Too much vino? LG brings Wine Smart oldster-mobe to Europe

The Wine Smart is a new 4G Android phone from LG, and it looks vastly different to anything else on the market: it’s a flip phone. Yep, it flips like it's 1999. Both LG and Samsung have been selling Android flip phones in their native land for a while. Doro tried a slider with the Doro 740, but European availability of an …

[Dan Paul]

Only thing wrong is ......

the keyboard. I had an old LG flip phone for years and it never died, had great battery life and great signal strength, just had that damn alphanumeric keypad instead of a real Qwerty keyboard.

Note for LG: Even us old people have learned how to text.

[mythicalduck]

Re: Only thing wrong is ......

QWERTY would be nice, but still, physical buttons has me interested!

[DropBear]

Re: Only thing wrong is ......

"Note for LG: Even us old people have learned how to text."

I, for one, would absolutely murder whoever necessary without thinking twice for an up-to-date full-qwerty Android. Emphasis on "FULL" though - none of that "portrait" Blackberry-style nonsense. And yes, my typing accuracy after several years of touch-torture is still under 50% (as in over half of letters typed go in wrong). Sigh... one can dream...

[Anonymous Coward]

At last, a phone that is more use as a phone rather than being a miniature games device. The thing I miss most on my smartphone is a physical keyboard to punch in phone numbers.

Another advantage with the flip phone is that you are much less likely to pocket dial.

[sabroni]

Another advantage with the flip phone

is open to answer and close to hang up!

[AbelSoul]

Re: Another advantage with the flip phone

"is open to answer and close to hang up!"

Which in turn provides the added benefit of making you feel just a teency bit Star Trek every time you use it.

[chivo243]

Re: Another advantage with the flip phone

I would love a flipfone. I would love to flip my flipfone open at a Monday morning meeting and say "Beam me up Scotty, there's no intelligent life here"

[Triggerfish]

Re: Another advantage with the flip phone

Which in turn provides the added benefit of making you feel just a teency bit Star Trek every time you use it

Ah the reason I bought the Motorola V3.

[GX5000]

Smartphones aren't phones, they're Big Brother and games

You'll take my Rugby II away when I say I'm good and done with it !!

[Mage]

Choice

Not everyone wants a flat slab of display. Hence sales of covers etc.

Sliders and flip phones make more sense.

Lots of people too, HAVE A LIFE! They have a tabet/Laptop etc for Internet / games / work. They just want a FLIPPING PHONE!

Of course it ought to have an MP3 player, Camera, Radio, calculator. That WOULD be like 1999 if you had to carry five gadgets instead of one.

Email? No, it can wait till I'm home, or I have the Netbook/Laptop with me.

GPS? I always know where I am, how to get were I'm going and how to get home. Or I study a map first.

Play Store, and other Google App? No thanks. If I want a Nintendo DS I'll buy one. If I want Google to know where I am, I'll tell them.

Web Browser.? You need a silly 5" to 6" phone and expensive data contract. No thanks.

I have big glass front Android phone. I never turn on 3G or WiFi data.

P.S. The Doro and some other phones supposedly for old people are overpriced and 2G Only. Some places only the Regulator needs 6 months notice for ending 2G and none to retail or users! It's assumed everyone has at least 3G.

Other places are keeping 2G (as it does some things better than 4G) and ditching 3G.

[Simon Rockman]

Re: Choice

There are quite a few 3G senior phones - Doro 615 and 624. But anyway it's far more likely that 2G will outlive 3G. One network gave a 2020 close-down date for 3G and 2025 for 2G

[Spoonsinger]

Erm.. my phone is a flippy 'feature' phone , (a tad old, but in that wine colour).

Reasons:-

1) Although old, it still last a few weeks between charges.

2) Don't really need it to do anything apart from make calls, do some SMS, take occasional low quality photos.

3) Doesn't break when you put it in your pocket, (or actually give you an over prominent bulge in such areas)

4) Doesn't have a contract

5) When people, (i.e. friends - who are in their 40's), laugh at you for having it, you are then totally in your rights to tell them to f**k off or actually pick away at all the things which are wrong with them or their life with no guilt at all.

[Johnny Canuck]

Me too!

Still using my old Nokia slider with numberpad. Lasts a week between charges and has very good phone performance.

[John Robson]

Re: Me too!

Whilst I'd love to agree with you....

I would have bought a feature phone, except that I had a few devices on the shelf, and it seemed pointless. So I now run an HTC Desire S.

It has most of it's "smart" features turned off - and how long do you think the battery lasts?

A week? more? less?

The 10% battery alert went off and I realised that I couldn't remember when I had last charged it, so I checked on the battery status screen: ten days, 19 hours. And it still had 10% left...

The other thing I like is that I can sync contacts to it once in a blue moon, but that's often enough to have the important contact details available when I need them.

This looks like a reasonable compromise - smart enough to keep contacts up to date, physical keys, protected screen... I guess that if you disable all the pointless ctuff then the battery will last well. I'd quite like an e-ink screen on the outside, so I don't even need to open it up to check if there are any missed calls/texts, or whether it's on silent - but that's a minor quibble.

[Alan Denman]

A phone that protects itself screen wise.

Revolutionary, but we prefer our bendy smashy phablets as they are.