My Phones

Introduction

With the release of the iPhone X later this year I thought it would be good to document all of my phones so far. In this blog post I’m going to list and talk briefly about all of the phones I’ve had since I was eleven years old.

Virgin Sendo M550 – May 2004

So many people had a brick as their first phone – a Nokia 3310 is one of the most popular – but not me! This was gifted to me by my parents before I went on a school trip to London in 2004 so I could call home when I was away. I would like to add this is the only reason I had a mobile phone at this age as I’m sure I would have been in secondary school beforehand otherwise! It consisted of two screens (inside and on the front of the phone) and it had a black and white backlit screen. I’m not sure why the image above shows coloured photos on the screen – it definitely didn’t do that!

Motorola V3 – December 2005

So after having my first phone for over eighteen months I wanted a new one (naturally)… So I was given the Motorola Razr V3 for Christmas 2005. It was a lot more stylish-looking than the Sendo and most probably the best looking phone on the market at the time. The big selling point was how slim it was. This was my first colour-screen phone and it also had Bluetooth and the ability to play music (not just mono/polyphonic tones). The Storage was only about 5mb after the software usage so I could only store a single song at a time but I loved it!

Samsung G600 – December 2006

Behold my next Christmas gift! 2007 saw the release of the iPhone however there was no way I could afford that (or wait)! I settled for the Samsung G600, my first slide-up phone. I had flip phones until this point and I loved the feel of the slide mechanism on this phone. This was my favourite non-touchscreen mobile to date! It was really nice to use and had far more storage than the Motorola V3 so it suited me perfectly. I even think there was a slot for a micro-SD card (or similar storage) which was amazing! This was also my first contracted handset – before now I just had a pay as you go SIM card and the phones were purchased outright.

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music – June 2008

After the release of the first iPhone in 2007, everyone wanted to jump on the touch-screen bandwagon! Nokia released the 5800 Xpress Music and the speakers drew me in. They were really loud and with the ability to store music much like an iPod / MP3 player did, I had to have one! I still couldn’t ask for my parents to buy me an iPhone as they were extortionately priced in comparison. This was the second phone I had on a contract with Vodafone.

iPhone 4 – December 2010

Here it is! My very first iPhone! I even remember the date this arrived… It was 13th December! I worked my butt off to save up for this phone and I had researched very extensively of how to get the best deal. It was cheaper for me to buy the handset outright and get a SIM-only contract for my usage. Stupidly I had stuck with Vodafone (who to this day DO NOT even have 3G in Tenby!) They used to have the best coverage for voice and texts however when data came along they couldn’t compete and didn’t support 3G! I was thankfully between university in Cardiff and Tenby until I switched to Three in December 2013 for my usage so it was only unusable when I was home and not on WiFi (which was a minority of the time). I loved the iPhone! Fell in love with the operating system and how easy it was to complete various tasks! I haven’t looked back since!

iPhone 5 – September 2012

I decided to upgrade my iPhone to the 5 when it was released in 2012. I remember queuing outside the Apple store in Cardiff and I bagged the very last one they had that day! I purchased this phone outright as well and used my SIM card from Vodafone until December 2013 when my contract was up and I switched to Three. This iPhone was a lot quicker than the 4 (and 4S that was released between). I liked how slimline it was and the extra row of apps was amazing! The screen was larger which allowed for four more icons to be displayed.

iPhone 6 – November 2014

By this point I had gotten into a pattern of buying an iPhone outright every two years. I couldn’t justify spending out that much on a yearly basis. The iPhone 6 was my next model which was a huge update again from the 5 that I had previously. Touch ID was introduced on the 5S but the iPhone 6 was the first one that I had owned with this feature. I loved the idea of it but was a bit skeptical to begin with. It worked very well and I had no reason to have my reservations about it. The screen size was significantly bigger than the iPhone 5 as well so this took a bit of getting used to. I couldn’t upgrade to the iPhone 6 Plus as that was a little too large! Overall, another fab phone!

iPhone 7 Plus – September 2016

Another two years passed and I purchased the iPhone 7 Plus. I decided this time to skip the iPhone 6S / iPhone 6S Plus as I was still purchasing the phones outright. This update was another bigger screen for me and it took a little getting used to at first. The iPhone 7 Plus was faster, had longer battery life, improved cameras and I also purchased the 256GB option. This iPhone is now actually for sale as I will be getting the iPhone X later this year. If you’re interested in purchasing the iPhone 7 Plus (256GB, Black, excellent condition, original packaging, AppleCare+ until September 2018 and a free portfolio case) please click here.

iPhone X – November 2017

The much anticipated iPhone X will be released later this year. Pre-orders start in October and it is released early November. I am hoping to get my hands on one as quickly as I can and also join the Apple iPhone upgrade program. This means I’ll be paying Apple (via Barclays financing) a monthly instalment for the handset before returning it eleven months later for an upgrade. I’ll still be keeping my SIM only plan for my usage with Three but I won’t have to fork out roughly £1k per handset each year. This upgrade program will also mean I don’t have to worry about selling my iPhone in the future as it is a hand-back system. For more information on Apple’s upcoming products and my thoughts/opinions following their keynote in September please click here.

Summary

So that’s my summary of the cell/mobile phones I have owned. I hope you enjoyed reading – let me know what phones you have owned in the past! Have a great day and thanks for reading!

[Amended August 2020 – Additions]

iPhone XS Max – September 2018

iPhone 11 Pro Max – September 2019