T-Mobile MDA Smartphone

Upgrading from a basic cell phone to a smartphone/pocket PC/PDA is an overwhelming jump. Those who are not tech-savvy will find this phone to be quite bulky and hard to use. And those who are upgrading from a previous smartphone/PDA will find this phone to be quite an upgrade, although will notice the design flaws as well. After starting from a basic phone, Samsung C225 and then upgrading to the first smartphone, audiovox SMT5600, and then to the T-mobile SDA, this phone has exceeded most of the previous phones problems; such as memory size, SD card location, and ROM upgrade ability.

The MDA was a great value for the large amount of features and the price I bought it at (140 Used, ebay). To list, the features that caught my attention first were: wifi (can be unlocked from b to g), larger touch-screen LCD (than previous owned phones), SD expansion slot is easy access at the top of the phone (SMT5600 and SDA SD slot was behind the battery), the OS ROM can be flashed to the numerous available HTC Wizard ROMS on the Internet (xda-developers website), The internal memory size is 128mb, the slide-out QWERTY keyboard seemed cool as well :-) (the SMT5600 and SDA did not have this). I recently upgraded the battery from 1250 mAh to 2400 mAh and now do not have to worry about low battery by the end of the day :-D

The amount of features mask its noticeable weight. My initial impression on the phone was,"this is a chubby phone." jumping from a thin smt5600 to a little chubby SDA, and then to a fat MDA, this phone looks like a heavy-weight. And I have noticed it does get uncomfortable holding the phone up for long periods of time while talking. It is noticeable when in my pocket. Weight isn't the biggest issue, although it can be if you are upgrading from a thin and light basic phone. The amount of features it has might make you forget about the weight though. Unlike a basic phone, there are countless programs this the MDA can install and use. For instance, I have installed one of the many free game emulators called Pocket Nester, a Nintendo NES emulator. I can play NES games smoothly!!! That sure beats the games the dinky basic phones have ;-) There are programs that update the audio software to create an IPOD like interface. If you are a business person, there are many great productivity and office software. Personally, I have used the built-in calendar and a neat feature with smartphones is the automatic control of silencing the phone when an appointment is entered. It has two loud speakers on the side of the phone which can be used when in speaker-mode or listening to music or watching videos. Although the volume level is adequate, callers complain about the microphone volume being too low. I have noticed the microphone location is at the bottom of the phone, the size of a pinhole! I do not know if the size of the microphone hole is affecting this. The QWERTY keyboard is a nice feature, but those will find it hard to text with one hand since there is no dedicated alphanumeric pad. Furthermore, the T9 software is not as efficient as it suggests words rather than auto-completing words. One nice thing about the larger LCD screen is browsing websites, there is more to see on the screen than on the smaller SMT5600 LCD screen.

For a tech-savvy person like myself, the option of upgrading the phone OS from Windows Mobile 5 to WM6(from xda-developers) allows me to use a better, faster, more stable ROM version compared to the stock ROM version. The SMT5600 and SDA are not as quick as the MDA once the new ROM is installed. For a basic user, this upgrading process might seem difficult and it does void any warranty the phone might have. But for those who decide to upgrade, you will not be disappointed ;-) Go to xda-developer's website for more information. The people here are very smart and helpful!

For the basic user, I would predict this phone will be too much to handle and will most likely rate this phone as being complicated. Users who text will find texting with one hand to be extremely difficult because there is no alphanumeric keypad using T9. They will have to use the slide-out keyboard. Therefore, sending a quick or discreet text will be difficult. Also, the bigger weight and size compared to basic phones might be disappoint. I would suggest those basic phone users curious with smartphones/PPC to upgrade to a SDA first. The SDA has all the features an MDA has except touch screen, and the SDA has a keypad with T9.

For the advanced user, the amount of features and potential features can let one overlook the flaws of this phone.

Overall, for the right price of less than 200, this phone is a great value compared to an expensive t-mobile Wing or t-mobile Dash.