Ditch your smartphone and join the Nokia 1100 club
By Sean Cooper 
posted Sep 12th 2008 5:56AM
posted Sep 12th 2008 5:56AM
This is a novel idea -- one that we likely wouldn't do, mind you -- ditch your smartphone and see if your world actually does crumble using only voice and text to communicate. Nokia Conversations' Charlie thought that Nokia's best selling basic set, the Nokia 1100 -- some 200 million of these have been sold -- is the perfect device for this challenge as it does what a phone has to do and nothing more and that's call and (arguably) text. The rules are dead simple, live a month using only the lowly Nokia 1100. So? What are you all waiting for, grab one off eBay, donate your iPhone / Touch Diamond to charity and get to it. Oh yeah, feel free to let us know how you deal with the shakes and crying, but please, post that info from a computer.
Nokia 1100 for Phone Calls/Text/Simple contacts, a hPDA for note-taking and tasks, and some form of GTD setup and you'd be sweet.
Lo-fi is good :)
Interesting, but even if I would join (don't have a smartphone, yet), I wouldn't ditch a multi-hundred-Euro phone....
But that gives me the opportunity to get one cheap off ebay.... HTC Touch Pro, I'm comming!
I don't think my SERO plan would work with it.....
Well, I've thrown my hat into the ring with this blog post, and urged our readers to do the same:
http://www.mobileshop.com/blog/mobile-phone-news/can-you-give-up-your-smartphone-for-month-take-the-nokia-1100-challenge/
I'll give it a try, it could be a giggle, but I really rather strongly doubt I'll last past 3 and a half hours...
Probably a good idea if don't sell my smartphone JUST yet, then...
No problem.
I have a HTC Touch Cruise but i dont use any of the smartphone features. The only thing i use is the GPS.
I could do it...i just dont want to :-)
I work for a major U.S. Telecommunications Carrier and for years I've been using smartphone's. Recently I decided to take this challenge on my own by using a basic Nokia and I can attest that your quality of life will improve and the world will not come crumbling down. I find myself more relaxed by not constantly checking my work or personal email.
The truth is, if something is that important, people will call you. I miss the QUERTY, but I enjoy the savings in physical size of the device.
I recommend people give this one a real try, I think it takes about two weeks to adapt, but I would have a hard time going back to a smartphone now.
I wouldnt be able to do it. Im to addicted to my qwerty keyboard on my sp. Oh that and all of the skyfire internet goodness, gps, google maps. You know the stuff you cant live without.
Just about a month ago I left my Wing/HTC Herra in a pants pocket and ran it through the washer on a morning that I needed to catch a plane. The only quick solution was to stop by a T-Mo store and pay $89 for a basic Nokia flip phone with Bluetooth (2760H)
I survived the 2 week trip, but it sucked pretty bad. No way to check Gmail on the go, nothing but lame default ringtones, no Rats & Spears or Bejeweled on the plane and no geek cred at all amongst my iPhone totin' buddies.
As soon as I got home I found a used Wing on Craigslist for $200 and snatched it up... now all is right in my world again.
I did this semi-voluntarily a few months ago. I say semi because I wanted to stay on a smartphone, but the only offering from Verizon of any worth was the Apache, and it's crap these days. I couldn't wait for the XV6800, so I went with the Juke instead. The peace and quite from constant emails was nice, but I still miss being able to geek out and look up trival info at a whim, download and play games for free, having my Exchange calendar/contacts, and GPS apps (via BT, though now it's built-in to most newer phones).
My boss misses me having a smartphone too... I don't respond to emails after hours or on weekends anymore. But he doesn't miss it enough to buy me a smartphone.
I'll go back eventually though...
Had one for years, replacing a sadly deceased 3330 as it happens. Yes, having a phone that you can afford to lose or break, which is always daylight-viewable, which lasts for about 7-10 days on a charge with regular use, has a lightning-fast OS and which Just Works every time I pick it up is wonderful. The screen's scratched to near-opacity after 3 years next to my keys, but I can just swap the case out for a new one if I feel the need. If the battery keels over, it's the same BL-5C which is at the heart of most of Nokia's phones, so it's easy to replace. As an SMS/voice device it is utterly peerless. And I can go SIM-only don't have a 40% markup on my price plan subsidising a swanky phone.
The 1100 has officially been discontinued, mind you. Its derivatives (1110 etc.) and the 1200/derivatives are the current Nokia cheap-phones.
where in the us online can i aquire one?
I have had smartphone for long time, but my last smartphone (N82) got dropped to the lake made me to use my old friend 3310 for a month and it actually was pretty fun. The thing that did bother me was the lack of camera that i had gotten so used to.
I have this Nokia 1100, but it's locked and I have no idea to who, so I can't do the nokia unlocker thing. Any idea how to figure who it's locked too. Then I can unlock it myself. Thank you in advance.
i doubt i would be able to do this honestly. i mostly use my smartphone for texting, email, scheduling, note taking (bad short term memory), and internet browsing, and most of those things the older phones either dont do, or do very poorly. so my smartphone is used more as a PDA for me personally than a phone.
plus there is no real incentive to do it. i mean if i had to, im sure i could do it, but im not going to do it by choice lol.
It's on Amazon for $50. I'm not going to spend that much to do a little challenge. Plus I would lose because I couldn't give up my iPhone 3G for a day.
could NEVER does this. I actually tried it about 1.5 years ago, I had whatever WM5 phone was hot on T-mobile(I think it was the Dash that has just come out) & for what was supposed to be a week I switched to a Nokia N series. I FREAKED OUT within HOURS lol. No e-mail, no qwerty, Just a multimedia phone, OMG whatever the bloody h#ll was I thinking!!! That evening I promptly swapped Sim cards again & sold the N on Ebay for more than what I paid for it! NEVER NEVER AGAIN, Need Qwerty & Email like I need air lol!!!
When I got my first cell phone, it was a Tracfone, a Nokia 1100.
I used that phone for two years to communicate with people, and it worked really well for me, to be honest. In fact, there's one thing that phone still has that most don't: a dedicated flashlight that actually works really goddamn well.
Im actually living this right now. Broke my Sprint curve (last time I ever go without insurance...) so I had to switch back to my old crappy Sanyo flip... I want to jump off of a f*cking bridge. No e-mail, no GPS, no BRICKBREAKER...WTF?! Thank God, sweet mercy is on the way, eligible for upgrade in 2 months. HTC Touch Pro, here I come.....
I have a Nokia 6230 and only use the internet for news once in a while. I survived for my first two years with a 3120 and did just fine.
I could easily do this, but id rather use a different phone, i have an env2 but i only ever use it for texting and calling, once in a blue moon do i actually take a pic and its of nothing even worht doing it, when i lost My original "the V" earlier this year i almost bought the coupe but my insurance ended up sending me an env2 for peanuts so i just kept it, but my next phone i really think im going to get that new phone from verizon that rivals the coupe. no camera or anything , just texting and calling. Id do this but with the coupe or that new phone, i cant think of its model off the top of my head. I might even ebay 1 of them....
how weird. I am selling my unlocked iPhone on eBay and moving to a legit 3g. My contract with Vodafone isn't up for another 45 days so I've bought a motofone f3 to tide me over. Calls and texts is all it does. Got it for a tenner on eBay brand new. My iPhone will be gone i a week so I'm not sure how I will cope with the f3.
One thing is for certain it will help me fall in love with my 3g more quickly!
In addition to Nokia N95 I still keep my old Nokia 6210. That is the most robust and reliable phone I've ever had. Believe it or not, I still prefer to take that old one to the beach or ski slopes. However, I can't give away my N95 because I use it as a camera and post photos and videos to my blog using Wavelog.
Well, I would've managed it, except my PC exploded, so I needed to use IM on my phone.
Otherwise I would've managed it.
Honest.
I would.
Well, alright, maybe not, I was getting withdrawal...
My original post: http://www.mobileshop.com/blog/mobile-phone-news/can-you-give-up-your-smartphone-for-month-take-the-nokia-1100-challenge/