Categories: random
Tags: phone, technology, ineptness
Date: 08 April 2009 16:59:50
My mobile phone isn't very well. It is rather ancient, and didn't do anything fancy, but that was fine by me - all I needed was to make and receive calls and texts, and I also used the reminder and alarm functions but that was pretty much it. But it's definitely feeling its age and has been slowing down and cutting out and generally objecting to being used so much, so it's time to move on.
Last year one of my friends gave me an old-ish but new and completely unused PDA, so I am currently charging that up. It has lots of extra features - internet connectivity (not that I'll ever use that, I waste far too much time online as it is!), camera phone (actually that is potentially quite handy) and all sorts of other stuff. It has a stylus for touch-screen operations rather than a numeric keypad, which is a bit of a faff and I'd rather have just had a numeric pad, but hey it was free so I'm not complaining about that.
My problem though is that, as far as phones and that sort of thing are concerned, I am an utter Luddite. I simply can't get excited about them, which is why I've never bothered keeping up with networks and new technology (bluetooth and all that sort of thing are a complete mystery to me). I have always just had a pay-as-you-go account, as I simply don't make enough calls or texts to make having a contract worthwhile (£10 topped-up on my number will last absolutely ages - at least a month, and usually quite a lot more than that). Anyway, it now transpires that I don't think the new phone/PDA will accept my SIM card/PAYG account, but I haven't the first idea how to go about finding out whether the PDA will accept any other PAYG SIM cards or if I have to get a contract (which I really really really don't want). Google is not particularly being my friend - I have searched the make of PDA, and have got millions of hits that I don't understand as they're full of phone-speak. The user's manual doesn't have any immediately obvious information for Luddites like me, it seems to assume knowledge (and interest) that I simply don't have.
So, here's my plea. The handset I have is a Vodaphone VPA compact, and my current SIM card is a Virgin Pay-As-You-Go. The networks options on the PDA suggest that T-Mobile is the default - do T-Mobile do PAYG? If I go to a (scary) mobile phone shop, what are the questions I should be asking? Help!