Worst Cell Phones - Palm Centro

Why are some buttons green and others not?

Do you ever get Centro confused with Centrino? Has Intel called?

The Palm OS was pretty neat about 10 years ago. I know. I have had at least four Palm Pilots. But the Centro looks like cheap junk. Oh wait. It's $99.00 so it is cheap junk.

I should be fair but I cannot be after the Palm lady laughed at me in 2003 about my Palm Tungsten W, so there.

By the way. some of the buttons on the Centro are green because Palm is trying to go green. They are, however, taking baby steps and could only see fit to purchase a few of the new green buttons.

Worst Cell Phones - Bang and Olufsen Samsung Serenata

Introducing the new Serenata! Here are the features!
- Network - GSM 900 / 1800 / 1900!
- Display - TFT touchscreen, 256K colors!
- Ringtone - Polyphonic (64 channels)!
- Talk time - Up to 3 hours!
- Design - Butt ugly!

There is no better way to describe this other than it is looks like a remote control, possibly for a television or a stereo. And then it dawned on me: B&O probably had a few thousand remotes sitting in a warehouse somewhere in Scandinavia and some whiz kid thought, "Hey, let's shove a GSM radio inside and call it a phone!".

The rest is history - just like the Serenata in late 2009.

Worst Cell Phones - Sony Ericsson Xperia X1

Tad, handsome,urban,hip,metro-dude professional, hops on the passing street car from the busy downtown street. In his free hand is his happening Sony Ericsson Xperia X1. Tad glances down and sees an alert with his next appointment displayed on the glass screen.

Later, while in a meeting in a modern boardroom replete with multicultural/gender attendees, Tad is responding to text messages with a business partner on his Xperia X1.

At lunch in a nearby organic, vegetarian restaurant, Tad receives a humorous video from his club/drinking buddy Lance on his Xperia X1.

Finally, Tad takes texts a flirty message to Heather across a bustling, trendy nightclub full of attractive, skinny, well dressed partiers. Heather notices Tad's Xperia X1 and smiles seductively at Tad.. [fade to the Sony Ericsson logo.. ]


Who designs these phones anyway? (the ad above, by the way, is fictional. No intended slights to hip, urban, well dressed, handsome, flirty, vegetarians named Tad, Lance or Heather).

Here in the real world.

Cell phone is in pocket or holster. Cell phone is used 99% of time to make voice calls. Most are made where there is no land line, i.e. the car or somewhere outside or in a building not one's home or office.

Most data is checking of email and responding. This is frequently done one-handed while standing in a line or waiting for some reason or another.

Phone is constantly used with one hand. Typically, the non-dominant hand so the other hand can drive, eat, etc.

That being said, "why do big manufacturers continue to make two-handed little typewriters? Why do they make slider type phones which increase the size of the cell phone by 2"?

I have an office mate who has a two-handed device. He infrequently uses it to type emails or messages. For the most part, he uses it to receive inbound voice calls. He looks uncomfortable using it and so it stays neatly in the big ol' holster on his belt.

In the meantime, I have a Blackberry. I use it for nearly everything and always one-handed. In fact, using it two-handed is, well stupid.

Sorry for picking on the Xperia X1 (Thank you Phonescoop for the review and pics!). Maybe it is neat phone. But not for two hands!

Worst Cell Phones - Applie iPhone - Price Drop Coming?

OK, so the "I Love Apple, I got an iPhone first, look at my stupid Apple sticker on my new VW Bug" crowd will murder me for this, but I think the iPhone is a stupid piece of cellcaca.

I watched a friend recently hold his up in his left hand while he slid objects around on the glass face with his right hand finger tip - "See how cool it is!" he bubbled.

Sure. How well does that work in sunlight? While driving? Without your glasses? What a neat two handed cell phone! Why not get a full size keyboard and monitor to go with your phone? Then you can really enjoy the multi media extravaganza!

Call me the anti-Apple Luddite, but I don't get the hubbub. Besides, was that worth the $799 - no wait, 599 - um I mean 399 you paid for it?

And now a little story today I have heard a half dozen people mention, Apple may be forced to drop the prices of the iPhone to meet Steve-O's 10 million phone sales in 2008 goal.

And one price being bandied about is a sub-200 price point, say 199.99 (with ATT activation, tax, title and license not included, some offers not valid in all states, offer void where prohibited by law)?

But wait there's more in the iPhone news today? App-el has a problem with ATT authorized phones strangely becoming "unlocked" and not showing up on ATT's activation list - about 1.7 mill-yun subscribers. Apple picks up a cool ten percent of the fees for each activation. Where'd dat money go?

Soooo.. if you are looking to get a new phone it might bode well to wait a few months?

I know I have to. My wife wants me to get her one. And now you know why this cellperson is a bit peeved today!

Worst Cell Phones - Serene Mobile

This is quite simply on of the ugliest things disguised as a cell phone I have ever seen - The Bang and Olufsen Serene Mobile.

Years ago, my father owned a Bang and Olufsen stereo system when I was a kid. He purchased it new at Marvin Electronics and when he brought it home, I thought he had scammed it off a space alien. That stereo was the coolest piece of home hi-fidelity ever.

To this day, that stereo continues to crank out the tunes as it resides in my sister's home.

So B and O decided to get into the mobile (cellular) world and this Frankenphone wandered out of the laboratory.

Uggh.

First, who had the idea I wanted a phone that looked like a time clock? Also, who cares if this thing can sit on a desk and play music or some other celliness? Look at that key pad! How can you text with any degree of accuracy?



Here's another thing. The Serene co-operates with a B&O phone system (bet that costs a few francs!). When connected to a B&O phone system and when an incoming call or text message arrives, the Serene opens automatically and displays the message.
How much would you pay for that feature? Wow - talk about the useless function of the year..

And get this, the Serene comes with a docking station which also acts as a recharger. Did anyone at Bang and Olufsen study cellphonehistory and learn that recharging docking stations went out with Skylab?

Uguhlee. I wonder how many of these gems were sold?

No thanks. I will listen to my Bang and Olufsen stereo and continue to use my plethora of non-B-and-O cell phones, but never shall the twains meet.

Worst Cell Phones I Have Owned - Nokia 3560

Early in 2006, my phone took a dive, shattered and I had to dig out an old cell phone until a replacement arrived. (Thankfully, all of my phones in the past few years have been GSM so swapping the SIM card has not been a problem - I do not know what I would do when my Verizon CDMA Blackberry dies. Shudder).

Rummaging through my old phones, I resorted to using this hideous contraption once more - the Nokia 3560.

The 3560 was ahead of its time - on another planet of dysfunctional Scandinavians. What a piece of caca this gem was.

What stood out was the horrible and completely useless circular dial pad. The mechanics were bad enough but the ergonomics were worse. Did anyone at Nokia think "Quality Control" when they rolled out the first plastics on this monster?

The plastics were amazingly cheap and thin and the back cover was prone to breaking when replacing or moving the SIM card.

The strange hand held design made the phone impossible to carry in a pocket forcing the owner to carry the equally ugly holster when out and about.

Finally, the camera was hard to use and made this annoying sound when once clicked images.

A 3560 owning friend threw his into the Gulf of Mexico during a particular fit of rage. Fortunately for cell phone history, I kept mine. Ain't it a beauty?

Worst Cell Phones - Palm Pilot Tungsten W

The King Daddy of Worst Cell Phones.

Well one of them.

I was a Palm Pilot fanatic.

I had the first version way back in '96. I upgraded to the Palm III and then to a 7x, I think around 2002.

When the Tungsten W came out, I was excited. Finally, I could quit carrying both a cell phone and a PDA. The best of both worlds!

First problem: The Tungsten only worked at the time with ATT Wireless, now part of Cingular which is now the new ATT. (Cellular phone companies are like classic rock bands - they change names and members, but play the same old songs).

The ugly bad about the Tungsten W.

- Dialing by icons aka software dialing! . Yes, you could dial using the full size QWERTY keyboard, but the interface to use was the screen, a la Apple iPhone. The problem was dialing while driving - not easy and I wonder if iPhone users have the same complaint?

- Phone calls on headset only. Really. Voice calls on the Tungsten could only be made with a headset. There was a software install which allowed the Tungsten to operate like a normal phone, (microphone and speaker on device), but I could never get it to work. A call to Palm at the time revealed the feature was never supported.

All in all, this was not a bad thing if you had glascelphobia (the fear of your face touching a large glass panel while using a cell phone).

- No Bluetooth. It seems this phone was designed around 1992 before wireless technologies were envisioned. Not only did one have to use a headset for all calls, an actual wire was required for the ear bud. Fun, especially when the phone was not plugged into your ear and you were on the turnpike in traffic.

- No WiFi. One needed to purchase the non-cell phone version for WiFi fun.

- Blazing websurfing! At 40kbps!

- No apps. Because the processor in the Tungsten W was not the same as those found in other Palm Pilots, there were few if any apps for it. Non-Palm W apps froze up the Palm W. Reset by ball point pen tip time!

The palm de resistance came at CTIA 2003 when I visited the Palm booth. I showed the W to one of Palm's employees and the conversation went like this:

Me: "Hi, I have a Palm W and had some questions about it.."

Palm Employee: "Oh, you bought one of those? Yeah, that product did not work out so well. You know the new Treo is coming out which is a much better device".

Me: "Oh, so I can trade this in for one?"

Palm Employee: Laughing. "No. Not for that thing!" More laughing.

Shortly afterwards, I purchased a no-name ATT Wireless phone, a Samsung I think, and the Palm's SIM card departed for its new home. The Palm W continued as a PDA and languished in my back pack for a few more seasons.

Sometime around 2007 I last saw it in my desk. Battery dead, data lost. A brief relic from a bygone era now long since dominated by Blackberries.

Another sad chapter from the Worst Cell Phones I Have Had.

Technorati Profile

Worst Cell Phones

I have owned about 20+ cell phones over the past 5 years or so and about the same number the previous five years. Most have been utilitarian, press a button, make a call.

But some have been bad. Hideously bad. The only thing worse is that I actually paid money for some of these dogs.

Fortunately, bad cell phones often go the way of bad breakfast cereals or television series; they seldom last long and are pulled so fast that few remember they ever existed.

Because technology and the people behind technology are flawed, I expect to purchase more bad cell phones in the future and will post my depressing experiences.