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eXpansys offers sub £100 Benq E72


Guest PaulOBrien

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Guest Paul (MVP)
Back in January I unboxed the teeny-tiny BenQ E72 Smartphone. Packing half decent specs...
  • Windows Mobile 6 standard
  • TI OMAP1030 260 MHz CPU
  • Quad Band 850/900/1800/1900MHz
  • 2" QVGA screen
  • 2.0MP Camera
  • 128MB ROM / 64MB RAM
  • microSD expansion
  • Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
  • WiFi with optional UMA support
  • 108mm x 46.3mm x 13.8mm (it's small!)
  • 88g

...the E72 is a pretty smart little device in a world largely devoid of Smartphones. The E72 is particularly interesting as eXpansys are now offering it at a bargain £99.99 [aff], and that's before the £10 MoDaCo voucher discount!

I don't have mine any more, but I do like to have a Smartphone around as a backup device, or when I need a device that is super-small to take to the pub. Anyone else have one of these babies?

P

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Guest WearTheFoxHat

I'm tempted at that price to get one for "what the hell".

Ordered !

Looks a nice wee phone. Might serve to replace my work handset, and at least then I can sync it with lotus notes! :S

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I wonder if this would prove a good replacement for my Vox (slightly worse-for-wear now) as I don't use the keyboard on it?

Shame they only do it in red!!

It looks a bit slow in the video Paul - would you say it was comparable to the Vox? I think it has a slightly faster processor than the Vox.

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Guest bluesmudge

Mine arrived this morning!

Few points to note -

fancy day night background ... not on the one that comes from expansys. neither is the skype app or skype voucher . . not that i brought it for either of those things, but i know some of you might be! I guess the ebay item paul brought was a different bundle.

Good little phone - I wanted to downsize my MDA to something small, with potential of complex function, but not a compromise between PDA and phone. This is my first candy bar smartphone since my C550 approx 2 years ago. The better battery, thin and light design make this a smartphone you could really live with .. . and the wifi is a nice touch.

To think I almost brought a thin nokia!

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Guest WearTheFoxHat

Mine arrived this morning .... some things are a great spec, others are a bit lacking.

Micros SD card slot ... but only up to 2GB

Wifi - Excellent

Bluetooth - Excellent

2MP Camera - Actually not too bad, id say probably better than that on the TyTN II

However it only has GPRS and EDGE at times ... it doesn't have 3G and certainly doesn't have HSDPA.

I was planning on using it as a pub phone, and putting my T-Mobile sim in there, and letting hosted exchange sync my calendar and contacts on there. But after using it for a while, I think I might use it as a replacement for my work handset, and let try to get it synchronising with Lotus Notes via USB ... so I've got a copy of fairly recent emails and calendar when Im out and about.

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Mine arrived this morning .... some things are a great spec, others are a bit lacking.

Micros SD card slot ... but only up to 2GB

Wifi - Excellent

Bluetooth - Excellent

2MP Camera - Actually not too bad, id say probably better than that on the TyTN II

However it only has GPRS and EDGE at times ... it doesn't have 3G and certainly doesn't have HSDPA.

I was planning on using it as a pub phone, and putting my T-Mobile sim in there, and letting hosted exchange sync my calendar and contacts on there. But after using it for a while, I think I might use it as a replacement for my work handset, and let try to get it synchronising with Lotus Notes via USB ... so I've got a copy of fairly recent emails and calendar when Im out and about.

After unlovking use this file to allow you to use 8gb sdhc cards....

SDHC.777.cab

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Guest DarkWanderer
After unlovking use this file to allow you to use 8gb sdhc cards....

Will this cab work on other phones too? I'm thinking in particular my Qtek 8500?

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Guest WearTheFoxHat
Er, it's only a 2G handset...

P

You know me ... blindly go out and purchase stuff !

I think it's a great handset tho. Although I've managed to crash it quite a few times now! I've made it my works handset now, and just have to get it syncing with my Lotus Notes (urrrrgh!) !

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Back in January I unboxed the teeny-tiny BenQ E72 Smartphone. Packing half decent specs...
  • Windows Mobile 6 standard
  • TI OMAP1030 260 MHz CPU
  • Quad Band 850/900/1800/1900MHz
  • 2" QVGA screen
  • 2.0MP Camera
  • 128MB ROM / 64MB RAM
  • microSD expansion
  • Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
  • WiFi with optional UMA support
  • 108mm x 46.3mm x 13.8mm (it's small!)
  • 88g

...the E72 is a pretty smart little device in a world largely devoid of Smartphones. The E72 is particularly interesting as eXpansys are now offering it at a bargain £99.99 [aff], and that's before the £10 MoDaCo voucher discount!

I don't have mine any more, but I do like to have a Smartphone around as a backup device, or when I need a device that is super-small to take to the pub. Anyone else have one of these babies?

P

PAul, Got one last week and it is really a great phone.In fact, I would rather have it than my HTC S730. It may not have the same quality of finish but ut us very decent and the unit works well.

Should we have a dedicated listing now for BenQ? Seems a good number of people are buying these now....

Arthur.

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Have u tried Skype on this? I wonder if it's able to run it smoothly and whether it's got the speaker problem as other windows mobile devices?

Skype works prefectly on it through the wi fi connection that I used. Skype is not already on the device so will have to be downloaded from their site. It still outputs to the rear speaker though; is the same on my HTC S730. Seems like thats the way the way in which the Skype software works. ;)

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I wonder if this would prove a good replacement for my Vox (slightly worse-for-wear now) as I don't use the keyboard on it?

Shame they only do it in red!!

It looks a bit slow in the video Paul - would you say it was comparable to the Vox? I think it has a slightly faster processor than the Vox.

I have definitely replaced my HTC S730 with the E72; the former now going up for sale on ebay!!!!

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Guest WearTheFoxHat

I think it's a great phone. I've got it setup as my works phone but have my calendar, tasks and contacts syncing from my personal hosted exchange. That means I can keep all my contacts in one place ... and if I dont want to carry two phones, I can forward works calls to personal handset and still see whose calling me!

Now if there was a simple way to copy/sync the works calendar from Lotus Notes too. :S

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I have definitely replaced my HTC S730 with the E72; the former now going up for sale on ebay!!!!

What's the performance like compared to the 730? I'm judging that the 730 is quicker than the 710 (Vox) which I am looking to replace!

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Hi to all - my first post on this forum.

I've been a WinMobile user for a number of years. I currently have an HTC Tytn II but was looking for a small WinMobile smartphone for leisure use. The Benq E72 seemed to fit the bill and I ordered one today from Expansys.

In repsonse to my question whether the E72 was locked to any particular network, the guy I spoke to at Expansys said that it could be used on any UK network. This implied to me that the E72 is not locked to any network. However better to get an opinion from actual users than a salesperson.

One question is whether the E72s currently being sold by Expansys are actually locked to any networks or not and whether I can use my (Maltese) sim. Also, what type of locking (network and/or applications installations) may the E72 have?

In any case I have downloaded E72_Unlock.cab and Unlock[1].Disable.cab, but what type of locking do these remove?

Thanks in anticipation for the replies.

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Oh well, I just ordered mine from eXpansys (price has gone up a bit though! £10 discount voucher worked!).. I'll feed back here once i've had a play with it ;)

... which still hasn't arrived, even though it was apparently sent out on Thursday via Special Delivery (and our local postie is VERY good).. :wacko:

Expansys didn't have a tracking number for me... not impressed.

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Ordered mine from expansys at 13:00 Friday, arrived 09:00 Saturday morning. First thoughts are that it's a nice little phone. Wanted it primarily as a "pub phone" so I could leave my touch dual safely at home of an evening and I'm sure it will fill that criteria perfectly. I have been using it all day today to just run it through it's paces and battery is almost gone but I have been running activesync all day via GPRS to connect to my exchange server. That is where I have been having problems. I don't know whether it is an issue with Orange at the moment or whether there is a problem with the phone but the push email works fine for about half an hour then it dies. Manual sync-ing results in an error and the only way to get it up and running is to turn the phone off and reboot whereupon it works for a while again then dies. Also after not receiving any SMS messages for a few hours last night I turned it off and on again and a load came through at once. As I said, it may not be a problem with the phone, it may be that Orange are up to their tricks but I will try it for a few more days to see if it is rectified otherwise it'll be going back.

WiFi works no problem, screen is small but nice. I don't find it any slower than my old E650.

Minor quibbles. There is no flashing LED to show the phone is on. It has an LED at the top right which flashed red when a call is missed and another to the left of the screen which flashes when an SMS or email is received. Some people may like this feature, I personally don't it's probably some compulsive disorder but I keep hitting a key to make sure it hasn't frozen or something

It comes with a piece of software called Speech Commander which I can't get to initiate with my handsfree kit in the car. Whether it is supposed to or not I'm not entirely sure but I'll have more time to give it a try tonight hopefully.

Keys are nice and responsive but the soft keys are recessed slightly compared to those around them and I can sometimes find myself hitting the Call and End buttons instead.

All in all it is a good enough phone to enable me to give the E650 that I was using as a spare to the missus. It's less of a brick than that one and I never used the keyboard anyway so the smaller form factor of the E72 is very much the going out phone I've been waiting for to compliment the Touch Dual for business purposes. If it does have to go back because of the sync problems I will definitely want another to replace it.... unless other are experiencing the same difficulties. I would be interested to know if anyone else is experiencing problems with activesynch over the ether or SMS messages not coming through.

Cheers,

Al

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