[magic_peanuts]

Paul [MVP], on Jan 30 2006, 20:25, said:

If you want a , you buy the Universal

P
<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Brick?

Phone that thinks it's a laptop but fails?



It's a great bit of kit, especially with a Jabra BT800 bluetooth headset.

Don't get me wrong, the C600 is a great phone. I still have my original SPV and comparing the two really is like comparing a Lada to a Ferrari.

I'll be back for the C1000 with a 5MP camera, a hot swappable mini SD card, wifi, 3G + HSDPA, and DVB-H TV!

[Sponsored Links]

[Maxrom]

Paul [MVP], on Jan 30 2006, 13:22, said:

Action Lock was an application that you probably never saw. Do you remember Action Register? That formed part of it. The purpose of Action Lock and it’s associated components was to allow you to application unlock your phone over the air. Now you’re with me right! Yes, that is missing, which means, at time of writing, there is no official way to application unlock your C600 via Orange. In the finest tradition of ‘nature finds a way’, more shady solutions have emerged in the community to accomplish the same end.

Just a quick one about this - I got a C600 just before Christmas, and until recently hadnt needed to develop on this phone. However, once I attempted this using Visual Sudio 2005, it became apparent that the phone was locked down very tight, and disallowed debugging on it.

I emailed Orange support at this address : [email protected] and explained the situation. After a day or so, I got an email requesting my details, and the IMEI of the phone. Once I sent these back, it was about another day and I got a tailor made .exe to install to the phone that gave me an Orange application under Accessories which easily allows me to switch between high, low and no security.

Having set it to no security, I installed the SDK certificates .cab file for VS2005, and I'm now able to develop directly on the device. Whilst not as straightforward as before, this an official way to derestrict your phone, and once you have the tool installed, it allows you to change security levels very easily

[Jamma14]

So Paul, battery life aside, what would it be the c600 or the i300???

Ps. Good review, looking forward to the universal one!

This post has been edited by Jamma14: 30 January 2006 - 10:05 PM

[siksik6]

the crap camera's still holding me off. Yes, I know the prophet's lovely, but I want the C600 form factor. Are you listening HTC!?

[PaulOBrien]

Battery life aside, very tough call indeed... for reasons that will become clear when I post the i300 review.

In short, the i300 is a fabulous device with a great attention to detail in the software build... but, well, the battery life as it is makes it a no-go (for me at least).

P

[creamhackered]

Good review

[phdutton]

I've just got the C600, wanted the M5000, but £150 is just way too much for me right now, free is much better!
I've been away from Smartphones, had the original SPV, and the E200, but then made a bad move to Voda for 18 months. Now back on Orange, and I must say I agree with Paul, they have come on leaps and bounds! It's how I wanted the original one to be when I had it.
I do miss the Orange Backup feature actually, thought it was a really clever idea, and worked very well. But if something new is coming, then great!

[Disco Stu]

I agree the C600 is a gorgeous-looking phone. The silver bits reflect other colours nicely. 8)
Sometimes the menu fails to load after pressing the left soft key but a reboot sorts that out. I've had programs failing to load for the same reason.
I find the stubby joystick a little tricky and am often catching the Back/Red buttons by mistake. When texting I have a habit of pressing the Red button instead of back.
The T9 editor is in the Windows folder but you'll need to build your own shortcut.

Battery life is so good I find myself wondering if the meter is actually working !
A Facade-based homescreen was a necessity for me to accept the phone but I'm now a fan

EDIT : nearly forgot - d'oh !
Three years of SPVs and I now have my first sticky headphone socket switch

[shadamehr]

The lack of wi-fi REALLY does spoil it Paul - sorry to have to disagree with you.

But let me quantify that remark, because it's even more straight-forward than it seems.

You see, I am not really a business user per se, and don't heavily use my phone in that way.

Indeed, I rarely if ever, use it for my Email though I DO go the alternative route for a record, by having Active Sync sync the last seven days of my mails to the phone, now that I have the patch to store this on Storage Card.

So, the arguments about wi-fi only being for business or upper class users, let me dispell them by not even BEING that class of user.

To me, a SmartPhone, now that it has matured, is a real option for the normal personal user now. And that is what I am.

But since I got my SP5, I am amazed at how much I have my wi-fi used. Let me just give you one single example... Illium Newsbreak. Forgive the vulgarity or information overload of my next revelation, but, first thing I do of a morning, is get up, head to the loo, and turn my wi-fi on, and update ALL my RSS feeds. If I wanted to I could download my email too. Now I KNOW I could do this at the PC via active sync, but this means having to boot it up, or leave it on, connect, wait til active sync does a full and slow sync (did we mention AS now syncs on connection - gone is the "when I say so" option), and then doing a slower update of the feeds, all this TAKING UP time.

Instead, I do all this seemlessly, simply, quickly and easly, while using up DEAD time (I did warn you it would be too muuch information *lol*).

Then when I get to work, or on a train, bus or wherever, I am up to date with all the news I want. I could buy a newspaper, but Newsbreak is customised fro SPECIFIC items of interest to me.

And a newspaper can't tell me whats in my emails (though as I mentioned earlier, email sync is not a biggy for me).

I am surprised Paul, that someone like you isn't tempted by features such as this.

As a PERSONAL user, not a business class customer, it's worth being crass again, and pointing out that I can kill the same 'dead time' I referred to earlier, that I won't describe in detail again, while I am sitting stuck there during the day, by chatting on Messenger. (So any of you lot that see me sign in on a Mobile Device in future, might hazard an undesirable guess as to where it is I might happen to be *lol*)

Wi-fi makes this all possible, and using it makes things second nature.

Now I KNOW you have had the chance to try it all Paul, as you have both an SP5 and a C600, but it's things like this, that no one seems to be talking about, and that make me a little miffed when people say "there's still no practical use for wi-fi yet"

I have LOADS of practical uses for it, that I never thought about before having it, and I am not even a business type user.

Finally, the biggest bug-bear of all... all those people, yourself included, that say "Not needed YET"

Fair do, except that almost implies your only gonna keep your phone four months.

Because if you ARE correct, and its a case of "not just yet" then I strongly suspect that four months from now, certainly no more than six or seven, then there will be EVERY reason for wi-fi on a handset.

And on that basis, then unless you DO change phones every four to five months (and I understand how you can Paul, but not the rest of the world), then what will people do then - you will have a phone that is no good for the things you want it to be able to do then.

Surely THAT has to factor into the equation when thinking about what you want a phone to do.

For most people, they need to think what they want to be doing in TEN MONTHS time, not just now, as they will still be stuck with the same handset then.

And if you can really tell me that if we give it a whole ten months, that we won't by then have a real use for wi-fi, then I'll be surprised.

Conversely, if we do have a whole raft of uses for wi-fi on a SmartPhone by then, then all I can offer you lot, is, "well, shouldn't you have took everyone's advice, and bore that in mind when you chose your last handset?"

If so, I urge you, if the option is open to you (I I fully appreciate that for a lot of you it's not, but I number ported from Orange onto a great tariff, and got a free SP5), to forget all about the C600, and get a Qtek or i-mate tornado with wi-fi in - its the best thing I ever did.

I have so little use for a C600, now that I have the wi-fi capable version in the form of a sp5, that I am PAC coding my other Orange account and going elsewhere, as there is simply nothing good Orange can offer me handset wise, when they think the C600 is prime handset to be offering me. I have no use for one - owning a SP5, a C600 would then be fools gold to me, obviously.

And shouldn't that last remark soum it all open perfectly, as to how much 'lesser' a C600 therefore, is, to an SP5?

If battery life is your argument Paul, fair do. But I don't HAVE to have wi-fi on all day yu know - if I leave it off, my battery life must surely be as per a C600, as I get ages out of it...

Anyhow, thats my two pennies worth - hope it was useful.

Admit it Paul - you just LOVE the design and form factor of the C500 / C600 - that's what it is innit - to be fair, I loved the size and weight of the C500 too. But my sp5 is anything but a big phone you know *lol*

[encece]

Short Post from me for a change....
I have an SP5m and still never use WiFi. EDGE speeds are fast enough for me. I download and send email all day on two accounts syncing every 15 minutes. Newsbreak dowloads news every hour....all while in my pocket.

In my day to day, work and home...if I'm in a position to use WiFi...I'm in a position to use a PC. Which I'd rather do over my phone anytime. For me...a mobile phone is for when you're, um, mobile.

If someone could tell me a better use for WiFi, I'd be glad to listen. (And please don't tell me that I could control my MediaPlayer on my PC). :roll:

But Nice review. HTC phones get better and better REFINED and their latest batch is always worth the upgrade. Looking for some new innovatiove ideas from them though! Smartphone or PPC. They need to take a BIG step forward...or better yet, SIDEWAYS! 8)

[Ingvarr]

I have a cheap landline internet connection on my home wireless router, and so I use it for my smartphone when Iam home to surf via WiFi. Its a lot faster and more economic then GPRS/EDGE.

Also I watch films via WiFi.

[PaulOBrien]

I do like the C500/600 form factor Shadamehr, but I also love the SP5 form factor, it gets a lot of admiring looks.

I still stand by my WiFi comments for the majority of users. I do the same things as you, sync up NewsBreak (if you're a Plus member check it out, it's free!) first thing in the morning (but lying in bed rather than on the throne!), and use occasional messenger. I do them however by GPRS, and NewsBreak uses a tiny amount of GPRS data.

Maybe if a decent Skype client for Smartphone comes out, or a game you can play over WiFi or something then I might be more inclined to agree... but I don't honestly see WiFi in Smartphones becoming a mainstream requirement inside of the next year.

Maybe i'll be proved wrong and you'll quote me on this post, lol!

P

[PaulOBrien]

Spill the beans too Shadamehr... who did you get your great deal with?

P

[Swampie]

encece, on Jan 31 2006, 05:24, said:

Short Post from me for a change....
I have an SP5m and still never use WiFi. EDGE speeds are fast enough for me.
<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Must be nice to have EDGE in your country. I don't believe EDGE is rolled out in the UK yet (and I belive some network operators have said they don't intend to).

[PaulOBrien]

Orange in the UK only plan to roll out EDGE as fill in for 3G...

P

[Dark Horse]

I'm truly amazed that this is the first handset that gets the official Modaco seal of approval. Exactly what does the software and hardware do that is significantly better than the C500? I got a C600 and after spending weeks playing around with it, I felt it was more of a minor incremental upgrade rather than anything revolutionary.

Yes, WS2005 may offer more extensions than an Essex hair salon, yes, it may offer marginally improved battery life, yes, the QVGA screen is something to make our ignorant Nokia brethren green with envy but are any of these features truly revolutionary and provide a substantial improvement in the end-user experience?

I'd say I'm a heavy user of the smartphone platform and Wifi is a must. It's not the concept of speed that's the issue rather more of compatability. I travel often and many countires don't have 3G let alone EDGE yet plenty are beginning to embrace the Wifi revolution. It's handy to be able to check email away from the office as well as not incur horrendous roaming GPRS charges. If Orange really are interested in making money from selling OTA applications, they must work towards making the distribution of those services considerably cheaper or better yet, free! Why should consumers have to pay both software and bandwidth costs on a smartphone when those bandwidth costs are largely redundant if one already has an Internet connection?

I firmly believe that the smartform wifi model is a stable one, certainly one that is mature enough to be used in the enterprise. Having used Wifi on a number of handhelds, the smartphone implementation, at least in the SP5 handset, gets it just right. Its small and fast enough to be useful for dipping in and out of, yet doesn't impact battery life to the extent that it renders the moby useless. More importantly, it works and it works very well.

I think WM2005 is very much a missed opportunity for MS to put right plenty of the small issues that overall would have made a big impression on the majority of users. As such, I'd argue that the C500 is still the most impressive handset on the Windows Smartphone platform given that Orange/HTC/MS addressed a lot of the shortcomings of the previous OS and devices.

Regards,

Dark Horse

This post has been edited by Dark Horse: 31 January 2006 - 11:19 AM

[PaulOBrien]

Quote

I'm truly amazed that this is the first handset that gets the official Modaco seal of approval. Exactly what does the software and hardware do that is significantly better than the C500? I got a C600 and after spending weeks playing around with it, I felt it was more of a minor incremental upgrade rather than anything revolutionary.

But the seal of approval isn't for being revolutionary... it's for the fact that - at last - it's a Windows Mobile handset that works exactly as it should, in the function that it provides.

i.e. you buy the handset knowing it doesn't have 3G etc., but the things it DOES do, it does well.

Of course, it's all IMHO

P

[PaulOBrien]

Quote

As such, I'd argue that the C500 is still the most impressive handset on the Windows Smartphone platform given that Orange/HTC/MS addressed a lot of the shortcomings of the previous OS and devices.

Agreed, it was revolutionary.

Look at the C550 to see how you can screw up after such a good handset as the C500, then look at the C600 to see how it can be done right.

I'd be interested to hear from C600 owners as to whether they agree with me...

P

[Dark Horse]

Paul [MVP said:

,Jan 31 2006, 11:00]But the seal of approval isn't for being revolutionary... it's for the fact that - at last - it's a Windows Mobile handset that works exactly as it should, in the function that it provides.

i.e. you buy the handset knowing it doesn't have 3G etc., but the things it DOES do, it does well.

Of course, it's all IMHO

P
<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The C500 does all of this as well and works exactly as it should too! The impact coming from an SPV original to a C500 was "wow", both hardware and software were revolutionary. Can you honestly say that you had the same reaction when migrating from a C500 to a C600?

Regards,

Dark Horse

This post has been edited by Dark Horse: 31 January 2006 - 11:17 AM

[PaulOBrien]

No,

Quote

But the seal of approval isn't for being revolutionary

I'd describe using the feeling of using the C600 for the first time more as warm-fuzzy-familiarity but with noticeable enhancements (e.g. screen and WM5).

P

[Sponsored Links]