Tag: nokia

My Nokia E61i

I have been eyeing a new phone to replace my existing Nokia 6230 for a while now. I finally caved in and bought a brand new Nokia E61i from the Nokia priority dealer in the Pune city area today.Nokia 6230

My last smart phone was a BlackBerry 7100. The phone was tuned for e-mail like other BlackBerry’s. However, the 7100 fit well in my jeans since RIM managed to squeeze in two alphabets for every key. Setting up GMail on the BlackBerry was a breeze and did not require additional tweaks. Using the proprietary BlackBerry network, my desktop Outlook contact book always stayed in sync with my BlackBerry. I could even charge my BlackBerry over USB – a feature that was extremely handy when I traveled overseas.

The BlackBerry 7100 (and later models) are killer e-mail devices because they do the following extremely well.

  • push e-mail
  • new e-mail notification
  • a huge local e-mail cache with search
  • a complete contact book to store names, phone numbers and e-mail addresses
  • keep your e-mail, desktop contact book and calendar in sync without cables
  • the ability to modify your “sent from”
  • auto configure access to GMail and other popular personal e-mail providers

However, without the BlackBerry network, it is next to impossible to provide the functionality listed above. Joining the BlackBerry network in India costs Rs. 2000 a month which is by no means priced for individuals. In comparison, AirTel GPRS costs Rs. 350 a month with no caps on how much data you can transfer. Additionally, we decided to avoid Microsoft Exchange and opt for Google apps for our office e-mail infrastructure. Until and unless you plan to be on the BlackBerry network, a BlackBerry might not be a good fit.

Nokia E61i

There are several phones that compete fairly in the general smart phone category. I had a serious look at Samsung i600 (~Rs. 18,500), Nokia E62 (~Rs. 12,500). The Nokia E61i was the final winner primarily because it is based on the very stable Symbian OS. Also, it is an improvement over the earlier (tried and tested) Nokia E61 and was launched in May 2007. In terms of features and connectivity options the E61i is comparable to other phones in the category.

Nokia E61i - package contents

The Nokia E61i costs a little north of Rs. 18,850 here in India. Additional charges including VAT apply. In my conversation with the dealer, he claimed that Nokia phones have only a 1% retail margin and therefore credit card charges would be over and above the price of the phone (an additional 2%). Unlike the US, additional discounts are not offered by carriers. You usually end up paying the full cost of the phone and having a zero commitment contract.

The phone comes in a box with a battery charger, a single battery, a memory card (microSD) of 256MB, a pop port headset and a CA-53 data cable. The Nokia CA-53 data cable happens to be the most popular data cable as far as duplication by after-market vendors. I have attached a screen shot of the cable to help identify the real thing. Fake Nokia CA-53 cables never work as intended.

I will be looking to get the best out of the phone in the coming weeks and promise to highlight some of the best applications available out there.

Related Links and Credits:

Nokia E61i is just about good for anything

Nokia CA 35

GPRS and m-blogging in India

Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson are excited about the potential of m-blogging in the Metros according to this article in the Economic Times. The article is bullish about the future of m-blogging but does not really put across any hard facts.

Notice the fact that of the consumers who opt for a GPRS-enabled handheld, less than one in 4 opt for GPRS from their mobile provider. Only the carriers have themselves to blame for the current trend. I believe that poor support for GPRS services and awareness of applications for the service are to blame.

There are over 156 million mobile subscribers in India. According to industry estimates, around 10% of mobile subscribers in metros use GPRS facility and 2-3% in tier II and III cities have hooked on to GPRS facility, which allows fast internet access on mobiles. Approximately 40-45% phones sold in India are GPRS enabled. According to IDC, in India the sale of camera phones is registering around 25% quarter-on-quarter growth.

Globally there are 200 million bloggers. Industry estimates put 100,000 as the figure for India. (According to Blog Herald, there are 1.2 million bloggers in India). And the number is growing. “The number of m-bloggers is fast growing though the trend is just an year old,” says Nokia’s Mr Taneja. Nokia N series has m-blogging feature to capture the potential of this segment.

Who needs 3G? Lets just go Wifi!

Netgear SPH101I finally tried out a Skype-Wifi phone this weekend. The Netgear Skype Wifi phone SPH101 was on display at a local IT-exhibition here in Pune. The phone was already preconfigured to pick up on the Wifi network at the Netgear stall. I picked up the phone, signed into my skype account and made a local call. The call clarity and quality were average and I enjoyed the feel of the keys and the overall skype experience. The keys were configured similar to any other standard phone with 3 alphabets to a key. The phone retails for approximately Rs. 15,500.00 in India, not a small order by any measure.

The Wifi phone itself not really a revolutionary breakthrough. Skype has been bundled with other data-enabled phones in the past – specifically, Pocket PC and Windows mobile. Also, at that price-point, the Wifi phone does not exactly make sense as a replacement for a fixed line telephone. But what makes Skype exciting to me is the idea of a global identity. With Skype you no longer need to know my locally relevent contact number, area code and country code. I can also purchase local numbers in different countries using SkypeIn and have those identities map to my single Skype identity. The global traveler (ahem ;)) could stay connected wherever there is a civilized airport with Wifi.

As long as I am signed into Skype that is. Mobile data connectivity here in India is a story by itself. I am currently signed into GPRS with AirTel. Depending on the day, month, time, latitude, longitude, environment, and of course – depending on how the god of the air feels (Vayu), I could get average connectivity or no connectivity at all.

Could Skype on 3G change all that? Skype is still exploring VoIP on the Hutchison 3G networks in Europe starting way back in Febuary.

In an effort to scope user demand, 3 Sweden is offering a Skype bundle with a 3G flat-rate subscription and 3G data card. With a mobile flat-rate data plan from Hutchison 3, users can make unlimited Skype calls. Christian Salbaing, MD of Europe Telecommunications at Hutchison 3, downplayed concerns that Skype traffic would cannibalise voice revenues. He described it as an attractive value added service that would help tempt more customers onto its network.

The pleasures of flat-rate dialing were too tempting to resist. As I placed the SPH101 down and turned around to leave the Netgear stall – my thoughts were all about the current 3G bids taking place in India. Is there a solution on the cards?

Just then, my eyes landed on the stalls of a popular VoIP provider in India – Phonewala. Phonewala were offering Broadband+VoIP-enabled PCO’s (for those interested, PCO is short for Public Call Office). With a simple Linksys phone adapter (approximately Rs. 4200), Broadband connection (Rs. 900 p.m for 256kbps) and a handset – PCO’s could offer “dial the world at Rs. 2.99/-“. Great, the local tea-stall owner can now call his cousin in Atlanta at rock-bottom rates.

Brilliant! What if PCO’s began offering Wifi? The entire city of Pune would be connected within a few days. We could give some of the big wireless guys a run for their money. Of course, there remains the question of how would the poor PCO operator get paid? But then with our history of socialism – I am sure the city municipal can work something out 🙂 (for those not laughing yet, please don’t mind my rambling).

At the end of the day, the Indian private wireless providers just don’t want to have to do anything that might disturb their revenues. I wish they would stop haggling and seed a long-delayed wireless data revolution in India. Sure voice revenues would start to whittle down – try focusing on areas where there is real value.

Oh and just so that you should know, using Skype in India is not politically correct according to the Economic Times – “Illegal web calls by BPO face axe“.

AirTel GPRS settings for prepaid users – Nokia 6230

Important: To those who found this page while searching for settings for airtel gprs. Make sure you have activated Mobile Office first. As far as I know, Mobile Office or AirTel GPRS is not free for prepaid users. If you were to e-mail me – please note that I cannot help you if your phone is very different from a Nokia 6230, 6030, N-series, 3030 and some of the other standard Nokia gadgets.

Your best bet is probably to visit an AirTel shop like I did. If you must do it yourself – the AirTel GPRS access-point in Pune (and maybe other cities) is airtelgprs.com. Try setting that on your phone. There is no username and password needed, but you need to have activated Mobile Office as shown in AirTel pre-paid GPRS Activation and Usage.

More gprs related articles on Sukshma.net.

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Finally received GPRS settings for my phone. All I did was stop by my local AirTel prepaid shop, they fixed up my Nokia 6230 for GPRS usage.

While speaking to the salesmen at the shop, I requested for the settings to be (at least) written down so that I might share them here. Unfortunately, the gentleman who was aware of how the Nokia 6230 should be set up refused to write the instructions down (odd?). He setup the phone and handed it over.

After a quick glance at my phone settings, I could figure out he had made the following changes: Go into Settings >> Connectivity >> GPRS >> GPRS modem settings. Alias for access point was “Airtel live!” and GPRS access point was “airtelfun.com” (Update: Turns out, these settings are really rubbish – the settings in the next paragraph are the ones that work).

Step out of Settings, go back into Web >> Settings >> Connection Settings. Create a new Connection set by selecting an (empty) slot. Edit the new connection settings, call it “Mobile office“, set your home page, disable all proxies, select “GPRS” as the data bearer. Select Bearer settings, set the GPRS access point to “airtelgprs.com“, authentication type “normal“, login type “automatic“. Leave the username and password as empty.

Let me know if this works for you. Remember to activate GPRS. by sending over SMS “GPRSACT” to 511. Also remember that they are charging Re 12/- per day.

Web and GPRS network-enabled applications started to work fine immediately after.

AirTel pre-paid GPRS Activation and usage

Update: AirTel has recently discontinued the SMS activation and deactivation service for GPRS/Mobile Office. You now need to call 56561, press 1 for English, press 1 to activate GPRS. It takes about 2 to 4 days to have GPRS activated, painfully slow. To deactivate GPRS or Mobile Office, call 56562, press 1 for English, press 1 to deactivate GPRS.

To activate, SMS “GPRSACT” to 511. AirTel will begin charging you Re 14.99/- per day. You will need to SMS “MO” (Mobile office?) to 501 for the precise settings for your phone (I did not get a response with settings as promised), or call their customer-service.

To deactivate, send “GPRSDEACT” to 511.

I also have a brief article on setting up your Nokia 6230 for AirTel’s Mobile Office.

AirTel LIVE! and GPRS are not the same. For AirTel LIVE, I suggest you start with the AirTel web portal and FAQ on AirTel LIVE by clicking here.