Eddie

My mom now has a better phone than me; or rather, she will when it arrives in the mail. I picked out the Nokia 7510 for her. At first glance, perhaps it’s a weird choice. It’s a feature phone and she’s definitely not a feature user. But given how rarely we change phones—counting all the cellphones we’ve owned, this will only be our sixth—it’s important that the phone be adequately future-proofed. So while the only important specs to her are talk time, reception, and having a standard headphone jack, I zeroed in on phones that had Bluetooth and were quad-band.

Of those, I picked out the Nokia 6263, Nokia 7510, and the BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8220. That last one is an odd choice, but it fit all of my requirements, has an impressive camera, and is the same price as the Nokia 7510 after discounts. I quickly ruled it out once I held a demo unit in my hand, however. The UI is completely different from any phone my mom has used before. And to be honest, my snap judgment was that its UI isn’t good. I’ve probably watched too many iPhone videos. Also its hinge mechanism, which is reminiscent of the aluminum Powerbooks, feels amazingly awkward on a cellphone.

The Nokia 6263 is the successor to my current cellphone (6133). I think my phone is a solid, reliable phone. CNET’s review says the same about the 6263.

The Nokia 7510 is a step up from the 6263. In my opinion, its big differentiating feature is integrated Wi-Fi with support for Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA). UMA is a specification for sending cellphone data over IP-based networks. It’s a bit like VoIP with a key exception: UMA calls can seamlessly transition between Wi-Fi and cellphone networks. That difference makes UMA seem like the most compelling way to converge mobile and landline service. In the end, I decided that the possibility my family would make use of UMA (T-Mobile charges $10/month) was enough to justify the extra cost of the 7510.

(I backdated this by 93.5 hours. Yeowch.)