The OTHER Apple Phone

The bloom may be off the iPhone for you, like it is for me -- it was pricey, then it was suspiciously cheaper, it was locked, it was unlocked, it was bricked, whatever. But along comes a guy with ANOTHER Apple phone that's just plain coolness -- he's making calls on his Newton. His what?His Newton. You remember the Newton -- one of the earliest handheld computers/PDAs. I've been looking at PDAs in the wake of IDC's announcement that the PDA market has plummeted over the past year. And I've discovered that the PDA is alive and well on that elephant's graveyard of our technology and culture, eBay.

You can still get almost any PDA or accessory for a PDA there, which makes The Unofficial Apple Weblog's story Rig of the Week: Newton as telephone not only nostalgic, but more than a little practical. One Marcus Hammerschmitt cobbled together a Nokia Card Phone 2.0 he got on eBay for 10 euros, a HDC-6D headset (Cost: 1 euro), a prepaid T-Mobile SIM card (10 euros), and NewtSMS+ 1.10a software. For an investment he estimates at $48, he's making calls.

You can quibble about whether it's an Apple phone or a Nokia phone in an Apple shell, but either way, it's an inspiration. Everything old is new again.