cellphone with wifi / gps

[Graham]

Also, local SIMs often have great rates so I tend to go unlocked.

I've only done it twice, but I found buying a pre-pay sim card when I get somewhere works really well. Unless it's (I think) t-mobile in the US and they don't tell you that the money you put on it expires after something like a month GRRRR!

 

[mrcorbo]

I have to say having the slide-out keyboard has been very nice at times, but 90% of the time I need to type a short phrase I don't even bother to slide it out. Finger-typing on the Fuze screen works pretty well.

I believe I have heard that WinMo 7 is going to be built around multi-touch, so I wouldn't expect that the interface would work properly on phones without the proper hardware support. WinMo 6.5 is another story, though. There are 6.5-based ROMS available now and it isn't even released yet. Too buggy and too many compatability issues for me ATM, but there are a lot of people hacking away at it, so I expect I'll be upgrading before too long.

 

[Graham]

While I agree it's unrealistic to expect to get WinMo7 on a 6.1 / 6.5 device, I can't really see how mutli-touch would be a requirement for the interface?
I can't think of anything other than pinch zooming, which is hardly a critical feature. The pro2 / diamond2 have a dedicated zoom touch bar below the screen.

That's not to say resistive touch screens can't do multi-touch..

 

[Mize]

I've only done it twice, but I found buying a pre-pay sim card when I get somewhere works really well. Unless it's (I think) t-mobile in the US and they don't tell you that the money you put on it expires after something like a month GRRRR!

Actually my Chinese (China Unicom), English (Virgin), German (Orange?) and Spanish (?) SIMs all expired in similar fashion. Actually is was one month after last usage. Likewise GRRR.

UMTS 2100 also works in South Korea and I have to be there in the next month or so. Might have to borrow the wife's iPhone. I've been using a Centro since becoming disgusted with my 8525 (HTC) slider win mo phone that was always five letters behind my typing.

 

[Graham]

Well with the US one I had, it didn't matter when you last used it - the money you put on it expired after a certain amount of time. So I bought it and put a lot of money on it, only to have the money expire with ~$30 still on it sometime later (recalling properly, I think it was 60 days). At least here the money lasts forever and the card will only expire if it's not used for over a year, and you get a warning.

 

[Mize]

Well with the US one I had, it didn't matter when you last used it - the money you put on it expired after a certain amount of time. So I bought it and put a lot of money on it, only to have the money expire with ~$30 still on it sometime later (recalling properly, I think it was 60 days). At least here the money lasts forever and the card will only expire if it's not used for over a year, and you get a warning.

Ouch. When my guys come visit from China they used get AT&T (Cingular) cards and I've never heard this complaint. Now I just have extra phones on a shared minutes plan since it's so much cheaper.

 

[Davros]

I bought a payg phone 2 years ago it came with £2.50 credit ive never topped it up and have had zero credit for at least 18months and it still works

 

[ban25]

I make few calls on the mobile when in Japan, but they are key ones (saying goodnight to the kids for example). My hotel phone is dirt cheap but being able to be reached is critical and phone rentals are a pain IMHO (especially when the company pays the phone bill).

Also, local SIMs often have great rates so I tend to go unlocked.

It's definitely convenient roaming on NTT or Softbank with all your contacts and notes handy. I agree that renting a phone and charging it up with minutes periodically is annoying, but next time I will probably use both.