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You are here: MacNN Forums > Community > MacNN Lounge > Have They Completely Removed This Feature From Contemporary Cell Phones?

Have They Completely Removed This Feature From Contemporary Cell Phones?
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Big Mac
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Nov 22, 2005, 12:06 AM
 
I just upgraded my cell to a Motorola E815 (yes, I realize Verizon stinks in many respects), and while I'm generally quite happy with the phone I have discovered a disturbing shortcoming. The phone has no field within a contact to store notes on that individual. My previous phone, an entry level color phone purchased just over two years ago, had the ability to add notes to contacts. Now I took a look at my brother's Samsung, and I can't find any note field there either. I called customer service, and a rep confirmed that I was not overlooking an option; he also suggested, in a genuine attempt at helpfulness, that PDA phones offered such features. Perhaps I'm too cynical, but I see basis to suspect that the feature I'm missing was taken out of contemporary cell phones in order to boost sales of PDA phones. With that said, are there any phones on the market not crippled in this way?

"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." TJ
     
rozwado1
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Nov 22, 2005, 12:19 AM
 
What do you put in said contact notes?

Although it wouldn't be hard to include in new phone PIMs, I don't think many people would find a use for it.
     
Big Mac  (op)
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Nov 22, 2005, 12:24 AM
 
I put identifying information for some contacts, especially those with common names, so that I can differentiate between them. I'll also put birth dates and other small notes in. I realize that with a camera I have the ability to take a picture of the contact to make identification easier, but what about previous contacts? And what about when I have to upgrade to a new phone in the future - I won't be able to transfer those contacts anyway because of Verizon's restrictions. I would still prefer to have a field for extra text.

"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." TJ
     
volcano
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Nov 22, 2005, 02:49 AM
 
I have a Samsung A670 that will be two years old this coming July. I never even noticed the lack of a note field until you brought it up... I used them on my old phone occasionally, but I found it gratuitous and not that useful. If I have an event or date to remember, I tend to use the Memo feature on the phone.

You don't like Verizon? I had Cingular prior to it and I refuse to ever go back. It seems that everyone I know that uses Cingular is always complaining about the reception and the number of dropped calls (mine included). Since I've been with Verizon, I haven't had more than 2 or 3 dropped calls - so I'm a happy customer.

You mentioned the inability to transfer contacts in the future... do you mean when you upgrade to a new Verizon phone or switch to a different company? My phone had to be replaced last June because of a malfunctioning screen, and the employees at the Verizon store had no trouble in transferring my contacts from one phone to another. Unfortunately, I lost all my pictures and ringtones that I had saved on my phone for nearly a year - but my contacts were far more important.
     
Big Mac  (op)
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Nov 22, 2005, 03:06 AM
 
I don't have a memo feature on my E815. The closest I have is a datebook. Concerning my comment about transferring contacts when upgrading in the future, yes, I am referring to upgrading to a new phone on the same service. I did not know Verizon stores offered address book transfers. It would have been nice to know that before I spent an hour transferring them manually. Verizon's voice service is fine, and that's the important thing. But the restrictions on external data services - and especially the crippling of Bluetooth - are particularly annoying.

"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." TJ
     
TheoCryst
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Nov 22, 2005, 03:09 AM
 
You know what's REALLY missing? The fact that modern Nokias don't have Snake anymore. I loved Snake...

Any ramblings are entirely my own, and do not represent those of my employers, coworkers, friends, or species
     
11011001
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Nov 22, 2005, 03:17 AM
 
[QUOTE=volcano]I have a Samsung A670 that will be two years old this coming July. [\QUOTE]

This is depressing me, as I just bought this. It's one of the best phones you can get from Telus, which really says a lot about the company. That is, Telus is a cheap, greedy company bent on selling extremely outdated contracts, services, and phones at outrageous prices.

This is totally unrelated, but using their contract with me as weapon, they basically forced me into a second year. Specifically, they charged me $1600 for two months of local calling after my one year contract expired. This happened, because the unlimited evenings and weekends plan is only available on a x-year contract (even if you are paying for it on a month-to-month plan).

I had someone good with customer support people speak to them, and got $700 off the bill.

Privatization of the Alberta Government Telephones was a poor move in my opinion. It's disgusting comparing North American telecommunications to those available in Asia and other parts of the world. We are primitive and archaic in comparison. What an embarrassment.
     
gururafiki
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Nov 22, 2005, 03:21 AM
 
Originally Posted by Big Mac
But the restrictions on external data services - and especially the crippling of Bluetooth - are particularly annoying.
Bluetooth isn't crippled that much.
     
Big Mac  (op)
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Nov 22, 2005, 04:14 AM
 
Originally Posted by gururafiki
That's terrific, thank you so much, guru.

"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." TJ
     
DarwinX
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Nov 22, 2005, 10:42 AM
 
Originally Posted by Big Mac
That's terrific, thank you so much, guru.
That will get you going with the Bluetooth, not to mention it already works with iSync. I entered all my contacts by hand in my PowerBook, added their birthdays to iCal and did a sync when I got my new e815. Cost $0.00! Woot. Verizon charges like 10 bucks to do that. Plus now once it's on your computer, you don't have to worry again as long as you have an iSync compatible phone.

As far as notes: I just use the "drafts" section of the text messaging area. Not perfect but at least I can take a note or two. Just my 2 cents.
     
gururafiki
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Nov 22, 2005, 11:24 AM
 
Originally Posted by Big Mac
That's terrific, thank you so much, guru.
No problem. Make sure you get the "free internet" to work. That is an awesome feature that comes in handy while on the road.
     
TubaMuffins
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Nov 22, 2005, 01:51 PM
 
My LG VX6000 has a notes field for individual contacts
     
Chicacredes
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Nov 22, 2005, 08:25 PM
 
Originally Posted by Big Mac
That's terrific, thank you so much, guru.
I have the E815, and I purchased a 16mb trans-flash card that I can store my photos on. Then I bought a trans-flash to usb adaptor that looks like a jump drive to transfer my photos to my computer. It ROCKS!

AGP G4 DP 1.3 Upgraded G-Celerator 1GIG RAM | PB G4 1.25 FW800 1GIG RAM | Video iPod 60GIG
     
gururafiki
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Nov 22, 2005, 08:40 PM
 
Originally Posted by Chicacredes
I have the E815, and I purchased a 16mb trans-flash card that I can store my photos on. Then I bought a trans-flash to usb adaptor that looks like a jump drive to transfer my photos to my computer. It ROCKS!
Oh yea, I forgot about that. My buddy got one too, and he can transfer pics and movies to his computer. I only wish it were easier to make my own ring tones and use them without paying for it.
     
Kevin
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Nov 22, 2005, 11:34 PM
 
Yes, you cannot make paragraphs with the new cell phones.

It sucks.
     
Link
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Nov 23, 2005, 12:56 AM
 
The funny thing saying all this, in the US I still think Motorola has the best phones. Maybe that's just me though, Nokia's never really made a phone I ever liked (the 6xxx clamshell looks real nice though), but Samsung's clamshells are.. a far cry from motorola's clamshells.. bigtime.

I love my nice little samsung, it's tiny, has an external LCD, but the love stops there. Except for the cutesy startup/shutdown jingles, it doesn't support MP3s, JPGs, or GIFs -- can't record sound properly and has to have the most poorly designed phone book I've ever seen on a phone.

So my bro got a new v330, thing works awesome with OS X except there's no file manager I can find on it so we can't delete stuff we sent to it. I have his v300 sitting around since it has a REAL usb interface (the other big deal killer on the samsung is that it does serial out and has a USB converter cable for computer use -- NO OS X support at all)...

Sony does make neat phones though, but my approval of that company went down the toilet ages ago, the newest of these being their RIAA problems (DRM!)... grr.. could never respect that company again.

That, and getting a sony phone is damn near impossible in the US.
Aloha
     
Lancer409
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Nov 24, 2005, 03:33 AM
 
my sony ericsson k750i has 'em. =D

No trees were killed in the sending of this message. However, a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
     
Chicacredes
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Nov 25, 2005, 09:28 PM
 
Originally Posted by gururafiki
No problem. Make sure you get the "free internet" to work. That is an awesome feature that comes in handy while on the road.
if you have the E815 dont forget to enable the dial-up networking by entering ##dialup (##342587)
unlike the v710 verizon released the E815 with this feature disabled out of the box.

AGP G4 DP 1.3 Upgraded G-Celerator 1GIG RAM | PB G4 1.25 FW800 1GIG RAM | Video iPod 60GIG
     
   
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