I just bought a red Nokia 5310 XpressMusic mobile phone. It replaced my black Motorola Razr phone which technically still worked, but was bigger than I wanted, too quiet, short battery life, and a terrible user interface. I strongly considered an iPhone and, while I can see multiple times each day when internet access would be helpful, I’m wary of doubling my monthly bill from about $40 to $80.
The Nokia 5310 mobile phone satisfied my most essential need: The smallest possible full-featured phone. I carry my phone in my front pants pocket nearly all the time, and a bulky phone is uncomfortable and unflattering. The 5310 mobile phone is dramatically smaller than my old Razr in every dimension except length.
Update: Here’s a photographic comparison of the Nokia 5310 mobile phone and Razr sizes
Aside from size, these factors were important to me:
- The screen is bright and readable even in the sun and while driving
- The user interface is relatively simple and efficient
- It supports bluetooth headsets
- The battery life is supposedly long-lasting
- It has a 2 megapixel camera which I’ll use on rare occasions
- It plays music which I anticipate using occasionally
- Have a keylock that works reliably
I currently have AT&T which I have no great love for, but the cost of switching is high and I don’t know if the alternatives are better. AT&T is constantly bugging me to upgrade my phone but this would require signing a new 2-year contract. Though I’m 90% sure I’ll still be paying AT&T in 2 years, I’m wary of being on the hook with a contract.
T-Mobile is the only provider I’m aware of which is offering the Nokia 5310 mobile phone in the United States. AT&T prefers the Nokia models which seem to have been designed 10 years ago. I first looked on craigslist but the phones were relatively expensive and not located close to me. I turned to eBay instead. I bought the phone for $102 with $10 shipping. (In a future post, I’ll detail how to most efficiently buy a phone on eBay). The phone was originally purchased from T-Mobile and I knew I would need to “unlock” it in order to use my AT&T SIM card.
I looked into unlocking the Nokia 5310 mobile phone on the Internet: I couldn’t find anywhere to get the code for free, and all of the paid unlocking services online seemed like scams. Living in San Francisco, I’m lucky to have many independent mobile phone shops nearby who are willing to unlock phones for a fee. I expected unlocking to cost $20, though I ended up paying $45: Apparently this Nokia 5310 mobile phone is more difficult than most to unlock.
The 5310 mobile phone works great so far. It comes with a decent pair of earbud stereo headphones as well as a microphone for making calls via the earphones. Luckily the phone uses a standard mini-RCA connector so any pair of headphones can be attached. I was pleasantly surprised that the Nokia 5310 mobile phone includes a 1 GB micro-SD card for storing music, pictures, etc. I think I could replace it with an 8 GB card for about $35 if I wanted to store more music. The music player is surprisingly easy to use, the I’m stilling figuring out how to sync with iTunes. A third-party iSync plugin allowed me to sync my phonebook from my Razr to the Nokia 5310 mobile phone via my MacBook and BlueTooth.
In future posts, I’ll give more details about the Nokia 5310 mobile phone.
Have a specific question about the Nokia 5310 mobile phone or why I bought it? Please leave me a comment below and I’ll do my best to help out!
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