Vodafone touts low-tech phone for app-phobes
Talk'n'text - and not much else
Say hello to the Vodafone Emporia RL1, a 60 quid handset designed solely for voice calls and texting - and none of that app nonsense.
And with large, clearly labelled buttons, the RL1 is not only geared toward the smartphone-phobic but also folk whose eyes and motor skills might not by up to touchscreen navigation.
The 92g phone has a OLED screen, and only connects over 2G networks - on the 900MHz and 1800MHz bands only, we're afraid, making it less useful as a low-cost phone you can take overseas without worry too much about dropping it in the pool or having it nicked.
The RL1's two nods toward smartphone functionality: a calendar and an alarm.
The Emporia is available from Vodafone on PAYG now. ®
COMMENTS
Nice idea - but HOW MUCH?
You can pick up perfectly good Nokia entry level phones on PAYG for twenty quid, so really - why this crazy price?
I think it's a good idea...
Some people just neither want nor need a phone full of crap, which the marketeers seem to insist are necessary for human survival...
Sixty quid!
Why does it cost 12x as much as any other "dumb" PAYG phone???
On the other hand
Quite a few of those OAP's are the reason you don't have to speak German.
(Not an OAP, but I disagree with almost all you said too...)
How much?
I picked up a Samsung e1170 for 1p incl delivery from Phones4U for just this purpose. The Samsung is 2G only, offers calls, texts and a stop-watch and has a battery life measured in weeks. It is also rubberised so easy to pick up and takes a few knocks and splashes. It even came unlokced so I could put my own SIM in it. I really can't believe this phone is 7999 times better than the Samsung.
