After the previous incident with my Nokia 1100, it has not been working well. It still works — it can take calls, it can make calls, it can send SMS — what else do I need from a mobile phone? Except it does not ring at incoming calls. So I decided it is time for me to buy a new mobile phone.
This is what I bought — Three Skypephone on prepaid for $179 including $20 credit (off eBay, as Skype is an eBay company).
Three Skypephone next to my dying Nokia 1100
It is basically a cheap 3G phone made by Chinese company Amoi, locked to the Three network (so all you guys on Three can now call my phone for free!) Feature is pretty basic in today’s standard. It can’t do HSPDA, has a 2MP camera (1600×1200 image, 176×144 video), Bluetooth and Java. However, it is my first phone with colour screen! It’s also my first phone with MP3 ringtone, and I didn’t even have one with polyphonic ringtone either! Also my first with Bluetooth and Java and 3G and… So you can pretty much guess I am getting more Wow from this phone than Windows Vista.
However the most distinctive feature of Three Skypephone is… Skype integration! It is not a Skype client making calls using Three’s data channel. Instead, 3 Skypephone uses iSkoot to connect to Skype so all the “Skype-calls” are still going through the voice channel (only logging in and presence information are transmitted through data). Most my families are on Skype, and with 4,000 minutes of free Skype calls per recharge (that’s 2 days and 18 hours of continuous talking!!) it just makes sense to me to get this phone.
Some random thoughts after using it for 5 days:
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It is small and light. Not ultra-tiny, but at 44mm x 13.6mm x 100mm and 86g it feels even smaller than my old no-frills Nokia 1100.
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Good construction. Again, it is not Nokia but the construction feels quite solid, consider it is made by a lesser-known Chinese company. Obviously it is probably not going to be as rugged as my die hard Nokia, nor am I going to throw it into the washing machine for some extensive testing. It just does not feel it is going to fall apart like some of the Sony Ericsson phones.
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Camera is not very good. There is only one camera so it rules out a proper video call, and the 2MP camera takes some very cold shots (bad colour balancing). Videos are hopeless at 174×144.
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Task-switching button is very useful. Skypephone comes with around 11MB of phone memory (+512MB on MSD), and it can handle multiple jobs at once. For example you can have Skype, browser and media player opening at the same time. There is actually a dedicated “task-switching” button (next to the camera button) that brings up the “task list”, which is very useful.
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Skype calls are mediocre. Consider Skype was the main reason I bought this phone, the call quality is actually a bit mediocre. It is worse than your Skype client on PC with serious echoing and slight delay depending on the time of the day. It is okay if you are used to VoIP, but definitely not even mobile call quality.
The presence management is also less than real-time. You need to manually “refresh” to see changes to your contact list. Also because of iSkoot, you can’t actually see who is calling upon incoming calls — it just says incoming Skype calls but nothing about which contact is calling you.
But I guess I can live with all that with 24×7 Skypephone in my pocket :)
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Three coverage is spotty. I went to the Centennial Park on Sunday and the coverage was good there. However at home it will sometimes show roaming as it dropped out from the Three network.
Roaming is bad because Skype only works in Three network.
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One interface — USB. Only one connector at the bottom of the phone and it’s generic USB. It can connect to computers for data-sync as well as USB storage. It also charges itself over USB which is very useful. The included hand-free also uses the USB connector which means you can’t use your own earphone with 3.5mm jack. Yes the included earphone is pretty bad.
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Battery gets hot after a few minutes of browsing on Planet 3. Maybe not the kind of untouchable hot, but it does get warm to a hot that it feels uncomfortable. It does not occur if you are just making calls or using Skype but only with the browser so not a big deal to me.
Another thing about the battery. It is rated at 1150mAh and 320 hours of standby, but Skype does drain it more than what it was rated. I reckon it probably would not last more than 3 days standby with Skype turned on.
Overall a nice phone. I am using a different Skypename than the one I listed on my contact page so ask me if you want to connect me up. Beside making Skype calls it can also send IM over Skype (free 10,000 Skype messages per recharge). Time to look up on any Skype/Jabber integration so I can code a Skype bot, which will make this phone much more useful.
Thanx for the review! It’s very helpful. But I’ve still gotta ask this… how do you manage to talk to your families/friends when they call u from their PC skype? Cuz the skype calls are not as good compare to skype on PC…
@Tami — the call quality is actually not bad and quite comparable to mobile calls. Yes it is not as good as PC to PC Skype calls but I am just getting good at putting up crappy quality calls :)
Great mni review.. I think I’ll go ahead with the purchase, even though the phone is no “Nokia N “series, the skype calls make up for handset short falls.
Thanx Scotty!! I think I’ll go for a skype phone too… it’d be much easier to keep in touch with families and friends overseas~ (anywhere & everywhere… that’s within the 3zone). Thank you!
Scott: a per our conversations online, I went ahead and purchased the Skypephone. I’ve had somewhat mixed reviews, but overall, I think it was a worthwhile purchase. I don’t actually make that many calls with it (Skype-to-Skype), yet when I have, the quality was decent. I find it especially useful for chatting with all my Skype contacts.
I’ve since clarified and learned a few additional points. First, you get the 4,000 minutes at the recharge, but they apparently are every month you have money on your account. I double-checked this with the 3 guy: if you put the minimum $30AU onto the phone, it will last for two months. You get 4,000 the first month, and as long as you have some arbitrary amount of credit left, you’ll get another 4,000 the next month.
The phone also runs j2me apps, which is sort of handy: http://www.kelvinism.com/tech-blog/gps-skypephone/
And lastly, I think the black model somehow has a more buggy firmware than the white models. I make this judgment on my own experience and from another colleague. We have both found that our phones will jump over to roaming, while our girlfriends’ phones stay on 3g. If we do a network search of ‘auto,’ it goes right back to 3g.
Great review… thanks Scott! I was just wondering if you can skype call another person with a skype phone or if you can only call skype contacts who are logged onto the internet? Also, how have you found the battery life?
This Skype phone is rubbish! The USB does not connect, the battery runs out every 12 hours (in standby!) and the phone memory just wiped itself out.
If you put your finger near the top of the phone (the antenna) it cuts out completely.
Avoid buying this phone.
I have to say i am with V Patel.
This phone is destined for the garbage pretty soon.
I bought one when they came out. On a contract with 3 after reading this review.
Voice calls to skype are good. Skype calls and chat for free is great.
Speaker is garbage… forget trying to use speaker in the car.
Other people have said they can never hear me when speaking mobile to mobile.
When typing skype chat messages you cant even use the word “Skype”, and when using skype chat there is obviously a different dictionary in use to the predictive one for text messages.
Buttons have failed already. “0″ or space key lasted about 2 months. Backlight behind the keypad is stuffed. Took it into 3 who said it would take 3 weeks to be sent away to be fixed and they wouldnt give me a phone in the mean time.
Very disappointed with the phone. I wont get anything but a Nokia or maybe iPhone ever again.
Dont get one!
hi i had this pohne for one week on payg, and the screen cracked, two months later the screen cracked again, the first time it broke i didnt think i had done anything too heaviy with it so gave three the benefit of the doubt and paid to hae it fixed, this time round i have said no – however they refuse to give me an alternative model or my money back – even after two weeks of waiting for my customer service call back within 24 hrs! so now i dont know hwat to do – ive been screwed in my opinion the phoen is too flimsy for everyday use – it is crap not recommended at all – the customer service is also incredibly poor