MDA Vario - Anyone Know Anything About This Phone?
My Treo 650 died on the trip back from Thailand and I am not going to replace it.
I am sick of the Treo even though I did get the crashes I blogged about to go away. Thanks to everyone who replied. It was a memory problem made worse by my use of Goodlink.
What I want is a Windows Mobile 5.0 phone that runs on a GSM network, has good outlook integration, has a good camera and wifi, and is Skype compatible.
This MDA Vario phone, reviews here and here, looks great. It's available from T-Mobile in europe and, of course, on eBay.
If anyone knows anything about this phone, in particular if an unlocked unit will run on my T-Mobile sim card here in the US, I'd love to hear about it in the comments or via email.
Fred--you can send it back to TMobile and they'll replace it right away, I believe.
You should wait for the Moto Q; Windows Mobile, thin form factor, better keyboard than the Treo, very sweet. Might only be Verizon, though.
Posted by: charlie crystle | January 03, 2006 at 11:12 AM
can't help with your main Q - I bought a vario three weeks ago. it’s a great unit, nice form factor, good screen ok battery life. Fast enough for what it is, and the UK tmobile package is very good (40mb gprs). Downsides are 1) poor camera, 2) non-standard headphone jack 3) IE mobile is functional, but not great, and opera mobile is not available yet, and being WM 5 the accelerator service will not work anyway. The short comings in the OS and IE can be fixed in part with third part software for $30, but I’ve not installed this yet. I’d recommend the phone to anyone who needs a good smart phone, but not running at full PDA spec. if you need heavy excel, graphics, video, etc you need a more powerful unit, but for communications and mobile web surfing this is perfect. I’ve not used the keyboard as much as I thought, but when writing longer emails it’s a nice thing to have. On a side note it does highlight the need for more sites to be optimised for mobiles! The worst case being the MS M5.0 site, which displays terribly despite being a pre-loaded favourite!
Posted by: Charlie | January 03, 2006 at 11:24 AM
the only problem with buying phones that aren't yet available here is trying to get it serviced when it breaks...
Posted by: Jeremy Stein | January 03, 2006 at 11:33 AM
I have the MDA Vario although I have it from O2 and it is called the XDA Exec Mini I believe.
No problems with it. Camera is not awesome but does the job. OS runs fine and have had no probs other than the occasional restart required - just like any windows machine it eats memory fast.
Also...sometimes the redraw from portrait to landscape is a tad slow but a quick restart ie screen refresh does the job.
Overall am delighted with it, get my hotmail and gmail on the move now and can blog from anywhere I can get GPRS.
Hurrah!
Namaste
Al
Posted by: City Hippy | January 03, 2006 at 12:17 PM
Check out the Sprint 6700, WM5 plus a slide out keyboard which is good. Only downside from the the TREO is the lack of 1 handed operation.
Posted by: trevor | January 03, 2006 at 01:46 PM
Your treo should be covered by warranty from Palm fr one year. You should get it replaced just in case. I have seen treo users migrate to WM5, only to como back months later...
Posted by: nono | January 03, 2006 at 02:42 PM
Fred, I believe the Treo 700 is due out soon, with Windows Mobile 5.0...I'm not sure which carrier/s though...
welcome back.
Posted by: Michael Parekh | January 03, 2006 at 04:00 PM
I have a Qtek 9100, which is identical to the MDA Vario. Some companies also sell the same model under other names: Orange SPV 6000, imate K-JAM etc. They are all based on the HTC Wizard platform.
I live in Switzerland where I also bought this device, but I'm currently in the United States, and it works just fine with both T-Mobile and Cingular (better with T-Mobile though).
Overall, I'm quite happy with this phone. I actually think that the current Windows Mobile platform offers some real advantages over both the Treo and the Nokia Communicator which I owned before. And the Vario/9100/K-JAM is definitely one of the best Windows Mobile devices that you can buy. It's a good compromise between a compact form factor and rich functionality.
However, don't expect too much from running Skype on it. The MDA Vario has a relatively weak processor. Skype (at least the newest version for low-powered Pocket PCs) runs OK, but you need almost perfect conditions (network quality, freshly booted phone etc.) for it to really work flawlessly.
Andreas
Posted by: Andreas Goeldi | January 03, 2006 at 07:11 PM
Fred they rock - the whole series. I have one. Your best bet is to get one from eBay Australia, UK or EU (AU will give you a good currency return) since they are quad-band GSM, not locked into a provider and when you travel you can purchase local SIM cards and slot them in.
Posted by: Nik Cubrilovic | January 03, 2006 at 09:14 PM
Just tried Skype out on my new Vario. The low-CPU version does work... but just barely. I the other end could hear me fine, but the reception on the Vario became increasingly out of sync and kept on dropping out... After a minute it was unusable. This is only a beta and it does nearly work. Maybe it'll get better.
Posted by: Guigsy | January 08, 2006 at 12:54 PM
Ricky-
Your best bet is to wait a couple of months (if that). The reason being is both T-Mobile and Cingular will be launching the HTC Wizard in the very near future here in the US.
I just got back from CES and spoke at lenght with the MS Mobile guys. Both GSM carriers are very close to launching this device. While they couldn't officially confirm, "off the record", it's not a matter of if, but of when and when is very near-term.
T-Mo will launch it as the MDA Vario (I'm just assuming the name will stay the same as the T-Mo European version). Cingular's version is the 8200. It's the same phone with a slightly different housing and keyboard.
I've been waiting for this phone for sometime now and almost picked up one on ebay over the holidays. However, I figured I'd wait till after CES where I hoped I could get more information. I'm glad I did.
I'd stay away from the Sprint 6700 and Verizon's new 700W (Treo form-factor). As you are aware, these are CDMA phones and therefore useless overseas.
Posted by: Operation619 | January 08, 2006 at 02:28 PM
The MDA Vario will be released in the US from T-mobile on Feb 20th 2006 and the SDA will be released on Feb 13 2006 confirmed by t-mobile costomer service. yah.
Posted by: wendie | January 20, 2006 at 09:49 PM
the moto Q has been recalled and will not be released
Posted by: Wendie | January 20, 2006 at 09:56 PM
hi guys just bought thus vario the other day just wondering if any of you guys know the mini sd capacity limit for the phone cos im planning on buying a 2 gig sd card but not sure if the phon ewill support it.
so pls help
thanks
Posted by: Nazrul | May 16, 2006 at 08:34 AM
Hi,
My mda vario touch screen stop functioning, i tried almost everthing like reset,battery out,even reset device to factory setting by typing "1234" but no luck,
device start normal and phone is working well but i can not use pda because screen is not responding by touching on it ,
can some one help please,thanks rmsa
Posted by: rmsa | May 24, 2006 at 07:50 PM
I got a T-Mobile MDA, You know it cracks by pushing Stylet, 2 weeks after use had a small crack, it is getting bigger and bigger. T-Mobile does not do anything about it, they want to sell me another one. HTC, the manufactirer says, don't call me, call T-Mobile.
Posted by: Saeed | July 15, 2006 at 03:02 PM
I've got the HTC MDA Vario on T-Mobile, I dropped the phone and cracked the screen a while back and T-mobile are not interested and the phone is unusable so hmmmmmm be careful or take out insurance and pay the price if you never end up using it....... :(
Posted by: victor | August 15, 2006 at 08:10 AM