DS1 wants a camera phone for his birthday (12th)

[Curiousmama]

Can anyone recommend one that isn't too horrifically expensive...he may lose it after all.
He did want a nintendo dsi but already has ds lite so I managed to talk him out of it I can't afford one to be honest. Only weeks away until Christmas after his birthday, that's the end of October.
TIA

bump

Have you a preference for network - most of the phones will be locked, and the choice of network may make a difference...

Also, on whether he's likely to want to take lots of pix. If so, then the problem with the cheaper end phones is that they don't all have a slot for a memory card. Some have 10 to 15 MB of memory - OK for VGA photos but the better the quality of the camera image, the more memory will be used per photo.

I have a VGA camera in a Motorola phone bought at Argos for about 30 quid, but that was in pre-Christmas sale a year ago.

It has Bluetooth so can send or receive pix from another phone, but because the Motorola is only VGA it won't show pix taken on my other phone (Sony Ericsson) and in terms of storage, the photos from the other phone are 700 to 800 KB so it would not take many to fill 10 MB of memory in the phone.

Depends also on your budget - saw a couple of phones on the Asda website not long ago which were each 34.99 (not sure if they force you to get a 10 quid top-up on top of that cost).

Both are Vodafone PAYG (so you could then put in an Asda PAYG SIM - 8p/min and 4p/text)

Nokia 2630 - MP3 player and VGA camera

Vodafone 533 - 1.3 Mpixel camera, MP3

Not only does the second have a better camera quality, but checking this page on GSM Arena it can easily get 2 GB of music and photos if you use a microSD memory card (one of the cheapest around).

There may be some others on the Argos site, or Carphone Warehouse www.e2save.com site.

The Vodafone site has the Vodafone 533 for 30 quid (but it says "great value at 40 pounds" so I assume they charge for a top-up).

Once the Voda credit is used up, could then swap to Asda if you want for cheaper calls. (at 8p a minute to mobiles and landlines, Asda is cheaper than daytime rate on a BT line to call a mobile!)

Should add that if you gave some idea of what budget region would be OK, it could make some difference - I was working on basis of 40-50 quid tops, on basis of someone nicking it, but trying to get one which wouldn't have him getting the mickey taken as being a poor choice (or finding that if someone transferred a photo, that his couldn't show it).

Of course, if you ask him, he might suggest something to outdo someone at school, but it could make his phone a target of envy.

Have just got the vodafone 533 for my twins and its a great phone with an ok camera for the price. Their first phone so wasn't keen on spending too much

Would be interested to know whether you had to buy a top-up with it, or were you buying the phone in a contract deal, please, magnolia74 ?

Thanks webdude for your time posting also to magnolia for your input.

I thought no more than £60. It is his main present but money's tight and then there's Christmas soon.

I'd prefer a phone for Virgin as I'm with them and have 2 sim cards for Virgin. Also I can phone him free. I'm on contract but would just get PAYG for him for now.

Oh and he's not the type to worry about his peers opinions...quite the opposite

Right, so you've chosen the network, and set a budget, that makes life much easier. How long until his birthday (as I will pop into town early in the week to take a look at what's on offer, if you've a week or two to go.

In another thread there's been discussion about phones being locked. IME most (80%) have been tied to one network, whereas someone else was suggesting lots weren't. I think it's down to where bought (eg CPW may do most which are unlocked but Orange / Three / Voda shops would sell locked ones more often) and how recent - older phones seemed to be locked a lot more than recent ones.

For Virgin Mobile, you could use any that are Virgin branded or T-Mobile (which handles the VM calls).

OK, glad he isn't one from the MTV-generation "mould" and a clone that cannot think for himself.

Spent a while yesterday looking at laptops (another thread) and mobiles. Will post later after I've been to bed (!)

{{ other post was from me just restarting the PC and browser, sorry }}

I've always found Sony Ericsson and Nokia to give better pictures and be easier to connect to a PC than other brands - this one looks quite good, and comes with a 1GB memory card?

Thanks webdude and gagamama.
His birthday is October 30th so a while to go, I just want to be organised and then start Christmas shopping Plus he's having a halloween party at home so need to organise that nearer the time.

Aha... more narrowing down.

I saw that phone on Carphone Warehouse at 49.95 + top-up.

and on E2Save.com (CPW's web store) but that had a 5.99 delivery charge.

As an alternative (with a 3.2 Mpixel camera instead of 2 Mpixel, 60 MB of phone storage + up to 2 GB microSD, but no FM radio) I saw the
Samsung U600 for 44.95 + top-up (free delivery).

It's a better quality camera, and I'd certainly give it consideration but can quite understand if you prefer the Sony Ericsson.

(I have the K800i which has the 3.2 Mpixel camera in, too. Also looked at the Nokia 3600 with 3.2 Mpixel camera, but it was 59.95 so would go over your limit when you added on the top-up cost.)

Oh rats, just realised gagamama wasn't OP.

That Sony Ericsson W302 does look OK for the job. and comes in at 59.95. Looks like we've gone to the limit of the budget...

It is awkward when there are lots of phones at 29.95 and 39.95 but then you see that's only on one particular network, and VM or T-Mobile is 10 or 20 quid more (and other times the other way round, of course!)

I'll take a look in Asda, too, and make a note of their models (the Asda ones are unlocked so a VM SIM would work fine).

Thanks so much for your time WebDude

I do like the look of the Samsung U600 and Ds1 did say last night he's keen on the video aspect. £60 is ok as it includes the top up and means he can use the sim I have. Using this means I can ring him free from my phone So do you think I should go for it?

Seems I would have to take out a Virgin contract with the Samsung U600 from e2save.

Virgin have emailed to say I can get £20 off through them because of my usage.

DS1 also said he wants to make his own ringtones and a video.

???? re contract... There's the U600 Black, and U600 Black (under 'Clearance') in the PAYG section.

I just went to the link I put earlier :
www.e2save.com/payg-phone/Samsung+U600+Black+Clearance/4/U600BKCL and then clicked on "Buy" and it showed me no monthly fee and no contract.

Hmmm, don't know how I managed to wipe out the colour from those screen dump pix! Anyway, I did put boxes around the important bits.

Just looked again to double check and it was 55 quid (54.95) not 60, and has free delivery.

AFAIK the 'clearance' ones are reduced to clear them out, not 'seconds' or 'refurbished'.

On the CPW site, the 'clearance' Samsung U600s were 80 quid (O2), 60 quid (VM, T-Mobile and Orange) and 40 quid (Voda), all plus 10 quid top-up.

MP3 ringtones can be used on the Samsung.

Phone has video option... but you will need to use the spare 5 quid to get a microSD memory card as video will gobble up memory!!!

I bought a 2 GB microSD card on Ebay for under a fiver. Have used IJT (though not for my microSD card purchase) and they are prompt.

cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=280394049422

Thanks a lot WD appreciate the help. I'll check that out.