In spite of a previous post I have a new T-Mobile branded SDA sitting in front of me. I knew the local TMo store had them in stock, but they were mean to me when I walked in to check out the size of it: they offered an additional rebate on the phone in exchange for a two year commitment with T-Mobile. Dirty pool!
And in spite of my reservations about another candy bar phone… well. It’s a better upgrade than I thought it would be. Much better – so much so that I don’t even have the typical “I bought WHAT?” feeling this morning!
What did Randy have: an SMT5600 that was unlocked to work on the T-Mobile network. Small form factor, GSM, Bluetooth and Windows Mobile 2003SE were the driving force in my originally getting the phone.
What’s Randy got now: an SDA from T-Mobile, which is the direct successor to the SMT5600.
What’s new in the new model… there’s a bump on the top of the SDA that wasn’t in the SMT5600 and it’s slightly thicker overall. That’s the only negative change, with regards to hardware. True, the memory card is still under the battery, but that’s the same in both models – after a while with it like that, I’ve decided it’s not a big deal for me. The SDA does have a slightly larger screen but it’s also sporting QVGA resolution… this makes for a larger display that is far clearer and more colorful than the SMT5600.
There are buttons all over the thing, which I thought I wasn’t going to like at first, but it’s already grown on me. They added a new button for the “Communications Manager” which is spiffy because the phone is not only Quad band but it also offers Bluetooth and WiFi. Ya hit the new button and it brings up a form that gives you one button access to enable or disable any of the wireless bands, plus a shortcut to ActiveSync and the BT/WiFi connection settings. There’s also a (T) button and three media buttons on the front of the phone – I guess the SDA was gear to simplify MP3 playback – and I didn’t expect to use any of them, but I actually do – more on those later…
The softkey buttons are a little small because of the media keys, but that’s not too bad either.
The joystick on the SDA is a little temperamental but it’s better than the rocker bar on the SMT5600. The camera is now a 1.3 megapixel offering – haven’t tried that out yet. “External” memory is still using an MiniSD card – thank you sooooo much HTC! – so I was able to use the same card that I had in the SMT5600. File Manager, Task Manager, and Voice tag dialing are all in WM5 – I missed all three dearly when I was beta testing Windows Mobile 5.0 on the SMT5600 so I’m pretty excited to see them return in an official device.
All of that was on the packaging. The things that have surprised me have come from working with the thing for the last few hours…
One of the things that drove me nuts about the SMT5600 was when I had to set it to “Silent” mode… every phone made from 2001 on had a “quick set” button for Silent more – different for each handset maker, true, but still there – yet the MPx200 and SMT5600 did not. The SDA does: press and hold the # key and it will toggle between Silent and Normal mode.
Speaking of buttons, I was little annoyed that the (T) button opens IE with some T-Mobile site that never showed up for me… via WiFi anyway. For all the babble about UMTS, GPRS, 3G, 1xRTT, or whatever… I could give a rat’s ass. I don’t have a data plan. I spent three years in the quagmire that is wireless and I don’t plan to spent one red cent on it. Not with my money. WiFi, on the other hand, is available most everywhere. At home, the SDA found my access point and happily went online; at work, the Microsoft network was found and connected to – I haven’t tried anything else. Either way, I might finally have a reason to use PIE on a mobile device again… yet the (T) button always sent for a page that didn’t open; probably because I wasn’t on their WAP network.
I poked around online and there’s a way to remap the application buttons… in the \Windows directory there are a bunch of SHORT_.lnk and LONG_.lnk files… these shortcuts have names that correspond to a hardware button. For example, the vibration button is mapped there: LONG_POUND.lnk points to \Windows\mute.exe – there were a bunch for _AP1, _AP2, and the like. SHORT_AP1.lnk mapped to iexplore.exe with the TMo URL passed in.
Here’s the trick: these files are in the ROM so they can’t be edited and the can’t be deleted but they can be preempted. Via your PC, using ActiveSync, find a file you want to open, say iexplore.exe. Select it and create a shortcut for it. Rename the shortcut to SHORT_AP1 and throw it into \Windows – now the (T) button will open IE with no starting URL. I then put the Task Manager on the “Prev Track” button and the Bluetooth toggler on the “Next Track” button… easy enough to change them back: delete your shortcut file from \Windows and the original file reappears.
More surprises: I didn’t need to reboot the phone to see these changes take effect. I also noticed that I could move stuff around in the Start Menu folder and those changes were also picked up without rebooting. This is a bonus of Windows Mobile 5.0 – in 2003SE I always had to restart to see my changes in this area.
Then there was the biggest bonus of all… I paired up my Bluetooth headset to the phone. Locked the keypad by holding the red End button. Hit the “voice dial” button the headset. The phone actually responded.
I’ll say it again: the keyboard was locked and the Bluetooth headset was able to initiate a call. That’s killer… that’s simply killer. Now I can leave the phone in my pocket and place calls – with the SMT5600, I had to take the phone out, unlock it, then initiate the call… was a painful process that’s been fixed!
That’s about it for now – I’ve only had it running for a few hours now. I slapped a piece of WriteRight over it, since I still plan to keep it my pocket, but overall, I think this will be a fun phone to play with.
Of course, if I spike the phone into the ground because it performs a crime against humanity, I’ll follow up this post – so far, I’m more impressed than I thought I would be by it!
That phone will save your life someday…or like, win you money.
Unless I crash a car while trying to dial it – that would negate both!
ahhh… the simple pleasures in life…. things that actually work
Gods on the Phone
By Michael Levy —
Gods Secret Plan Revealed.
I awoke one morning from a pleasant nights sleep and before my eyes focused clearly, the phone rang. The caller ID only read, celestial being, so I was not going to answer it. Well, you never know if it is the devil on the phone or God. I was in no mood to be talking to the devil so early in the morning, but when it comes to God, he can call at any time and I’m ready to listen to what he has to say, even though he complains all the time these days that nobody listens to him anymore.
I took a chance, it was God on the phone, and he was in an extra state of uneasiness. He told me he has been keeping a close eye on human behavior patterns the past few thousand years and realizes he has made a few mistakes when it came to the human body. We should note that one of Gods days equals ten thousand of our human years, so after closer observations of moral beings for a day, he has drawn up a new blueprint for the human race, because he sees the current model will be extinct before his next day is over. Here are a few of the novel designs God told me he is going to incorporate in the new human model, for he wants to make sure . . . All is really good next time around.
The first change will be people will have a chimney on the top of their heads. The roof of the mouth will have a flap and when a person lights up a cigarette, the flap will automatically open and the smoke will go up a specially lined flue and will be filtered into clean air by the time it comes out the chimney. This will stop the smoke going into the lungs and causing people to die of lung cancer. He will also flavor the extracted clean air with lavender and frankincense so all non-smokers will invite smokers into their homes and enjoy their clean, mountain air tonic.
The next great idea God has come up with is to take out the liver, kidneys and bladder, replacing them with a distillery. No matter if a person drinks pure water, soda, beer, or spirits. It will pass through the body and into an express distillery. There will be a choice of many exotic alcoholic cocktails. Whatever a person thinks up will be transmitted by neurons to the distilleries mechanism, so that when the person urinates, they will pee into a glass and hay presto, they have their drink of the day. If they want to put a bit of fizz into the drink, all they need to do is jump on the spot for a minute and it will come out shaken, not stirred . . . Self – replenishing drinks . . . How cool is that!
The next measure he has implemented is to take out the intestines and digestive tract. This will be replaced with a fast food processing plant. Burgers, hot dogs, etc., will all be available on demand by just thinking about it. People will be able to eat whatever they want and just think what they would like for t he next meal. Then, before they can say Jack Robinson, the eaten food will be processed so that they can have an elimination and out will pop burgers and hot dogs, just the way they like them cooked. Of course, they will have to take a plate with them to the toilet, or they will have to fish out soggy burgers.
Yummy, I can just see your mouth watering at the thought of it.
There will be no requirement for doctors or pharmaceutical drugs, because in the new human model nobody will ever become sick or die of old age. The new structure will be made of flame and rust proof indestructible molecules, sinews and tissues, so people can abuse themselves from morning until night with smoking, drinking and overeating junk food and nothing will harm them.
However, God still likes his little jokes, so for the time being, he will keep the mind just the way it is now. People will still believe they have free will and can make up as many religions as they deem necessary, so that they can keep the flames of hatred burning brightly. In fact, hatred will be the main subject in all schools and made compulsory for every student. Science and intelligent design will be removed from the curriculum, for with hatred as the main subject, people will have plenty to fight over.
Society will still be able to wage destructive wars, only problem being, they will not be able to kill one another. They can invent all kinds of nuclear weapons, smart bombs, etc., but they will only be able to blow up buildings, animals, plants and trees. People will be indestructible, so they can create mayhem and chaos all the time, therefore, no need of video games or reality TV shows.
The fun has only just begun for God, for he will give each person a different language to speak, so nobody will be able to understand what anybody else is saying. It is not that much different from what we have now, with people who speak the same language and divide each other up into different groups, only this time around, the groups will only contain one person. Each person will be given the same name, but with a different model number. They will all be named, Frankenstein and each will have their own serial number.
Not all the new changes will be so much different to the medical professions present day model, which has altered the human body by removing intestines, face-lifts that go higher and higher with each season and all the other great gifts they have augmented. Its just that God has taken it to a more advanced level of sophistication and realizes it is what people are asking for each day.
God believes the fresh benefits are huge for his chosen races that are built in his image. Humans will be able to cut down all the trees once they can manufacture their own clean oxygen supply through their personal chimneys. If they run out of space, they can drain the oceans, because they have their own inner, ever regenerating, drinks machine . . . Who needs water!
Once they run out of that space, they can build mega-homes of one million sq. feet. Impoverished people can sleep standing up and every human will own one sq. foot, in a million sq. foot home. Every common person can brag about living in a million sq. foot home. But not the rich people, they will have their own underground bunkers with all the modern day trappings of real wealth (but that’s another story) Also, since they cannot kill each other and will live forever, they can breed animals, to kill them just for sporting fun in a new game called, animal wars. When they wipe all the game animals out, they can bomb the breeding factories and make animals extinct creatures.
Before too long, without any water, all the plants and flowers will perish and the earth will become a barren landscape . . . A barren wasteland, which will resemble the moon, mars and all the other planets in our solar system. The good news is, it will save billions of dollars on future space missions, for who needs to visit barren planets when we will have contrived our own right here on earth. Yes indeed, home is where the heart is and a barren wilderness is a worthy home for aggressive humans. Indeed, God know, all will be better than good.
Of course, human beings have a great imagination and now they know Gods future plans they may beat him to it and restructure earth and the human body themselves. They may even concoct a completely new form of God and make this present-day one redundant. Perhaps they will devise a God that will remove the human brain, replace it with one that delights in greed, and fear more than the present model. The newfangled God can dispose of any feelings of love & joy, so that people can feel contented, soaking up other people’s misery. Powerful, clandestine speculators will be able to manipulate the commodity markets more than they do now and make crude oil $1000 a barrel, Gold $10,000 an ounce, etc. Business can learn better ways to swindle people and cheating contests will be held for executives, who will get billion dollar bonuses for being the biggest swindlers.
Most people will remain poor, but with a chimney in their heads and a distillery in their tummies, who will care. Yes, future generations will have a lot to be thankful. They will be able to debate why life is so boring, whilst reminiscing about the good old days, when people could actually kill each other in wars,. Since they all talk different languages it will bring new life to the phrase “Actions speak louder than words”
So, let’s raise our glass’s and drink a toast to future prospects . . . “Here’s looking at you future generations, with the scheming red in your eyes and the venomous perversions in your grin.”
I awoke in a pool of sweat realizing I had only been dreaming. I fetched the newspaper in from the front porch and read the headlines. I cried out . . . Oh My God . . . It was not a dream; he’s begun to generate the changes!
Errr… OK?