And instead of giving you the specs from the nokia site, here’s some things I can do with it:

• Phone people; yup! Granted I use a bluetooth adaptor for that most of the time (well when I know it’s a long call) because it’s quite a meaty phone to hold around
• Type a lot faster with the QWERTY keyboard; oh yeah, useful when blogging and writing texts to people. I really enjoy using the keyboard to type stuff and I can definitely get more words done compared to a normal numpad.
• See all my things at a glance; beauty of Nokia phones (using Symbian S60v3) is that you have a lovely standby screen which is flooded with information that I can check out at a glance, this includes the last two text messages I’ve received (and a quick preview of the texts), calendar entries (more on that), new email and text alerts, missed calls and answer message alerts, wifi scanning (says whether or not it detects wifi spots). The todo list is by far the most useful one out of them all
• Todo list; it’s becoming more and more difficult to remember stuff I need to do, having a phone to quickly enter them on a todo list saves me time remembering them as well as motivate me to do them (since it’s written and all)
• Wifi and 3g; wifi is one of those beauty features that allow mobile interneting a breeze, since I dont have a all day internet mobile package wifi is useful for me to use my phone to it’s maximum capabilities. I have quite a lot of emails coming through and when I wake up in the morning, the first thing I do isnt turn the computer on, wait for it to start up and check my mail, I just check the mail through the phone, no start up needed since it’s already on and I can read it when I head to the tube. It’s also useful when you’re visiting people and they have wifi available, I mean a laptop is cool but doing all the laptop stuff on a mobile is cooler since you don’t need to lug a laptop. But yeah, if wifi isnt available, than it’s 3g time, decent broadband like speeds so it’s all good.
• Surf the web; mm this baby can display the entire page with it’s wide screen and all. Makes more sense than portrait since it’s all narrow. I’ve got all sorts of sites to browse on including Google Reader, Twitter, Flickr, Muse board ( thanks to the new mobile skin I made), Facebook (everyone’s doing it :(), RTM, and Calendar.
• Email; nice to check emails here, it has an email button to make the process easier, I use email to send flickr images, todo items as well as blogging
• Fring; it’s an awesome app that I can use for skyping and msn’ing, they’ve recently updated their software so that msn is a lot nicer. (I’ve used the skype app for phoning people abroad, New York was an example)
• TomTom; now I know I dont drive but when people drive me it’s nice to know where I am, this isnt a necessity but there are times where I’ve found it ultra useful, including finding Nando’s.
• Syncing; not only can I sync my todo list to my outlook at home, I can also sync my google calendar onto my phone and check out events when mobile, pretty useful and makes use of the calendar display thing when I’m on the standby screen
• Notes; a nice place for me to write up my blogs, I used this a lot when I’m on the tube and then email them to myself for further updating and posting. Makes my tube journeys a lot more productive (instead of just reading the papers).
• Youtube; this app is awesome, view AND download youtube videos onto my phone, it’s fun to show people random clips
• Underground tube map app, sometimes I need that damn map
• Panorama photos; not just normal photos that all camerasphone do, this baby does pano shots, it automatically detects the edges and yeah, instant pano shots
• JoikuSpot; I can create a wifi hotspot for my laptop or someone else’s laptop, dead useful at times when I want to use internet on another pc
• Putty; featured in Maddox’s iphone article, you can make Scarlett Johannson moist!
• View PDFs; sometimes I get pdf bills I would like to check on the phone, not that important but fancy to have
• Nes emulator, tetris and solitaire games; sometimes I don’t carry my ds lite or psp (I’m spoilt :$) so it’s nice to have something to play with

So yeah, very useful phone! It’s nice to have it all packed into one! I’m not keen on having my music there however since I love an awesome chunk of hard disk space to listen to my t00ns haha.

For my contract, I got myself a dolphin £20 plan at first which had 200 txts and 70 minutes, I later on upgraded to the Racoon 25 with 100 txts and 220 minutes, not sure why but it encourages me to phone people a lot now (inn keeps assuming I’m only phoning her because I’m wasting credit). But yeah, now it puts a smile on my face when I have an excuse to phone people hehe.

Anyway, after a lovely lecture at Mobile Business today (as well as a nice talk about my project report with my supervisor). I had the urge to do something immediately when I got back home..

No not that (filthy minds you), and no not finish my report! Rather then following the crowd and continuing to juice out 60 pages worth of project banter, (I’m on 57 now anyway so I can take a break haha), I decide to.. FLASH MY PHONE!……….AGAIN!

Now I dont think I blogged about the time I flashed my phone (actually I just found it haha). But the first time I received my phone, I was instantly appalled by Orange’s stupid Homescreen crap they’ve put on the phone. These days, mobile operators would like meddle with a perfectly functional and cool phone firmware and shove alot of their operator specific crap in it to restrict users when using their phones. Usually its to protect themselves from people using other features etc. Anyway, the first time I flashed it I got it done professionally (though the location I got it flashed from wasn’t too professional looking, in fact it was their house and they just do it with their laptop haha (they have the gear before you ask!)). Anyway, that was fine, my phone was flashed then (I also suffered a nasty fall that day but lets not talk about it haha)… the second time was when Nokia announced that you can flash your own phone. Being someone who enjoys having their stuff up to date I jumped on the software upgrades etc and downloaded the nokia software, it was nice and official so it was alot more chilled and relaxed to do it etc.

Anyway, the thing I didnt know was the fact that it recognised my product code and that it required an operator specific firmware. So BAM! I’m stuck with the operator specific crap… AGAIN! I wasn’t having none of that, I didnt really want to spend more money to get it debranded again so I opted in looking at ways of doing it myself. Now there are, but they are DODGY and usually carry a risk in bricking your phone. But I did it anyway, and guess what? Bricked phone. Had to go back to that professional place and get it reflashed in order to get my phone working again.

So yeah… after that traumatic experience, here comes part 2. My supervisor / lecturer talked about his new swanky N95 phone and talked about how Orange were sly enough to disable voip calling. He was then googling for solutions to get past this and in the end he was contacted by someone who gave him the solution.. which was.. ladies and gentleman, flashing your phone. The whole phone debranding thing sent shivers down my spine. Though for my lecturers case he managed to get it done successfully, using the same dodgy software that I once used. So what does that leave me? I’m stuck here googling for new firmware updates and whether or not there are new safer methods out to do the job, and strangely..there was! Which was out in 2007 (where have I been). The method is alot safer and requires changing the phone id to a generic code. Reading more into it I found out that you can also turn N70 phones into an N70 music edition phone (firmware wise). So yeah, it got me all excited and this is where the crowd all shakes their heads, tut and go “geeks will always be geeks” haha.

So yeah.. I’m waiting for my phone battery to charge. I have my phone all setup and ready to go. Once again I’m going to panic over it but it does seem like a reasonably easy task this time, not to mention the fact that I’ve tried the official route before and it seemed to have worked :). So yeah, another crazy day of phone flashing and all.

So yeah, if you cant reach me on the phone after this.. chances are I’ll be heading back to that damn place to get my phone professionally reflashed because I bricked it again haha. Also, if you play me on Tetris DS around this time and notice that I’m beating you mercilessly, that means I bricked it again, if you find me very agitated or antisocial, that means I bricked it again. Haha. But yeah, if I feel happy after this ordeal, that means I’ve successfully flashed my mobile phone and managed to add in a TINY bit of functionality to my phone which I’ll probably won’t use anyway haha. So yeah, this is where you go “geeks will be geeks” again with their constant need for updating stuff even though it adds no real benefit.

Update: Haha, well, just managed to get my phone RE RE Flashed. It worked the first time and I had the new music edition thingy but I felt it was kinda rubbish so I reflashed it to a standard generic one. So yeah, it worked Just funny how I felt the need to reflash it because something was bothering me haha. So yeah, everything is fine and dandy

I also ordered a creative x-fi (i think thats the name) soundcard. No idea why, probably because it felt stupid ordering £70 worth of things and then having to pay £8 in post and packaging. I usually shop my hardware in batches so yeah.

Anyway, here it is

The motor is pretty loud as most reviewers stated, but the speed and sharpness of the lens is amazing. You can instantly notice the shutter speeds being extremely fast when you’re using arpeture mode and all.

Here’s the first photo I took with it

There is a possibility that I’ll be going to a wedding in Halifax with inn and alice (jallas from the messageboard) to do photography and all. Have to see if its feasible and that travel isn’t too extortionate, otherwise it sounds like an a ok and all. Would be quite fun to do some paid photography once in a while (even though alice is the only one who’s getting paid, but you know what I mean.. I think)

The games were short but fun to play. I particularly like the silly introductions of different “baton forms”. Stuff like the Mohawk or the Elephant. Cracks me up hehe.

I also ordered Zelda Twilight Princess. Should be delivered tommorow.

Though saying that, I hardly worked out and did any upper body exercises, so I kinda had it coming. My whole body was sore from playing wii haha. The strange thing was that it all came lingering in action on the day after I bought the wii rather the next day. I really shouldnt swing my arms that madly when I play bowling or whatever haha.

I managed to get myself wiiplay with an extra wiimote. I played wii play with my mum a bit and she got slightly addicted to it and all.

Selling games was pretty easy, GAME were selling certain games for £20 so I managed to make about £90 with 5 games. I did a few extra game sellage and I got my £164 worth of vouchers. The remaining was done through CEX.

My second problem was the availability of wii’s. They are STILL rare to purchase. As soon as they are in stock, they are sold out. This meant I had to find a clever way of buying these beauties. I viewed a few online sites to check the availability and stories on how people got their wii’s. I eventually found out that GAME do stock wii’s one a week and that they are purchased in a first come first serve basis. So the trick is to phone up every day until they have stock. It took me several days to finally get some stock. As soon as that day arrived, I was at GAME at 9.30 something ready to buy the damn thing. At first they said they DO have stock but its still waiting to be delivered, they told me to write my name on a list and that they’ll phone me up when its ready on that day.

I managed to find a Cafe Nerro and just sat there playing Trauma Center. Eventually I got a phone call saying my Wii was ready. I rushed into GAME and BAM, was a proud owner of a wii.

It was the most exciting thing ever, and the best thing was that I didnt pay any money for it haha. I felt very spoilt then hehe.

Above are some wii photos. Its far too exciting getting it set up and all, but eventually I calmed down and go down to some playing, Mii making and Wii sporting.

Some things I needed still were; another wiimote, some more games, an SD card, nunchuck and a component cable.

Wii Sports is amazing, although they’re only tech demos that came free with the wii, it was still nonetheless an awesome game. The innovation behind the wiimote was amazing. Its definitely a fresh and exciting idea of controlling stuff. Wii sports was highly addictive, I think I went nuts at it the whole day. You eventually get more subdued to the fact that you dont need to swing the wiimote excessively (unless you are determined to be in wiihaveaproblem.com)

Overall I was very impressed and happy with my purchase, it was even more satisfying getting the thing for free :D.

I immediately started skinning my ds to a nicer looking skin (iphone looking one) and tried a few videos. Everything worked, the music was nice and video on it was disturbingly cool haha.

A quick video demonstration can be seen below