Nokia 5160 Cell Phone

I got my new Nokia 5160 phone about a month ago and I wonder now how I ever got along without it (much like how I wondered how I ever got along without my computer). I absolutely love the convenience of having this little phone - my old pager was a big pain. People would page me (sometimes for no reason), I would fork out $.35 to call them back (sometimes $.50 because the pay phones won't give you change back if you pop in 2 quarters), the line would be busy or I'd get voicemail. I hated it. Now, with my cell phone I can either talk to them right when they call (if I feel like it) or I can receive voicemail and know what it is they are calling about instead of receiving the 'mystery page'. I initially got this phone because I like to drive out to Nevada every once in a while to raise hell at the casinos. Sometimes I leave at midnight to drive there and that is scary driving on 'the devil's route' when it's pitch black out here in the desert. If anything happened to my car, I think I would cower down in my back seat and pray that nobody stopped to help me, because I believe anyone willing to stop and look at a pulled over car in the middle of the night on a lonely stretch of highway MUST be a psycho murderer. So I wanted to be safe by having a phone to call for help (but I don't know who I would call!).

Here are some of the features of the Nokia 5160 cellular phone:

Dual-mode
This means the phone operates in both digital and analog mode. I think it is very important to have a cell phone that can handle both. What happens in dual mode phones is that when you are roaming outside of your "home area" (which is where you purchase your service/i.e. I live in the Phoenix/Glendale metropolitan area of Arizona so my home area is the greater area of Phoenix and most towns outlying Phoenix, such as Scottsdale, Glendale, Tempe, etc.), your phone will search for another service to handle your calls. This could be another cell phone company's digital service (if you have AT&T and roam outside your coverage area, you may roam onto Sprint's service), or it could be analog service. Analog is what the old school mobile phones use. It's a perfectly good mode to be in, however it just doesn't sound as crisp and clear as the digital mode does. Your phone will do this switch for you automatically if you have it in automatic mode (which I believe is defaulted into the phone when you purchase it). However, if you don't have a dual mode phone and you happen to wander outside of the digital service area - count on your calls dropping right in the middle of you telling your friend about the fun new vibrating toy you just bought.

Battery life
The manufacturer info says that the battery has 180 minutes of talk time and 192 hours of standby time. To tell you the truth, that doesn't really mean much to me, but it sounds like a lot! I basically just use my phone on the weekends, although I do receive some calls during the week when I am online. I typically charge my phone only once during the week and maybe again on the weekend if I am using it a lot. My calls typically last 20 minutes, so I'm not on it for a huge amount of time. Maybe that gives you a better real-life example of the talk and standby time the battery is capable of. I believe the Nokia has one of the longest battery lives of all the cell phones out in the market.

Basic features
The Nokia 5160 supports text messaging, voice messaging, call waiting and caller id - however, these must be features that you get through your service provider. The phone simply supports these features. If you get a good phone plan, you will get all these features for free (yay!). Other features of this phone include:
* an address book capable of holding 100 names with numbers
* one touch dialing
* a button to program your voicemail number into so you can listen to your messages with one touch of the button
* a clock
* your own personal welcome message (I programmed mine to tell me "You are a beautiful tulip!" whenever I turn the phone on from the off mode.)
* missed calls listed
* call timers (to see how long you were on a call)
* multiple menus to program your address book, select different tones, view messages, play games, set keypad lock, change settings, and a few other things

Bonus features!
The Nokia 5160 comes with 30 different alert tones (the ring tone you want to hear when someone calls you) including: the Charleston, the Samba, the Mexican Hat, that Take me out to the Ball game song, William Tell, and many many others! This feature allows you to distinguish your phone from other cell phones that may be ringing around you. Instead of reaching for your purse or belt clip every time you hear a phone ring, you will know your ring from anyone else's.

This phone also comes with 3 games that one can play when bored. These games are called Logic, Memory, and Snake. I have played Memory and it is lame. Remember the old Memory card-matching game with pictures on the cards? That's what this is, except there are only 4 cards on the phone's tiny screen which means there is no challenge whatsoever. Just boring. I have also played Snake which is a little more challenging, but gets very old real quick. The object of the game is to move your snake using the keypad buttons (up, down, right, and left) so that he eats little food pellets on the screen. The more he eats, the longer he gets and you have to try and keep your snake from hitting the walls or running into his own tail. I'd rather play with a different snake, thank you. I haven't given Logic a try yet since the other games were so stupid. I'm sure it's as lame as the two I mentioned. But, if you are on a road trip and run out of old 80's songs to sing to your driver, I'm sure these games will provide at least 30 minutes of fun.

Overall
The phone is really simple to use and has some nifty features on it. I highly recommend reading the owner's manual before using the phone. It will tell you how to program your voicemail and set the features you want on your phone. It also tells you how to answer incoming calls while you are the other line, how to call forward, and other basic functions that you may know how to use on your phone at home, but may seem confusing on your cell phone. The manual is very helpful and easy to understand.

The buttons on the phone are a little hard to press, but I like this because it means the buttons are not too likely to get pressed accidentally while in my purse. The phone is small, so people with big gawky hands may have trouble operating it. I have tiny hands and I use my nails to press the buttons.

The Nokia has fun accessories you can buy for it. For example, I bought a glow-in-the-dark faceplate for mine for only $20 and it just looks nifty. You can also get car adapters to charge it while traveling. The phone does already come with a regular charger for at home charging. And of course you can get a leather case for it so your pwetty phone doesn't get all scwatched up!

Oh yeah, and I only paid $99 for my phone, not $149 like the manufacturer info states.

I suggest everyone get a cell phone simply for safety reasons. I read another review where the reviewer stated "get rid of your cable tv and get a cell phone plan instead" to cries of "but I can't afford a cell phone!" - that is excellent advice. You can get a cheap cell phone plan for the same price of your cable bill every month, and have peace of mind at the same time.