Overview:

The Vodafone V1605 is the Vodafone branded version of the HTC hermes; it’s a Windows Mobile 5 device. Here are the full technical specifications for anyone that’s interested.

It’s quite a large device to carry around, although not that much larger than my old Nokia N70, it feels really solid and well put together. On the whole it’s really nice to use however – this being a windows device it does lock up from time to time forcing you to carry out a soft reset. Most of the time you just roll your eye’s and reboot, but it’s infuriating when it locks up when you’re trying to answer a call.

Set up:

Things didn’t get off to a great start when the phone crashed the first time I switched it on: while running “SetHSDPA.exe/Disable, a reboot sorted that one out.

The first thing I did once I’d gone through the set up process was upgrade the ROM so I’m now running the latest version of the firmware.

Getting GPS to work on the vodafone V1605:

Next I decided to try and get Google maps for mobile installed. Getting the application installed was a doddle, getting it to talk to my GPS reciever wasn’t. After hours of frustration I found this article which explains how to activate GPS on the V1605. It turns out that by default Vodafone hide the GPS settings in the control panel and you need a registry hack to reveal them. Once I got passed the initial issue of getting the handset to talk to the GPS receiver Google maps worked a treat.

Accessories & Software:

At the same time as ordering the phone I got myself a 2GB memory card to install applications & save files on – so far I’ve only used about 10% of it! I also bought a cradle so my phone can sit on my desk in the office & stay synced with my PC. This got me thinking, if the phone is always connected to the PC wouldn’t it be nice to be able to send text messages directly from the PC rather than have to pick the phone up? After a bit of searching I found my moblier a great little piece of freeware that talks to your phone over activesync and displays the phone’s screen on your PC’s monitor allowing you to navigate around the phone’s functions with the PC’s mouse & keyboard! Then I discovered by accident that if I move my mouse pointer of the left hand side of my monitor, it appears on the phones screen! This is brilliant, it means that my phone becomes effectively a third monitor on my desk albeit a tiny one.

I’ve tried a handful of other third party applications out too, including:

• SPB mobile shell. This is “shell” that sits on top of the windows mobile operating and ads things like a fancy clock and weather forecasts to a “now screen” (today screen replacement). It is very pretty, but since uninstalling the trial I’m surprised to say I haven’t missed it
  
• HTC Custom, a tool for your HTC Windows Mobile 5 or 6 device’s settings. Pretty useful tool and free too
• Opera mini, So far this is the best web browser I’ve found for Windows mobile
• Minimo, Mozilla’s mobile browser. I really wanted to like this little app, but frankly it’s just boring to look at and doesn’t feel as slick as opera.

All in all I’m pleased with my V1605, we didn’t get off to the best of starts – but I think we’ll be happy together for the next 17 months.

I really liked the look of the v1605, My previous handset (before my current N-70) was an i-mate jam (also an HTC device) I really liked it. The only drawback with the Jam was that it had no keyboard – dialling a number or sending a text with the touch screen could be a right pain, so when I upgraded last year I decided to go back to a Nokia handset until a decent Windows Mobile handset came along.

A couple of weeks back I was in my local Vodafone store upgrading Laura’s phone and got talking to the guy about my imminent upgrade, he told me that I would be able to have “any handset I wanted” as a free upgrade. So imagine my annoyance when I walked into the Vodafone store in Crawley today and they told me it’d be £200 to upgrade to the V1605!

I decided to call Vodafone customer services on 191, I spoke to someone in the upgrades department that said that the best price they could do the handset for was £150, I could however have the V1415 (HTC Vox) free. I my opinion the v1415 is not as good as the V1605, despite the fact that it’s a Windows Mobile 6 device (the 1605 is WM5), it has a slower processor & no touch screen.

I said that this wasn’t prepared to accept anything except a free upgrade to the V1605 and I’d go to T-mobile to get it otherwise. They put me through to someone in their customer retention department. He asked why I wanted that particular handset, I explained that I wanted a Windows Mobile device with a touch screen, keyboard & wi-fi. Vodafone don’t have any other handsets (currently) that meet that spec at the moment and eventually he agreed to upgrade me to the handset I want for free, it’ll be delivered tomorrow.

So to summarise, when upgrading your Vodafone handset:

1. Do your homework, decide exactly what you want before you talk to Vodafone
2. Call 191, don’t upgrade in store
3. Be as specific about why you want the handset as you can; this limits the customer service rep’s chances of being able to persuade you to take another model
4. Stick to your guns
5. Threaten to go to another network

And with any luck you’ll be successful too.