available to buy in Europe and presumeably the rest of the world. Their tagline is that it is the "world's first PC-Free Skype-certified phone", meaning that unlike most other dedicated Skype handsets out there, the computer does not have to be on to make or receive calls.

If this doesn't sound revolutionary, it really isn't. Ever since Skype became available as a Pocket PC application, people have been creating their own special VOIP phones. The ingredients are simple: all you need is a WiFi enabled Pocket PC capable of running Skype and a WiFi connection (of course).

My setup uses my multifunctional and ubiquitous iPAQ h4350. It has built-in WiFi which means that even when the computer is off, it can quite happily connect to my wireless access point. The biggest problem was in trying to find the version of Skype most suited to it. The download page is rather unintuitively arranged according to brand, and something as prehistoric as the h4350 is clearly not listed in the HP section.

In the past there used to be two versions of Skype, one optimized for low CPU devices and one for high CPU ones. I'm not sure that distinction still applies, so for the sake of consistency I went with the Dopod 700 download since it at least runs Windows Mobile 2003. Once it is installed, you just need to log in and you you are ready to go.

I leave my Pocket PC logged-in all the time. It sits next to my regular phone and rings when someone tries to call me, and because is PC independent. It really is like a dedicated Skype phone. What is using it actually like? Well, as with all Skype calls, your mileage does vary according to the quality of your connection. That said, with echo reduction on, the sound quality is perfect for speech.

In terms of hardware, the h4350 is not really set up to be a phone. The microphone, for one, is at the top, while the speaker is located below. I use it as you would a speaker phone, but if you want a little more privacy then it would be a good idea to invest in a headset. It also takes a while to get over the thin-but-wide feel of the PDA.

WiFi enabled Pocket PCs can be had for much less than the Phillips VOIP841, and you get a load of extra functionality too!

Handheld PCs reborn

At the recent 3GSM conference in Barcelona two interesting phones made the headlines. The first was Nokia’s new E90 smartphone, the natural progression of its own 9000 series phones. The second was iMate’s new Ultimate 7150. To judge by the press coverage of the event it was as though a whole new form factor had suddenly been invented, quite forgetting the fact that clamshell devices, albeit sans phone module, have been around for a very long time.

In my mind, this form factor has always had a special appeal. Quite apart from protecting the screen, it also allows you to have a near full sized keyboard, with keys which actually have some travel. None of those press-and-they-barely-move keys you get with slide-out keyboards.

The very pinnacle of such devices, and I realize that I will no doubt rile the EPOC fanatics out there, were the Handheld PCs. I say ‘were’ because the platform is no longer supported, and has not been for nearly seven years. Like its Pocket PC and Smartphone counterparts, Handheld PC runs on Windows CE. Unlike them though, the native build closely resembles a Windows 95 desktop. With the help of skinning tools you can actually make it resemble any Windows desktop you like, including Vista.

I have a Samsung Izzi Pro, a Handheld PC developed at the height of interest in these devices when there were many companies churning them out. There were later, better specced Handheld PCs released subsequently, the Jornada 720 being one of the best, but never again would there be the range of manufacturers or hardware variations. The Izzi Pro has a great swivel and fold form factor which allows it to convert between a traditional laptop and a tablet, and it has a near full size keyboard, which I can type faster on than my more conventional laptop!

An iPhone super skin

Interface is, allegedly, king. At least that is what technology seems to be pushing at the moment. Windows Vista, Mac OSX and Linux/Compiz/Beryl all seem to be emphasizing looks, and hopefully usability, on the desktop.

In the mobile phone space this has hardly been ignored, but the sheer number of different platforms means that there is no unity of interface across them. I used to use a Nokia phone for instance, and was really reluctant to leave the Series 40 interface because all other interfaces were unfamiliar to me. The more cynical will suspect that manufacturers are doing a Microsoft (or an Apple for that matter), that is, making people so used to one interface that they are reluctant to switch to something different.

Currently, I am on my second Windows Mobile device, a Ubiquio 501 running Pocket PC phone edition. My previous Windows Mobile phone was a Motorola MPx200 running Smartphone edition(s) (see previous post), but even though the two platforms share a name, there was still a learning curve in the move between the two.

The iPhone interface, of course, has the web in a bit of a tizzy, and even I have created an iPhone skin. However, the chap in this video has taken it even further and gone as far as programming an iPhone-looky-likey screen lock and the flick-scroll interface for his Eten M600, another Pocket PC phone. I don't find either of those UI ideas particularly useful, but you have to admire the dedication and skill, and to a lesser degree the obsessiveness of the guy.



I also have a Samsung D830 which runs an Adobe-designed flash-based interface. This is pretty and works well. What I found most interesting though, is that Samsung have decided to copy their own interface, allowing it to run on Windows Mobile, and created a launcher for the new Samsung i718. While this is undoubtedly because they want to keep the user experience consistent whatever the platform, at the same time I can't help suspecting that no-one was going to rush out and slavishly copy the Samsung interface any time soon.

The real moral of this story? Interfaces come and go, what's fashionable now, may be unfashionable in a year. Go for hardware which is durable, and for software you can customize. You'll win every time!

Edit: Oops, it looks like Apple's aggressive legal team have forced YouTube to remove the video. However, you can download it here.

Movin' on up

In my view, one of the best smartphones to ever have come out is the Motorola MPx200. This was one of the earliest, and possibly the first, clamshell smartphones. Sure it didn't have a camera, bluetooth or WiFi, but it was durable, functional and fairly good looking.

The real magic, however, lay in the possibility of upgrading the operating system. The MPx200 was initially released with Windows Smartphone 2002 on it. Before long though, a ROM was leaked which allowed you to upgrade the entire operating system to Windows Mobile 2003 Smartphone. And then more recently, it was possible to take it even further to Windows Mobile 5 Smartphone. Until last week this was the most up to date operating system available on any Windows phone.

Now of course, Windows Mobile 6 is out. You have to wonder whether an upgrade will be available for this still fully functional 5-year old phone.

Unfortunately, one of the main sites for cooking up these ROMs is being shut down by Microsoft. I can see why, but the fact that the software is upgradeable is what drew me to the hardware to begin with. So it appears to be a case of cutting off their nose to spite their face.

Sad times indeed.

Casual gaming: GameBoy Micro vs. Nokia 3300?

I am now well into my thirties, and not really the demographic for the average (or at least my perception of the average) console gamer. That said, I was at Dixon's Duty Free at Stansted a couple of weeks ago, waiting for a flight to Berlin, when I chanced upon the GameBoy Micro.

Way back in the days of my youth I was one of the first few who bought a GameBoy. It was my birthday, I had some cash to spend, and under the instigation of my friend Ju, we went to Far East Plaza in Singapore and picked up one of those black and white (actually, more green) beauties. It came pre-packed with Tetris which was great fun for a while, and I went on to buy Super Mario Land. In the end though, the games were too expensive for a secondary school student with no income, and although "unofficial" cartridges were available with multiple games on board, the relatively poor game play, and the fact that you had to keep squinting at the screen to see anything even with maximum contrast, meant that it died a relatively ignominous death, sliding into oblivion in the back of my bedroom cupboard.

Anyway, back to the GB Micro, and I was amazed at how far things have come, both in the size and quality of the device. The issue with games has not changed though, and they still cost a bundle.

That got me to thinking about devices I already have which could also play games. I do not seek a full console experience and to be honest would only play games on such a small device when I am waiting for a bus or similar situation. A game to kill time. Then I remembered my Nokia 3300 which I bought a while back but got frustrated with. The major problem with that phone as a phone is that it is nearly impossible to synchronize your computer addressbook and calendar with it which I why I eventually upgraded to the Nokia 6230. However, I did miss the rather unusual keyboard layout of the 3300: I have the European edition which as a large D-pad on the left and a number pad on the right. This makes it a really decent gaming device.

It has since been superceded by the N-Gage in both its iterations, but as it handles Java games, the 3300 has a huge library of software available. And the clincher is that if you know where to look for it, much of this can be had for free. Not bad at all for the casual gamer!