Nokia's reboot of the 5310 is a blissfully dumb phone that will lug some mp3s about just fine The Nokia 5310 XpressMusic was the primary tormentor of late-2000s commuters*. With a powerful built-in speaker and room for a micro SD card, shellsuit-sporting hoodlums could serenade weary bus-goers with the latest computer-generated noise from the Ministry of Sound. Fond memories, right? Now you can relive them again as HMD …
I looked up information by country, and it seems that it's already been shut down in Japan, South Korea, Australia, and Canada. Taiwan, New Zealand, the United States, and Switzerland will be following suit soon, some of their providers already having dropped coverage while some others maintain it. The remaining areas where 2G will remain for some time are Europe, Africa, and South America, though details are not clear. Keep that in mind before buying something.
At least a decade more worldwide
They can kill 3G and 4G quite easily but the 2G spectrum can't be killed outside of Japan and a few other places due to being used by Emergency services, most of Africa and South America and a whole lot more countries.
Many countries have already planned the reallocation of 2G (& 3G) frequencies for 5G services as it's the only way to provide sufficient bandwidth and soon you won't be able to buy much new equipment for 2G services. Note, reallocating some of the spectrum for 5G doesn't mean the emergency services can't continue to use it, as they only need a small portion.
You can do that with most terms describing something using modern technology. A lot of the terms are either technical terms that have been generalized or invented words that save time. An example is streaming, a technical term describing a method of sending data, and quite a generic one at that. The public seems to have redefined it to mean receiving video or audio data online, whether that data is streamed or predownloaded. They rarely use it for many other things where streaming is used, like streaming video out of their machine for a videocall or streaming data in both directions for a torrent download.
In the case of "podcast", it's a relatively short way of saying "media file attached to a subscribable feed, likely an RSS feed". Just like "blog" is a short way of saying "a website on which articles are posted" or "wiki" is a short way of saying "a website that can be edited by the public". I don't see much problem condensing terms like that.
Having fond memories of the original I bought one of these as a cheap MP3 player and radio. I shouldn't have. Compared to the original it feels cheap and flimsy. However the most annoying aspect of the device is the MP3 player. I loaded up an SD card with some music files and started the player. It gave me a list of every file on the card with the only way to select a particular album being to scroll through the list to get to the start of the album I wanted to play. There's no wayy to list albums or navigate folders.
Yeah, but it's only thirty quid. If it lasts a year or two (and 2G will probably be around for a lot longer than that in the UK), you're still winning. Seriously thinking about upgrading from the 105 just to get threaded text messages and Bluetooth. Can't quite work out what internet it has though (WiFi? WAP?!) – personally I'd like it to have none, but it seems to have a browser for some odd reason.
Looking back at the Nokia 3310 HMD reboot, a 3G version followed the 2G only one after about 6 months.
Also the price was £49.99 but O2 were soon doing them for £20, which is where I got my backup phone.
2G phones are no good for Three already. Vodafone have suggested sunsetting their 3G in a couple years.
I believe their statement there means that you do not have to plug in a wire to serve as an antenna. Most phones with FM radio capability do not have an antenna built in and use the wire connected to the 3.5MM jack to serve as the reception antenna; without it, you either get an error message or just get static. That said, I couldn't find a manual for this device and I'm certainly not buying one, so I cannot confirm my supposition.
If that's the correct explanation, then it makes sense. But it's not the first time I've seen the phrase "wireless FM radio" where wireless is being used redundantly because everything has to be "wireless" these days. Mind you, I'm old enough that I can still see the term "wireless FM Radio" and think the "FM Radio" part of it is redundant because I already *know* what a feckin' wireless is.
Now get off ma lawn unless you are here to help me string the 30 foot aerial across to the washing line post.
Stringing aerials to the washing line post is a bad idea. I found that out years ago... when various trousers and sweaters ended up wrapped round the wire due to strong wind
Beer because I needed one after having to climb the pole and cut down my own aerial to retrieve my clothes
That hasn't been an issue for most of the lifetime of FM. Even the earliest portable radios could receive it with antennas much less than the wavelength. Consider a simple radio with a telescoping antenna. While it may need to be extended to receive weak signals, it still receives plenty with the antenna retracted. That size for many sets would fit just fine along the length of this phone. Whether they did it is another story, but if they did, it would work.
2G only? How long before this thing's a paperweight? Here in US, Verizon quit allowing non-4G (with VoLTE) phone registrations a almost 2 years ago, AT&T has shut down their 2G network. T-Mo says they're dumping it around 2022. Sprint had no plans (hadn't even finished rolling VoLTE yet...) but got bought by T-Mo, who is rapidly dismantling their antiquated network to roll out additional 4G channels.
Don't get me wrong, the cell cos sell a handful of "dumb phones" models here (the unofficial term since they are the opposite of smart phones.) But they support 4G and VoLTE, since everything earlier is getting shut off ASAP here. My dad has a LG Exalt LTE and it's odd.. the ONLY hint that it's not a 10 or 20 year old flip phone is the "4G" symbol at the top, better call quality (since it's HD voice), and waaaaay down in the settings (which do use the menu buttons -- no touch screen) there's a "wifi" and "hotspot" menu. Hook it up to a Linux box and be shocked to find that it's actually running Android 7 (properly locked down so nothing can be sideloaded onto the phone.)
I'd suggest Nokia do that, do a 5310 LTE. It's not for me but it'd expand the potential market a lot.
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