That probably was the thing that surprised me the most the first time I went to Japan. I expected that mobile phones would be sleek little things, but instead found quite bulky -- and often boxy -- looking things. Still, I think I would still prefer them over the selection I have here in the States with Verizon.
hmm? phones in singapore can disable the cam noise by switching the phone to Silent mode ... did you try that? maybe it might work
Phones here in the States are crap. Put crap with crap service and you get a contract agreement full of crap. Phones in Japan might be bland but we're still catching up to mobile technology over there. The only great phone I can think of now is the iPhone but even that works on crappity crap crap service. Would've been nice if it were on Sprint or Verizon (though verizon is pretty known for downgrading phones til they're craptastic). Even if the iPhone is nice, it's still a crappity attempt at besting a Treo or a blackberry.
Contented with my Sony Ericsson w850i but doubt that soon i'll be bored. The lack of bigger size screen and the blinking backlight is already boring me... but I hope this'll be my last phone.
we have a wide variety and choices of mobile phones and you can choose phones from a lot of mobile phone manufacturers from Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola, Samsung, etc. and i thought japanese mobile phones are superior in terms of functionality and form factor but i guess i'm wrong lolz XDDD
Used to think tat Japanese phone very cool few years ago when they have 3G! But now! their design sux and when i have so many choices Nokia, Sony Erricson, Motorola and those Smartphone from TW! I think japanese phone are too darn big!!!!!!! All their size like PDA phone! I like my phone to be slim and cool! No a brick tat we break through my pocket!
Admittedly I want my phone to have a decent battery life and be failry easy to text (and of course make phonecalls) other then that it has to be small..and believe me they are hard to find...like you mentioned a lot are comparable to a brick. My GF has one which can hold 2 SIM cards so now she only has to carry around 1 phone rather then the 2 she used to lug around. DOPOD and PHS are popular here.
Well Europe has dozens and dozens of mobile phones to choose of all trademarks being the best Nokia and LG. There isn't a single day that we don't a new mobile phone on the stores (ok I'm exaggerating a bit). The phones are very nice and cool with loads of stuff inside, everyone here as at least two mobile phones, since there are many at lower prices and very good. The trademarks I recommend here are Nokia and LG but Sony is getting good to, Motorola is starting to decrease its sales here because the phones tend to die pretty quick and Nokia ones last longer, my Nokia 6600 has already three years and hasn't had a single problem, is a fat phone but really damn good. I like them a bit heavy so that I know I have it in my pocket.
In France we have a wide choice. Only problem: contracts are expensive. But all phones are subsidied and some shops can sell you any GSM compatible phone with any contract and still subsidy it. (Yes some shops are actually selling iPhones for €800 or €400 if you take a new 24-month contract, any carrier :) But the network is good, and we have EDGE, 3G almost everywhere and HSPDA (3G+) in big cities.
In in the UK, so the selection is OK, but not great and all the phones cost an arm, leg and left nut unless you tie yourself to a contract! I do like the samsung sliding designs tho. I've always hated the clamshell design and phones with the buttons on the front are often pressed to make accidental calls!
Second comment: The sim card can be removed easily here and if you have a free mobile phone you can as many sim cards as you want. We maybe not as advanced in technology as Japan and Korea are but I'm damn proud that we have one the best mobile phones market in the world and one of the best trademarks ^^
LOL I still find Japanese phones generally more aesthetically pleasing vs the phone available in Singapore, though it's improving a lot now. Hahah, I love slightly chunky phones so maybe that's why?
In Europe we enjoy a huge selection of phones that are all the same on the inside and totally uninspired on the outside. Posts like http://formaldesign.wordpress.com/2007/08/23/sleek-mobilephones-from-japan/ gave me the impression that you're better off! One particularly bad habit of at least German carriers: they cripple the phone's software to increase revenue from services like photo mailing and add their logo to the case in various places, destroying even those feeble attempts at design the manufacturers do make.
Europe gets alot of the great stuff (I disagree with erdpilz). We might be slightly behind technologically, but we have ALOT of choice, telephones from Europe, Taiwan, Japan, and the USA. And no annoying sound when you take a picture with the camera.
In Hong Kong, phone selections are awesome. You can get nearly any type of phone, and at a really cheap price, with excellent contract. Of course, sim cards are exchangeable, so the phone can work in every country whilst using said country's sim cards.
we can disable the camera sound over here. anyway we have a wide selection of mobile phones in singapore. new models seems to come out like every week. most people here change their phone often, there are some who buy a new phone every few months. for me i buy a new model every 2 years when my contract is up. buying a new phone when renewing contracts is cheaper.
We have quite a decent variety of phone. I'm still waiting for the razr V9 to be out. But still somehow i really wish to own a japanese phone.
You could try the Samsung SGH-U100. It's about 5.9mm thick, and it's pretty simple; camera, music, and calls and SMS.
What bothers me most about the provider-lock on Japanese phones is that the lock-in is required by law! In short, the law-makers are in the pockets of the corporations, and the corporations wanted to make sure that no one decided to break the ranks and serve the customer by encouraging competition. I happen to think that Japan has far more attractive designs in general. I am astounded, though, that they are not only so thick, but also generally have such awkward keypads. I have a RAZR, and I love how thin it is. It's attractive and unobtrusive. I would trade it for a Japanese phone in a heartbeat, though, because of it's absolutely horrible interface and software functionality. So I'm waiting for an iPhone with HDSPA (3G) and, I hope, Japanese input support. I'm actually kind of excited about it now that they've announced a third-party SDK and that the ability to put my own music as ringtones has been cracked. One thing that I believe will hurt the iPhone in the Japanese market is its lack of a loop-connector hole to attach cell phone accessories to. I can't believe they released the iPhone into ANY market without one of those. Even if cell phone accessories aren't as popular outside of Japan, all iPhones look exactly the same with the screen dark!
I sell cell phones over here and we have a lot of imported unlocked phones so that you can just put your own sim card into it and it still works without having to extend contracts. I can turn off the camera noise on my RAZR. I always thought Japan would have pretty stylish phones, but I guess companies have chosen function over style.
I've got a samsung 706sc. It was the thinnest reasonably priced phone around when I was looking for one. Doesn't have a lot of features compared with the others on the market but it's certainly got more than my phone in Australia had. The only criticism I have is that it doesn't do predictive text in English. I think the next model out is even thinner again and probably has more features.
Well, i really want to have one of the J-phone. It looks so cool to me. Especially i want a Panasonic Foma which appear of Final Fantasy VII AC.
I think people outside Japan will all go crazy over Japan phones. BTW, I be going over Tokyo to work in probably 2 months time, how much does phone cost there? Is it 1yen as saw on your photos =P or there are other catch to it
Phones here in Australia are generally decent, and probabily similar to phones released in Europe and USA. Most locked phones can be unlocked by ringing the service provider. However specific phones that are exclusive to the network or some branded phones cannot be unlocked. I myself own a Softbank 709SC here in Australia (unlocked^^) and its decent, I have to say though Jphones are really restrictive with content>.,
> Even if cell phone accessories aren't as popular outside of Japan, all iPhones look exactly the same with the screen dark! Which is kind of the point. Apple doesn't believe in customers uglyfying their merchandise.
This phones kick my ngage ass, U_U i want a new phone!!!
If you want a thin phone, get one of em samsung ultra edition phones (although samsung seems to be rare in japan); like the Samsung U700 They've got most of the crap the japanese phones have (minus the pay thingy) and aren't too expensive either (at least here they aren't :))
Japanese phones are dull my ass! They are freaking awesome! I want to go to Japan and buy one of their phones to use here! Although all the extra features won't be used at all. But it still looks awesome!
I have an AU phone, w52sa, its pretyt slim, has a camera, gps, blah blah blah, and I
I still like my Talby. :] They don't make them anymore.
I dunno... I liked the japanese phones. Though admitedly, they do have different designs from the western models. What I did like was the plastic models available on most stores in Akiba... it's nice to "test" them. Problem on japanese cellphones is: either you like the "brick" model... usually flip, not very thin, usually tall (even more now with TV tuners and such), or you're screwed. For instance, I didn't see a single cellphone that looked like my SonyEricson (W810i) or anything on that size, apart from very subpar cellphones. That's kinda bummer. The sim locking is a bitch also. But I seriously don't think an iPhone will be the solution also... I mean, it's also brick sized, and it won't have the resources to use the best stuff the japanese cellphone market has to offer. Don't really like Motorola, but SonyErisson and Nokia western models are nice because of variety... lots of sizes/shapes/resources to choose.
I do love the look of Japanese phones a lot, so I still think the phones we have here are not bad at all.
I have a T-Mobile Dash and it serves me pretty well. It's thin enough for me, has internet capabilities, camera isn't too shabby, basically it has all my needs and was one of the only few good looking ones last year. However I did want the cell phone Chiaki used in the Nodame Cantabile Live Action, something about its blockiness.
ye the iphone totally rules right now.
It's all about the G Phone! Japanese phones are still cooler than US phones because of the organic LCD screen and smarter cell phone users. In America they need a full qwerty keyboard just to text message with 26 alphabets. Like, dude, check out how many alphabets, kanji and faces Japanese people can type with just 10 number buttons and a #*. Shesh. I have Sprint as a cell phone carrier. The 3rd party applications like Telenav and Garmin realtime GPS make me happy. Wonder if Japanese cell phones have GPS . Yes, camera sounds can be disabled. If Japanese camera sounds can't be disabled, can you install your own ringtone as a camera sound like on digital cameras? If so, why not just record the sound of silence and use it a camera shutter sound?
At least you guys have doCOmo. We're still stuck with GSM and "oh wow 3G lol". >_
Any phone you showed on this news are MUCH better looking then ANY phone here in US, including our OMG, "out of the world amazing" iPhone. I still don't get besides the touch screen, what is so "great" about the iPhone in here. Slow EDGE network, build-in application is NOT exciting at all. Check out all those cool app. and REAL 3G Video-conference phone in Japan. Just like while we're raving about Hybrid cars in the US like something totally new, Toyota is celebrating 10 yrs anniversary of their Prius.... sigh....
Japanese phones, crap? Are you mad? You can watch TV, pay for stuff, flip the screen, and a 5.1 MP digital camera?? Sheesh....! Im not really an expert on the matter though. My phone is pay-as-you-go and is about 4 years old. It rings people, texts people and has a colour screen. I dont really want much more than that for the size that it is. Modern phones have too much crap in them and the size just baloons. Theres a nice new sony ericson one out that is mega thin though. Not very hardwearing, as my mate broke his just by dropping it on the floor from hand height. Question for you danny - WHY do 99.99% of all japanese folk have flipping / clamshell phones? Its as if compact, regular phones are uncool or something....
yeah. any phone is japan is better than phones in here in the US. geeze you guys can even buy at the vending machines with your cell. what's next? im so jealous.
All the 'new' phones here are several years old. We just got the original RAZR recently...They want $200 for it on a 3 year plan. It's quite literally cheaper to order it online without a plan from a bigger city like Vancouver. I bought a phone a year ago and it was dead within a month. I tried to return it, but apparently they had changed their policy since the time I bought it and so it was now covered for only 2 days instead 30. >.< I had to spend $100 buying a 4 year old cell from someone else that wasn't using it anymore.
I actually like chunky phones :p but I want a japanese phone cos they look cooler than the chunky phones we have here. any ideas if japanese phones can work with SIM cards in Singapore?
actually here in argentina the most of the phones are like 3 years old, or more, and the most of the population still use B&W phones...
this being 'europe' since when is anything "cool" here?? & if its cool then whats stopping companies like Sony overcharging us by almost 40%??? if its cool, its expensive & if its expensive that means we have to spend more hours in the office & more hours in the office means no sex! & no sex means no gurlfriend/wife so yeah how uncool is cool? welcome to the Uk.
Yes, you can disable the camera noise on phones in the US.
I think phones here are pretty cool. That´s probably because I´m from a "phone-country". Everyone has a nice looking and pretty new phone. They are cheap too.
I thought that j phones were awsome danny like in densha otoko or this dorama ...cant remember its name but you post a video ^^ ..but with this post im getting quite disapointed mobile services around here are not good and my phone makes a monkey sound when i take a picture and i was interested too in how to disable that crap
japanese phones are the best of the best in the mobile phone industry, IMO. I like their insanely large screens. phones here are very expensive and most people only change phones once in two, three years.
Wow you actually dislike the design of japanese phones? You prefer something like a razor instead? cellphones in NA are always lagging behind. I would kill for a japanese phone :O~
We always get the last on phones...haha I have a razor and until recent weeks I thought it was crap
I'm glad we have the latest and coolest designs here in Europe. ^^ Those J phones look horrible and totally unoriginal (read utterly boring). I didn't know that Casio is a mobile phone manufacturer as well, Casio only sells digital cameras, calculators and voice recorders over here. ^^" Hey Danny, if you're looking for a thin slider phone with a 3.2 megapixel camera (and a lot more stuff), I recommend you take a look at the Samsung U700. ;)
Currently using my Sony Ericsson P1i, although I would prefer the Sharp 912SH. Too bad it's only usable in Japan!
America has some pretty cool phones, Motorola and LG seem to be goign at each others throats over here. I had an LG Chocolate before, and a Tréo 750 which rocked. Now I have an iPhone and it is easily the coolest phone i have ever had.
obentou: I'm a P1i user too ;)
Well, those designs are not my favorite (Samsung makes cool-looking ones in my opinion) but there is way worse in that category. No removable SIM cards?! Japan must not have many (if any) cellphone thieves fo
