[chbot] Smart phone

[Mark Atherton]

Hi All,

This evening at the meeting, several people asked how I was getting 
on with the new phone (very well thank you), and how they might buy one ...

Per Ian Tennant's recommendation I went ahead and bought from 
www.chinavasion.com and chose the "ThL W100" based on the reviews.

Ended up with Quad Core, 4.5 Inch, Android 4.2, 1.2GHz, 4GB ROM, 8MP 
R Camera + 5MP F Camera, spare battery, 2 x SIM and NZ charger.

Final price was NZ$189 + NZ$19 shipping - ordered Tuesday, arrived 
Friday of same week.

Main items on shopping list were
- Support for a free SIP client
- WiFi friendly for appropriate services
- WAN access was secondary
- 3G / WiFi gateway a plus
- unlocked to vendor or service providers

Various OS images are available online, including 'rooted' variants - 
although I haven't been brave enough to load a new image (yet).

Same unit is sold by DX for a few $$ less, and with free shipping. 
This may incur 6 weeks shipping rather than 1 week that cost an extra 
NZ$19 from chinavision.

Chinavision seem to have much smaller choice of units available (vs 
DX) but they do seem a bit fussier about what they stock.

If you buy a unit from these guys, please update the list (here), 
along with your impressions.

-mark