Mobile Phone Buying Guide

Blackberry, iPhone or Smartphone – which is best?  With the most attractive contracts running around 2 years, your next choice could be with you for a very long time. KitGuru opens the lid on mobiles to help you decide, which one’s best for me?

Technologies
If you type a lot, then having a proper keyboard will be the most important thing – typing all day on a screen can be very irritating – whereas Smartphones and Blackberrys have great keyboards.
Accessing email can be hit and miss. Most modern phones have decent mail connection technology, but Blackberry stand head and shoulders above the rest – especially if you (a) travel internationally or (b) have lots of friends with Blackberrys.
Media organisation and playback is key for many people, and here it’s the usability of the software – alongside the screen quality that will be important. iPhone and Smartphones with touch screens are much easier to use. Smartphone often plug into your PC and act like a hard drive – making music/video transfer very easy. iPhones normally want to connect to iTunes before you can move media.
Are you happy with the applications that come on the phone? If not, then remember that many apps are available for purchase for iPhones and Blackberrys, but are often free for Windows Smartphones.
When it comes to camera quality, audio quality and the ability to use the device as a phone – then almost all products are fine.

Service provider
While Vodafone presents itself as great for business, O2 as the main supplier for iPhones, Orange as your communications buddy and T-Mobile as affordable for the masses.  Go back 10 years and there were differences. Now, each of these networks provides a very similar service. Only Vodafone guarantees a signal in your house – with 100% UK coverage – but even the later providers like ‘3’ offer more than 98%. Mobile broadband speeds can vary and remember that communication on trains can often be grim.

Contract
Here you are balancing lower prices against choice. Handsets are expensive and they need to be paid for – initially by the service provider, but ultimately by you, the customer. T-Mobile will give you almost any phone on a 2 year contract for less than £40 with a complete package, with Smartphones starting around £20. Given that it costs up to £100 to fill your car with petrol, mobile phones are now one of the smallest monthly ‘optional’ costs we have and it is hard to go wrong.

At KitGuru we like Blackberry 9700/8520 models for business, the latest iPhones and LG HD devices for media as well as the HTC Touch Pro2 for Windows. KitGuru has been around the world, from Hong Kong to Las Vegas, with T-Mobile and never had an issue. All phones/providers can go wrong, so remember to get insurance. £5 a month might seem a lot at the start, but if you need to buy a £400 replacement phone, then it will seem like money well spent.

Buy links…
T-Mobile
O2
Vodafone
Orange
3
Virgin

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