Last November, I bought a 3
Skypephone, AKA an AMOI WP-S1, AKA an AMOI 8512. My original review
of it is here.
(blurry photo taken on my old phone)
After five months of continuous use, I've decided to take another look
at the phone.
And it is in remarkably good shape, despite being dropped, splashed,
almosted drowned, and generally abused. The magnet holding the battery
cover in place hasn't fallen off yet, which is unexpected. Some of the
rubberised coating has become a bit worn, but thats not really a big
issue.
Remarkably, neither the screen nor camera lens have suffered any damage
at all. The buttons all still work, and the USB port has failed to go
all loose and wonky.
Physically, it seems about as indestructable as my old Motorola V600
(but I haven't thrown it at a wall yet - most likely due to not having
anything to do with O2 these days).
Skype:
Well, yes. I've used it twice, and that was just to see if it worked. I
only know one avid Skyper (who will admit to it, anyway), and I never
bought it for the Skype functionality anyway. It works.
MSN:
It works now, after 3 finally got around to supporting it properly, but
the app is a pain to use on the handset.
PC Connectivity:
To start with, the software seemed overly complicated and tedious. Why,
I thought, couldn't I just plug it in and use it like a USB memory
stick? Well. After I found the MicroSD card taped inside the packaging
(just as I was about to chuck all the needless cardboard into the
recycling bin) and installed it, thats exactly how it works. It's just a
pity that it won't work that way with the internal memory.
MoDem:
This is the best thing about the phone. True, the connection speed is
only 115.2kpbs 180kbps download / 43kbps upload at the
moment, but that is double what I was getting through the internal modem
on the laptop on a normal dial-up connection. Sadly, the modem now
refuses to work when the AMOI's drivers are installed, but that is
hardly a big loss as it was just causing me to run up big phone bills at
work.
Pretty much everything i've tried is working over this connection, with
the exception of the YouTube multi-uploader. I haven't tried World of
Warcraft yet, because I'd like to retain some of what little of a life I
have left.
The connection speed may sound low, but its enough to watch videos
without them stopping all the time.
3 do have annoying policy concerning what they term as "adult" sites,
though. You can't access them. No chance. This is annoying as i used to
use
b3ta a lot, but now I can't
(apart from one day last month when their policy got relaxed - or got
broken, more likely - for about 6 hours). Also, quite a few of my
friends' sites have been tagged as "adult", as they are a sweary bunch
of troublemakers.
All this talk of data transfer brings me on to probably the most
important thing about a mobile phone...
Running costs:
Calls to normal numbers cost 12p per minute, with texts at 12p each. You
can buy add-on bundles to make these cheaper, which I only tend to do
for texts, as I try to not to ring many people (apart from taxis, pizza
delivery places and pubs).
Data is charged at a quid per megabyte, which sounds expensive because
it is. However, the internet add-on bundles can save you loads of money
and cost 50p for a day, £2.50 a week, or £5 a month.
I'm still not sure what the "fair use" data limits are for the weekly
and monthly blocks, but daily seems to be about 100mb. Which isn't bad.
I tend to stick on a load of daily blocks in one go, as its easy to
exceed 100mb in a day (if, for example, you decide to watch all the
Happy Tree Friends episodes whilst drunk), and you can move into the
next day's block without having to wait until midnight.
All in all, it cost me about £20 every three weeks.
So whats wrong with it?
The camera doesn't have a light or a flash. <sarcasm>Oh shame</sarcasm>.
The microSD card was cunningly hidden in the depths of the packaging and
nearly got binned. And doesn't come with an adapter.
I can't get the modem to work with the built-in bluetooth on my laptop,
yet it works with an external dongle. Not really an issue, as anyone
likely to want to connect a laptop to their phone will probably have a
USB cable on them.
And thats it.
Verdict?
It is still a brilliant and cheap little phone, and works almost
perfectly. I'd like to see a new version that does full mobile broadband
without me having to carry an additional dongle, and maybe a future one
will. I'll upgrade to that when it comes out, but for now I can handle
the slower speed. You should buy one now.
Oh, you want a rating? Right. Which 80s popsters had a song called
"System Addict"?
Thats right. Five Star.
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