[amitk26]

Originally Posted by Ram

Companies spend millions of dollars in R&D and testing.

Well if compliance is strong like GCF type certification for European union then there is no reason to doubt an unknown brand for safety and security.
Our problem is that TRAI is more worried about tariffs etc rather then creating compliance norms for India.

Big companies do not invest millions of dollars just for charity governments in developed economies enforce rules for which test like drop tests , radiation tests etc are defined.

For example for achieving GCF type certification one need to go to one of the handful of test houses in UK who charge around 500-700 pounds per hour. One round of test lasts for several days , each failure means retesting and additional expense. So before going for type certification testing every company launching product in Europe need to make sure that product passes all compliance tests and that triggers internal R&D spending.

One more point is that mobile phones are platformized a lot , Example Nokia phones are mostly based on TI platforms and manufactured by Flextronics.There is lot of consolidation in industry like ST, EMP and NXT merged to create ST-Erricson I don't know latest status but most of the low cost manufacturers phones were based on the reference designs provided by one of these OEMs where as big companies like Nokia are first movers and evolve the design further to include more features as per their research.

In order to save royalty Chinese government funded / supported few companies to create low cost platforms from China / Taiwan (example mediatek ) and today they rule the bottom of pyramid market.

Originally Posted by vivekiny2k

If a mobile phone (or cars for that matter) made in china and assembled in india works, I don't see any issue with using it. IMEI sounds to me like a licensing scheme, designed to keep low cost players out. We did have license raj till the 80s. Was it any better?

This is another extreme view , Governments need to enforce norms for security and safety ( both physical and data security) primarily governments duty is to create standard bodies who can create standards and enforce them for larger public good.
IMEI enforcement is not licencing scheme, Indian operators were cutting corners by not maintaining EIR registers as mandated by GSM specification which India also endorses , Government just pushed them for enforcement.

You may like to know that an ordinary mobile phone was most popular bomb trigger before this move. It just required one to connect ring buzzer /speaker to another circuit which can trigger blast.

[JayD]

I checked it out at the nokia care in chennai, and i was disappointed to say the least. Even though the display is AMOLED, Its nowhere comparable to the samsung galaxy S. The interface looked clunky, and look too similar to the normal symbian touch interface(Not a good thing). Th camera seemed average, atleast indoors, and that display does not help either, maybe the pix would be better in the comp. The only saving grace is the USB on the go feature.

[srishiva]

The UI is still looks uninspiring. Hope they bring out meego handsets faster to the market. However, any idea if we get Windows Phone 7 handsets in India?

[hiren.mistry]

The prices look good. My wifey needs a new phone and she will not look beyond a Nokia. This seems like a good upgrade from a 5800.

[shwetanshu]

Originally Posted by srishiva

The UI is still looks uninspiring. Hope they bring out meego handsets faster to the market. However, any idea if we get Windows Phone 7 handsets in India?

MS said early next year

[SRK]

Atlast I got my N8 on the 12th night. (I have been a Nokia person till date, this is my 3rd phone)



I chose Silver out of the Dark grey, Orange, Green and Blue available.
Need to learn to handle it as this is my 1st touchscreen phone. I upgraded to it from my N73 music edition which is still running great, except that the speaker sound has gone down a bit and the chrome of the keys is gone (its a 4 year old phone). Plan to re-vamp it from a Nokia service center soon (any suggestions here).

Now coming back to the N8.
I got it for 25K with no goodies except a Cadbury's Celebration box.
For me it is a great phone. Waiting to explore its full capacity.

By the way one thing I understood about this new phone is that most of the content/application depends upon Internet connection.
I would like to know what is the best mobile internet connection plan/package. I use an Airtel connection in Mumbai.

[vivekiny2k]

Originally Posted by amitk26

IMEI enforcement is not licencing scheme, Indian operators were cutting corners by not maintaining EIR registers as mandated by GSM specification which India also endorses , Government just pushed them for enforcement.

You may like to know that an ordinary mobile phone was most popular bomb trigger before this move. It just required one to connect ring buzzer /speaker to another circuit which can trigger blast.

Yes, I agree with standards, and cutting corners and enforcing standards is a game of cat and mouse always on between business and govt. Forget about small players, even companies like reliance like to play with them till govt closes a loophole. That's why I said, legal issues aside, consumer still makes the decision about his/her purchase.

I will not go into details of IMEI or EIR because I don't know a lot about it. But you think by enforcing this, the use of mobile phones as a bomb trigger will be more difficult? What are we trying to stop, the phone by its identity?

[v.anand]

Got an N8 for Rs.24,000/- from Nokia priority stores. I have been promised an BH 104 bluetooth device free, it was out of stock. Hope its a good deal, I did not pre-order it. For pre-ordered handsets, a car charger was provided as an added accessory.

[amitk26]

Originally Posted by vivekiny2k

I will not go into details of IMEI or EIR because I don't know a lot about it. But you think by enforcing this, the use of mobile phones as a bomb trigger will be more difficult? What are we trying to stop, the phone by its identity?

Well now it can be traced as on who sold and who purchased the equipment and that is a really big deal and biggest deterrent to use mobile as a trigger. This prevents every tom-dick and harry to plan blasts like with explosives packed in pressure cooker in mumbai by a local family 3 years back.

Do you think it is just coincidence that blasts triggered by mobiles have disappeared in last few months ?

[vivekiny2k]

Originally Posted by amitk26

Well now it can be traced as on who sold and who purchased the equipment and that is a really big deal and biggest deterrent to use mobile as a trigger. This prevents every tom-dick and harry to plan blasts like with explosives packed in pressure cooker in mumbai by a local family 3 years back.

Do you think it is just coincidence that blasts triggered by mobiles have disappeared in last few months ?

Actually that's news to me. I know you have to produce ID to get a mobile connection. But to buy a handset? can you not just walk into a store and pay cash and get it? How do you trace the owner of a handset?

EDIT: There are a lot of factors that go in preventing bomb blasts. It can just be a coincidence. If any, I would attribute it to restrictions on getting a connection than a handset.

[Visaster]

Please got to GSMARENA online and fill in your requirements on the phone finder section (left lower corner on the home page). You will have the ideal phone for any specific need of yours selected in matter of no time.
I would suggest you to go for just the basic phone

[amitk26]

Originally Posted by vivekiny2k

Actually that's news to me. I know you have to produce ID to get a mobile connection. But to buy a handset? can you not just walk into a store and pay cash and get it? How do you trace the owner of a handset?

EDIT: There are a lot of factors that go in preventing bomb blasts. It can just be a coincidence. If any, I would attribute it to restrictions on getting a connection than a handset.

Good question.

It is a well known fact that there is a full fledged security agency in India which does job of network monitoring ( same guys who are pressing for access to BB data encryption keys).

Most of the intelligence collected for domestic security today is using mobile phones, Every criminal keeps ( or used to keep) a number of SIMs some of them are issued from gulf and neighboring countries like Bangladesh and interchange them for different purpose to escape being tracked.

Phones without IMEI were helpful in this becuase if a person carries 10 SIMs and change them frequently then even one of the local SIM is being monitored there is no way that 9 others can be associated to same person specially if there is no record for roaming SIMs from other countries available to local authorities.

Now if IMEI is enabled every time SIM is changed using IMEI it can be tracked what all 10 SIMs are being used by same person and thus all of them can be monitored even if one of them was being monitored initially, thus plugging a big hole in monitoring capability.

Secondly every company has a record in which area a particular mobile is sold so to a large extent purchaser of mobile can be traced by traditional methods zeroing in on the initial point of sale.

Yes there are still loopholes like providers not verifying address actually before activating SIMs and sellers not verifying to whom handset is sold but they can be plugged gradually if there is a system in place to trace.

[NetfreakBombay]

Originally Posted by amitk26

Now if IMEI is enabled every time SIM is changed using IMEI it can be tracked what all 10 SIMs are being used by same person and thus all of them can be monitored even if one of them was being monitored initially, thus plugging a big hole in monitoring capability.

It is a 5 minute job to change IMEI of such phones. In fact that was official remedy for Chinese phones once duplicate IMEI was detected.

And all it takes is a cable + freely available tools.

It was a purely "commercial" exercise. These phones were hurting large players. Those players got taste of their own medicine. Same manufacturers now bring in phones through legal channels and have cleaned up sub 3k handset market.

[amitk26]

Originally Posted by NetfreakBombay

It is a 5 minute job to change IMEI of such phones. In fact that was official remedy for Chinese phones once duplicate IMEI was detected.

And all it takes is a cable + freely available tools.

Not if they also enforce OTP memory (one time programmable) area for IMEI , giving concessions to burn IMEI as aftermarket job itself was wrong.

Yes the reason cited and initial proposal is for security but commercial considerations and lobbying diluted the proposal and made it a farce but that is so normal for everything in our country that no one seems to be bothered :-)

I personally feel TRAI job should be something like a compliance definition similar to PTCRB or GCF which can take care of above issues and not to dictate who should charge how much for service.

[nandishpal]

guys n8 available at 23200 in bangalore with b&w,this is just for your knowledge,
so that you can save a couple of 1000's