phone for around 15k

1. Budget?

budget 15k .. can be extended but only if it's worth it

2. Display type and size?

any

3. Form Factor? bar, slider, flip?

any

4. Preferred choice of brand?

nokia.. but open to others

5. Preferred input method (QWERTY, touchscreen, numpad, touch-n-type).

qwerty, but willing to go touchscreen

6. What camera option you want? Please specify need for flash, autofocus, front facing camera.

front facing camera must, and abt the primary camera.. pictures should be as good as nokia e72 if not better , last phone was e72 5mp, autofocus , led flash

7. Preferred operating system? (Android, Symbian, iOS, Windows Phone etc).

any

8. Preferred connectivity options (3G, Wifi etc)Please specify clearly.

3g must

9. Preferred applications (Flash, Swype, GPS, etc)?

gps

10. Primary use of handset (multimedia, camera, mails, internet, gaming etc)?

internet

11. Any specific mobile phones in consideration?

thought of nokia c6-01

12. Any other info that you want to share

this phone is for a friend whose not very tech friendly
his requirements - 3g,front facing cam(for video calling), maps/gps,
preferably nokia :razz:

he's gonna buy it today, so need suggestions quickly

and the phone is not going to be upgraded for a long time, so need a rugged phone which can take some beating

Wave II S8530

V

Yeah wave s8530 will fulfill ur friend's requirements. Good camera, audio quality. And since u have mentioned ur friend is not tech friendly than he must not be using much apps, so it must satisfy his needs

Slight change of plans guys.
All the requirements are same but the budget is now 22k and a qwerty is must. How about the milestone?

ssk_the_gr8 said:
Slight change of plans guys.
All the requirements are same but the budget is now 22k and a qwerty is must. How about the milestone?

I'd suggest look at HTC Desire Z.

Milestone is outdated hardware...

N

+1 for HTC Desire Z, but your friend has to increase his budget further more.
Also Xperia Pro gonna be released soon.

If apps are not important, why not get the N8 or C7 instead ? I know that they don't have qwerty but are nice pieces of hardware to own (if the OS is excluded)

The qwerty on the Desire Z doesn't look much usable to me. Plus the battery life of HTC phones is a concern.

Milestone is outdated. Xperia Pro doesn't seem near.

N

^^^

GSMarena.com said:
Our fears aside, upon sliding it up, the screen automatically rotates to landscape orientation. And the fun starts. The brilliant keyboard has great ergonomics, well spaced buttons with excellent press.
The four-row layout is of great help here: the keys are big enough to handle comfortably. Two Function keys and two Shift buttons (one under each thumb) are more than welcome. There are even two user-configurable keys. The top, which accommodates numbers too (no numpad layout here) is very easy to access, with more than enough headroom.

GSMarena.com said:
The Desire Z is quoted at 9 hours and 50 minutes of talk time or 430 hours in stand-by in a 2G network (that's scaled down to 6 hours and 40 minutes of calls and 430 hours of stand-by in 3G mode).
In reality we would just squeeze one day of heavy use out of it - an hour of internet browsing, some music and video playback, 30min of gaming, 30min of using the camera and a couple of hours of getting to know the phone's interface. Basically the 3.7" screen was pretty much constantly on. We guess once you get to know your new toy you can even et two days of battery life out of it under moderate use.

Ever heard about famous T-Mobile G2, HTC Desire Z is it's replica. Both phones are said to be best qwerty messenger phones.
And with the releases of Xperia Arc and Neo, I think Pro is on its way too.

^^ Didn't read the reviews, sorry. But the keypad does look weird & unusual.

N

^^^ lol, no "sorry" required

And keypad - It's different.

Desire z cost?

ssk_the_gr8 said:
Desire z cost?

will cost around 24-25K but not more than that... :razz:

22k is the absolute max for the budget. So please suggest within this budget? Milestone seems the only one meeting the requirements,

^^ Then forget QWERTY, get the N8.

^^ milestone is so old. Motorola stopped its production long back. totally outdated H/W (but still a good keypad). QWERTY is a must?

qwerty is a must

You are not going to get a good phone with qwerty in a budget of 22k...
The best phone available without a qwerty in that budget according to me is HTC Desire

ssk_the_gr8 said:
qwerty is a must

Samsung Galaxy 551 for 10.5k to 11k is the best option at this moment...

*i.ebayimg.com/24/%21CB69N,%21Bmk%7E$%28KGrHqUOKiEEzSNLrBpwBNJeiQg9%29%21%7E%7E_12.JPG

Slide-out full QWERTY keyboard
Quad-band GSM and dual-band 3G support, 7.2 Mbps HSDPA support
3.2" 16M-color TFT capacitive touchscreen of WQVGA (320 x 400 pixel) resolution
Great QWERTY keyboard
Android OS v2.2 with TouchWiz launcher
667MHz processor
3.15 MP autofocus camera, QVGA video recording at 15fps
Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n
GPS with A-GPS connectivity
160 MB internal storage, microSD slot
Accelerometer and proximity sensor
Standard 3.5 mm audio jack
Stereo FM radio with RDS
Smart dialing
Access to Android Market and Samsung Apps repository

The screen resolution is low, but for a QWERTY, is VFM.

I'm gonna suggest milestone. It might be old but it's still good. And meets his needs.

ssk_the_gr8 said:
I'm gonna suggest milestone. It might be old but it's still good. And meets his needs.

Sigh... your friend will be really disappointed by the Motoblur UI on Motorola phones... its a piece of garbage. Then, he will blame Android for the bad experience with his phone...

This is very sad...

What's so wrong about motoblur ui?

Also , android is at fault for letting people skin it... If the skin is bad :razz:

N

Nah, it's just fine.
As you posted Required OS - Any, I dont think it would matter much to your friend

ssk_the_gr8 said:
What's so wrong about motoblur ui?

Also , android is at fault for letting people skin it... If the skin is bad

Motorola phones have locked bootloaders which are encrypted. They cannot be modded. As a matter of principle, everyone should boycott Motorola...

And Motoblur is a joke... it was OK when Android was new... for Android version 1.5, it adds some features. But compare its widgets and lagginess to my entry-level Optimus One, and you will be rudely shocked at how piece of crap Motoblur is...

NainO said:
Nah, it's just fine.
As you posted Required OS - Any, I dont think it would matter much to your friend

I guess so... coming to a smartphone for the first time... its OK. But the bad, laggy experience, buggy moto widgets would convince him Android is bad... which would be unfair... I am an Android Fan... as you know from my name... I would be sad if that happened...

Cheers!

he bought the milestone.... happy with it..
but already says WP7 is so much smoother :lol:

he used some friend's windows phone

^^ I knew that coming lol.

B

Dell xcd35

^^ good suggestion but doesn't fit OP's requirement & you are late.