Alcatel unveils mobile phone under £20
Take a hammer to your piggy-bank
Does your phone support Hair-Band GSM/GPRS/BONO EDGE and HSBC capabilities? If you think a 3G phone is under gravitational stress, or WMV music is a highstreet store...there’s no point paying for a cutting-edge handset. Alcatel is attempting to remedy this by launching a back to basics mobile phone.
Register Hardware would usually spend several paragraphs describing a handset’s features and capabilities, but this isn’t necessary with the £15 OT-E201, because it’s just so basic. It has a 65K colour, CSTN, (96 x 76 pixels) display and operates over GSM 900 and 1800 bandwidths.
The OT-E201 won't break the bank
There is no 3G capability or camera to speak of, but the phonebook can hold 250 contacts and its call records has an internal memory for 10 dialled, received or missed calls. Don’t hold out too much hope for a memory card slot though.
Available in black only, the handset’s remaining features include up to 250 hours of standby time and five hours of talk-time, two games and a calculator.
On the plus side, the OT-E201 is available now and is cheap-as-chips, meaning you won’t have to save-up for months and then wait in line before you get hold of one.
COMMENTS
Been there, done that.
Just earlier today we bought a Noka 1110i (not locked, no contract, choose any SIM) for 1750 Philippine pesos (about 18.90 pounds). There were cheaper options as low as PP1350 (about 14.58 pounds).
We bought it simply for one month local txt and calls to avoid roaming charges if we used our North American phones here.
This will sell faster than iPhone!
Finally, a mobile WITHOUT a camera! As a worker in a nuclear power plant, I will finally be able to take a mobile to the office building! The last one that I could wouldn't fit in my briefcase!
It is just perfect! All the features I will eventually use! People want phones thats take pictures, cameras that record movies, what is next, camcorders that can build clay models out of what they recorded?
USB charger and a screen fit for sunlight would make it great... wait.... isn't it the Moto F3 mentioned above? Too bad the F3 misses a calculator...
I'll get me coat...
Cheaper at Netto
Netto currently has a Nokia phone on sale for about £11
Subsidy?
What's the real unsubsidised price? GBP120?
I'm thinking that mobile phones will become like calculators - you'll just buy one at a garage/stationary store/$2 shop when your current one breaks.
Which would rather wreck the business model of Apple in selling $600 phones.
