Anyway, I have found a way to change your mobile phone into Apple iPhone. Read on if you want your Nokia, Sony Ericsson, and even Motorola to look cool! Don’t worry about the price, because it’s FREE!

No, you don’t need to close your browser or restart your PC, nothing wrong with them… you are seeing a new version of iPhone. Sony Ericsson iPhone! Hahaha…

No Photoshop trick involved.

But the trick is to use a cool software called GDesk. GDesk is a customizable and extend-able desktop system designed for the UIQ systems (which phones such as Sony Ericssons use). The desktop’s design is fully customizable and you can place applications as well as shortcuts and page links in anyway you fancy.

Check out one of the design I loaded on my GDesk which is running on my Sony Ericsson P1i.

Not bad, right? This is just one of the hundreds of GDesk designs you can download and use on your phone. Some of them look futuristic, some are cool and of course some are hot and sexy with pretty chicks! No need to say, I downloaded all the sexy designs!

With a few clicks, my phone is turned into an iPhone instantly… simple like that. The icons and the shortcuts can be customized to start any application you want. Take a look at a video I recorded. You will love this I am sure!

I will show you something more interesting - the Sony Ericsson P1i on my wireless LAN. But, a hot picture first!

Next, we look at P1i’s vast connectivity options. The phone supports 3G, Bluetooth, A2DP (means the mobile phone can stream high quality audio to a wireless headset through Bluetooth connection), infrared, USB, and WLAN. I don’t have a 3G account, so not sure how it performs on a 3G connection, but let’s try hooking up the phone through my WIFI (WLAN) network. P1i detected my WLAN without any problem at all and connected to it in a breeze. By the way, my WLAN is WEP protected.

Browsing using the pre-installed Opera 8.65 is quick but soon I realized there is a better Opera optimized for mobile devices. This version is called Opera Mini, and I wasted no time and have this free software installed on my P1i. Obviously, it’s so much better than the standard Opera!

Opera Mini is very good in rendering web pages for small displays, such as that of the P1i’s 2.6 inch display. While it’s really difficult if not impossible to read a web page on a screen of this size, Opera Mini is very smart. You can tap on any part of the screen and the browser will zoom in for you to read. You can then make use of the touch screen capability to scroll up and down by dragging the web page, of course you can do that also using the scroll wheel (located at the side of the phone) or using the scroll bars of the browser.

Check out a video of this showing me browsing my blog on Opera Mini 4, at the end of this post.

You can easily change the view to landscape also. Much like a wide-screen notebook, right? All these are the neat features offered by Opera Mini 4, made possible by P1i.

Another great thing about the Symbian OS (UIQ3) this mobile phone runs on is its capability to install whatever compatible applications you can get hold of, although there are not so many of them compared to older Symbian OSes. One of my favorite application I have tried was IM+ All-in-One Mobile Messenger. This is a really nice instant messaging application for UIQ3 devices. It supports not only MSN, but all the major instant messaging systems such as Yahoo Messenger, AIM, ICQ, Jabber and Google Talk.

IM+ is not free, but with the purchase of Sony Ericsson P1i, you are given a voucher to download commercial software from Sony Ericsson’s P1 Choice, a website dedicated to software for P1i. I have tried a couple of software from P1 Choice, and they run without any problem at all. I guess all the software here are hand-picked for P1i users. Most of them look very promisiong.

However, the voucher carries 10 points only, and good software such as IM+ costs 5 points. Not sure if we used up all the points, we can top-up or not?

I have yet to play with RSS feeds and PlayNow, whatever that might be; and many other features of this phone. I will update more about this phone in future posts.

I took opportunity of the holiday break and went to check out HTC Touch in Mid Valley. Well, in fact I should have gone to gadget malls such as Low Yat or PJ Digital Mall, but since my girls wanted to do some Christmas shopping, I had to opt for IT World in Mid Valley.

Right in front of the entrance to IT World, there are two prominent PDA stores. I played with the HTC Touch (2nd generation) but wasn’t impressed at all. The much touted TouchFLO interface is not too bad and the enhanced Home screen is attractive also. But apart from that, it’s just a normal Windows Mobile 6 PDA phone. I think HTC tried too hard to compete with iPhone in this device.

The design of the device is very compact though. It feels good in my small hand.

I didn’t try TyTN II as the price is way too expensive. But on 2nd thought, I should have given it a try… just for the fun. Anyway, the salesman was kind enough to introduce another PDA phone to me, it was Dopod D810. Wow, although there’s nothing to shout about in the design department, the phone is packed with features. It supports 3G, HSDPA, GPS, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, GPRS/GSM, USB, EDGE… enough to scare you or not?!

Given the two phones above I think Dopod D810 is a better one because of the features it can support. As for the TouchFLO interface, it won’t be long before some smart people come out with a software that supports it on Dopod. You can’t add 3G functionality, not to mention HSDPA onto the Touch, can you?

Anyway, I was not convinced to fork out close to RM2k for any of the device. I decided to make a walk to check out some other smart phones. Before long I found myself at Sonic Power, a phone shop located just outside of the IT World.

Obviously, they have a wide variety of phones… most of the latest models were very nice and impressive. But I was only interested in phones with 3G, WIFI and a touch screen. There weren’t many choices under the budget of under RM2k, but Sony Ericsson P1i standed out among them - in terms of functionality and price. Of course, Sony Ericsson W960i looks much better… especially with its 8GB internal memory, imagine how many videos and MP3s you can save on it! But, I didn’t want to starve just yet!

Those are all the latest Sony Ericsson models, including Sony Ericsson P1i and W960i side by side. You can see that all the models supports at least 3G. Apple, where is 3G iPhone? Out of all those phones, I think Sony Ericsson P1i is the best for my bucks because it features 3G and WIFI! I was already dreaming about surfing the Internet and blogging anywhere I want! *Chuckles*…

If you could see the price tags on the phones, don’t let them frighten you. You are expected to bargain! After bargaining… some bragging (of how handsome he is) and begging, the salesman lowered the price of P1i to RM1450. Wait, not that cheap lar, with the condition I gave him my old but loyal Nokia 3230, but in return I get to exchange the included tiny 512MB M2 (memory stick micro) memory card to a 2GB M2 card.

2GB, sounds like very big. But mind you, iPhone is equipped with 8GB of on-board memory! Anyway 2GB should be enough for me to play with for some time… whack some MP3 files, some MP4 videos and take some nice photos (upskirt photos?) to show you. Hahaha…

That’s my Nokia 3230 which I traded in, and the newly bought Sony Ericsson P1i. Lying side by side, I was so reluctant to leave you, Nokia… bye bye.

Please stay tuned. I will show you more about this phone later. I had a few sleepless nights playing with this baby!