Being the geek that I am I finally decided it was time to get a phone that did more than just make calls. There are a few reasons for this, such as wanting to experiment more with bluetooth, hack around on Windows Mobile, use a headset in the car to avoid crashing, and increase my geek status :)
I decided to go with the XV6700 from Verizon:
Having just picked up the phone Wednesday night, here are my initial impressions:
- The phone comes with Wifi, and it works great. I picked up my neighbors wireless network from two houses away!
- The user interface is pretty slick, it runs Windows Mobile 5.0 (I know its Windoze), has a full querty keyboard, joystick control and stylus.
- The Motorola H500 bluetooth headset seemed to work okay at first, but it is very uncomfortable and not loud enough.
- One really annoying thing that I hope to fix with some hacks is that you can not do voice activated dialing via a bluetooth headset. This just plain sucks. If anyone knows of any hacks, please let me know.
- The phone is also much smaller than I thought, although the belt clip that I bought (along with the car charger and headset for $80) is a little clumsy and big.
- It also comes with an infrared port, which I am hoping can be used as a universal remote for my entertainment center
- I have yet to get the phone to sync with my outlook mail and calendar, not sure why yet, I get some unspecified error that I need to investigate
- No support under OS X, yet, there is a company called Markspace that makes a product that will sync PDAs with OS X, including Entourage, iCal, etc… They do not yet support Windows Mobile 5.0, but are working on it.
- The web works awesome, both through Wifi and EVDO. Its nice having the Interweb everywhere :) I plan to pick up Pocket Streets 2005 so I don’t get lost (Which looks like I will also be buying a bluetooth enabled GPS to go with it).
- The camera works great, check out this pic I grabbed this morning in the parking lot. W00t!
More to come!
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