Other iconic phones that deserve to be resurrected

SINGAPORE — The Mobile World Congress is supposed to be about the next big thing in mobile tech, yet a basic feature phone like the retro Nokia 3310 stole the show in Barcelona this year.

The Nokia 3310 wowed the crowd at this year's MWC, should these others get another lease at life?

By

Elissa Loi

SINGAPORE — The Mobile World Congress is supposed to be about the next big thing in mobile tech, yet a basic feature phone like the retro Nokia 3310 stole the show in Barcelona this year.

Sure, it isn’t that pretty and it does barely anything (okay, Snake is now in colour), but that didn’t stop everybody from going ga-ga over it (and yes, there was the inevitable backlash).

But the new/old Nokia one of the brands that got on the revival revolution. For instance, TCL tipped a nod to the past with the Blackberry KeyOne (complete with physical keyboard) and Lenovo offered the Moto G5 and G5 Plus — tips of the hat to the Motorolas of yore.

Yes, nostalgia is a powerful emotional tool, and some comebacks are nice (a la the currently revived Guns ‘n’ Roses incarnation currently going on tour). So in that vein, here are some suggestions for classic phones that might do well to get a new shot at life.

NOKIA 8110 (1996). The 5110 may have been the first to include the game, Snake, but this was featured in the movie, The Matrix, and became the coolest accessory. This was designed with the business crowd in mind and what made it really stick out was the way it curved when the number pad was revealed. All this even before the curve was cool.

BLACKBERRY BOLD 9000 (2008). It might be difficult for you to remember when BlackBerry ruled the mobile scene, but it wasn’t all that long ago when everyone — from the coolest kid to the suits in the CBD — seemed to be using a BB. That trackball and QWERTY keyboard were what people used to BBM one another.

MOTOROLA STARTAC (1996). The Startac holds the title of first flip phone ever invented and its name is geeky on purpose, as a tribute to Star Trek’s Communicator. If you’re wondering why it looks so familiar, that’s because the Razr is considered its successor. It was also one of the first phones to have vibration as an alternative alert. (How revolutionary.)

SIEMENS SL45 (2001). She may not look like much, but she’s got it where it counts, kid. It’s the first phone to come with memory expansion and an MP3 player (yes, this is the phone that your smartphones have to thank for the same tech). And it also came with stopwatch, currency converter, and games – all into its tiny form.

ERICSSON T28 (1999). Considered a classic by many, the T28 was one of the greatest phones ever produced by Ericsson before it joined forces with Sony in 2001. Sure, it has a tiny screen, but it was positioned as a premium phone. A couple of its accolades include being the first phone to use lithium polymer batteries and having an automatically opening flip.

SAMSUNG SGH-E700 (2003). This phone was pretty bare-bones with no standout gimmick. It had the basic fixings like polyphonic ringtones and a VGA camera which aren’t remarkable by today’s standards; but the 780mAh battery gave it up to 230 hours of standby time. You win some, you lose some.

NOKIA 9000 (1996). The first in Nokia’s Communicator series, the Nokia 9000 was considered a mobile powerhouse for its time. Packing a 24MHz Intel processor, 8MB of memory, and a grayscale display, it was revolutionary back in the day. It looked like a typical phone, but open it up and you saw the future: A full QWERTY keypad and Internet connectivity (with a dedicated button). Taken for granted now, but amazing back then.

MOTOROLA RAZR (2004). Those who don’t know the “Hello, Moto” ads are too young to remember why this one made an impact. Back when thin was still a thing, the Razr exploded onto the scene and became the de facto it phone of the moment. For a clamshell, it had the slightest silhouette for its time at just 13.9mm. Initially positioned as a fashion phone, Motorola also teamed up with Dolce and Gabbana for a limited edition gold run.

LG CHOCOLATE (2006). Positioned as a premium handset, the LG Chocolate won widespread acclaim for its understated design. Depending on where you lived, the LG Chocolate took on different forms and colours (including a questionable pink). But what remained consistent were its sleek lines and red hot accents. Later iterations also included a slabby one that was not unlike the screen-dominated smartphones of today.

A version of this first appeared in Stuff Singapore

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Other iconic phones that deserve to be resurrected

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