Flashback: Checkout 7 Mobile Phones from the Early 2000s(pics)


Happy Throwback Thursday! Nigeria’s been said to retain the number
one spot as the most mobilized country, well, there’s no surprise here
because ever since mobile phones were introduced we don’t seem to get
enough of them.

Mobile phones have found their way into every sector of the society,
from the high-end smartphones to the simpler but equally vital handsets
that populate our cities, and to the ones made available in developing
areas. In the history of cell phones, they have certainly gone through
lots of modification, but what’s yet to be determined is if most of the
changes are better compared to what we had in early 2000’s or just
worse. Regardless, we all can agree that mobile phones have become an
essential part of our everyday life.
That brings me to this question, how old were you when you first got a
mobile phone? Times have definitely changed, right? Now you see kids of
10 years or less walking around with high-priced phones and I ask
myself what they seriously need it for.
I can’t  really remember when I got my first cell phone in secondary
school – probably ss1 or ss2 then – a Samsung, that phone blew my mind, I
stayed up all night putting in the catchiest ringtones – horrible
ringtones that were hot then, adding pictures, going through the games,
in fact, it was so cool, well until it got lost and I cried my eyeballs
out.
Although I’ve since gotten over that heartbreak, it still took me
down memory lane reminding me of all the many hip phones I’ve had
throughout the years, which almost everyone couldn’t get enough of,
asides from the memories these vintage phones represent.  In my opinion,
they are better than the current mobile phones we have, especially when
it comes to durability.
Looking back, which of these phones were your favourite?

Nokia phones

Ok, so almost everyone joined this bandwagon and why not? Nokia was,
sorry it still is, highly commended, when it comes to the battery life.
It had the best battery life in history, it would last a week or more
without charging, and oh, if it fell, you won’t have to be bothered
because the only damage that would occur was to the floor, plus, you
could read the screen in direct sunlight (since it featured the
first-ever monochromatic LCD mobile display), extra bonus: favourite
feature – the snake game you could play all day long. We sure loved that
mobile phone, guess that’s why it sold over 120 million pieces.

Photo credit: paynget.pk

Photo credit: ebay.ie

Motorola RAZR3

Before iPhone, Apple, Samsung, and the rest took over, there was the
RAZR, this phone basically dominated the market in the 2000s, as they
first hit the market in 2003 and became the best-selling flip phone
model of all time, selling over 1 30 million pieces worldwide in just
four years. They came in black, silver, and pink – my favourite, with a
small preview screen on the outside, and a regular screen on the inside.
The slim shape combined with the dual screen and killer camera made it a
must-have, even the name was cool, wow, the best way to express your
anger in a fierce way then, was by shutting the phone so hard and
flipping your hair, as a girl that is LOL, and for a guy that owned one,
boyfriend material 100 yards no jokes.

Photo credit: cashkaro.com

Sony Ericsson

This cell phone was probably among the first phone for anyone just
joining the league as a mobile phone user back then. It had a 2-Mpixel
camera and the colour was nice too. Later models like W900i were
introduced, like the Ericsson Walkman.

Photo credit: electronicproducts.com

The Ericsson Walkman wasn’t the first mobile phone with MP3
capabilities, but since it was introduced, it took over the popularity
of the dual cell phone/mp3 player. It’s hard to imagine right now a
phone that didn’t play music.

Photo credit: pixcooler.com

T-mobile Sidekick
T-mobile Sidekick was the perfect combination of cool and useful and
was the “it” phone to have in the late 2000s. T-Mobile’s devices were
GPRS/EDGE smartphones manufactured by Danger Incorporated. The OS
software run on the phone was called “Hiptop,” and the company
eventually partnered with Sharp. The phone included downloadable
software applications, e-mail hosting, instant messaging, and Internet
capabilities. The Sidekick revolutionized texting, as it flipped around
to reveal a full-sized keyboard – the flippy thing it did was really
cool by the way.

Photo credit: reddit.com

Photo credit: wikipedia.org

SAGEM

Sagem My X5-2 or My X5 was one of the earliest camera phones to go
mainstream in the Nigerian market. Recent smartphones make it look like
an embarrassment to what a phone can do, but having a Sagem in 2004,
when it was released is the equivalent of having a Samsung Galaxy S7 or
other high-end phones today. It had a camera quality of 0.3 megapixels,
yeah, it is nothing compared to what we have now, however, snapping
pictures with them gave us so much joy. It didn’t have Bluetooth, wifi
and the rest, but we can’t deny that the Infrared was still on point.
Let’s not also forget the removable Li-ion battery had a standby time of
up to 300 amps per hour, and talk time of up to 5 amps per hour – I
still wonder why the overpriced phones we purchase now can’t last half a
day.

Photo credit: codemasters.com

EnVVX9900

Verizon enV was manufactured by LG with an LCD display, 2.0-megapixel
camera with flash, Bluetooth, and USB capabilities, the Env appealed to
many consumers. The face of the phone reminded one of the classic
Nokia, but the inside revealed a large screen with a mini-sized
keyboard. It also had the option of a purchasable web browsing plan. The
first enV in the series sold so well that enV2 and enV3, enV touch
models were released.

verizonenV

Photo credit: electronicproducts.com

BLACKBERRY

Ok, Blackberry might not be that old,  feels sad putting it up, and
never thought I would leave this ship but hey, frankly it’s going out of
style pretty fast, so here’s to remind us how remarkable Blackberry
actually was. RIM launched the Blackberry 7210 in 2003 as its first
colour-display device. It had a resolution of 240 x 160 pixels, 16
Mbytes of storage, and 2 Mbytes of RAM. Users could open documents,
Excel, PDFs, and PowerPoint files since it had a Java platform and
browser. The battery usually lasted for two or three days – at this
point battery life started struggling, still, it was gorgeous. This
model for its time wasn’t that bad!

Photo credit: crackberry.com

Photo credit: online.wsj.com

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