The year 1998 A.D. was a year of the tiger. One of the most sensational songs of that year's Spring Festival Gala was the song "About Nine Eight" sung by Faye Wong and Na Ying. Years later, Happy Flower's "Charlotte's Trouble" exploded in popularity, with the protagonist traveling back to 1998 and paying tribute to this Spring Festival Gala and this song.
That year, I was in Beijing.
When I went home for the Spring Festival and had a party with my classmates, I talked about the banquet, and the wine was booming.
Coming to the workplace, whether ordinary or extraordinary, everyone has a good vision in mind.
From being a student to joining the workforce, this is a major change in life status.
Someone asked what everyone's goals are for the near future.
Several boys thought in unison: Well, try to earn money, try to buy a computer, buy a cell phone, and then buy a car.
This rhythm is not quite the same as the year of the tiger, 24 years later. 2022 graduates will soon join the workforce, so I guess the primary goal will be to pay for a house, right?
In 1998, the income of an average worker in a first-tier city was around six or seven hundred yuan. Beijing's fourth ring of housing prices, not more than 3,000 yuan / flat, and a home laptop, at least 30,000 to 50,000; a cell phone, at least four thousand to start; four-wheeled cars need not say, the most affordable three-car Jetta, but also to more than 100,000 a. These are the luxury and status symbols of the year, the house is nothing?
And now, and not to mention the price of three thousand in the fourth ring of Beijing. Even if it is 30,000 per square meter, I don't know where to find it within the eighth ring?
After joining the workforce, I lived in a basement in a group rental near Beijing TV station. When I went to the bathroom every day, I had to go around to the main building of the Central University of Finance and Economics. Because the restrooms here are clean, and there are partitions between squats. After coming out, I could sit quietly in the classroom and pretend I was a student here.
When the good luck, first out of school, into a good foreign company, a higher salary. But a month's salary still can not afford to buy a minimum price of cell phones. The company rented a cell phone and a number to be used by the travelers. I remember that it was a Motorola 8200, and at that time, a whole cell phone card was the size of an ID card and could fit completely into the body. Unlike today, the card needs to be cut to fit, and the smaller it is cut, the smaller it is.
Return from a business trip and turn in your cell phone. But after I got used to the scenery and convenience of cell phones, I began to feel that no cell phone can not be. The company's travel subsidy is also higher, so the business trip back to Beijing in January, the subsidy a calculation, plus the month's salary, can be enough to get a cell phone. I did not expect to realize the dream of owning a cell phone so soon, so I did not hesitate to go to the cell phone market one weekend. The first cell phone of my life was selected.
It was a German brand phone, Siemens S4, the size of a quarter horse brick, with an antenna that stretched and was old and long. If you pull it all out, you can almost use it as a fishing rod. The discounted price of the phone is 2,200 yuan, but not sold alone, you have to select the number in the merchant to enter the network, otherwise it will not be the price. The network entry fee was also expensive back then, 1650 yuan. So cell phone + number, the full price of 3850 yuan, and, back then, the cost of cell phones is not low, the monthly landline fee of 50 yuan, city calls per minute 0.4 yuan, the most abominable or two-way charges. Than the capital less than three thousand per square meter of housing prices, think, but also really tawdry.
This S4 phone, used for two years. 2000, I have been to work in Guangzhou, ready to change a smaller, very comfortable handset: Motorola V998. this phone in July 1999 came out, that is, become a god machine. It was the smallest and most elegant phone at that time, and the price immediately shot up to more than 8,000 yuan. Even after a year, buy domestic licensed goods in about 5000 a, very painful. But there are many parallel markets in Guangzhou, selling Hong Kong version of the machine, about a third cheaper than the national line more. But the parallel market is mixed, many bad traders tend to water into the second phone refurbished when the new machine for sale, it is difficult to identify. I bought a Hong Kong version of the V998 for 2,300 yuan in the electrical market in Dashatou.
Another year has passed, society is changing day by day, cell phones are becoming popular very fast, many domestic brands are appearing, prices are becoming more and more affordable, and the thousands of dollars of entry fees have disappeared with the popularity of services such as Shenzhou line, the threshold for owning a cell phone has been greatly reduced. The cell phone has fallen as a status symbol. Unfortunately, the V998 I bought in the parallel market is indeed a refurbished second-hand phone after water ingress, and I cursed the damn bad traders while brewing what phone to change again?
At that time, I thought about how nice it would be to have a phone that could hold two cards. Little did I know that I would soon see this idea on the market. Of course, when I purchased it, I realized that it was a pseudo-dual SIM phone.
This is the Xiaxin A8198, which was advertised by the very popular Xiao Yan Zi. It was advertised as the first phone ever to have a built-in dual SIM function. So even though the design was very ugly, I bought it for 1,780 yuan.
Why this is a pseudo-dual SIM phone is because it simply cannot standby at the same time. It can just insert two cards and then call transfer one number to the other card. So, I think I was duped to buy this phone.
When I found out that it was not what it seemed, I started to think about what kind of machine to replace it with.
Originally, in the late 90s, the big players in the cell phone world were Motorola, Nokia and Ericsson. Then Ericsson fell and Samsung soon came up. I went to the cell phone market on Lingshan Road, which has also become a distribution center for Hong Kong version cell phones, and it was very busy. I picked a big red flip phone, the Hong Kong version of Samsung SGH-A408, 3200 yuan.
I didn't know that this machine was actually the first phone designed for women. Specially added physiological period and some other features reflect the female theme. The beautiful ring tone and the novel style make it irresistible.
I don't know what to buy to use, but also to use with pleasure, even if someone said that this is for women do not mind. Later, I found out that there are many men who use this machine.
But this machine only used less than a year. 2002 June, once in Wuhan Square 26 upstairs bathroom, put the phone on the table, forgetting when leaving, about 10 minutes later remembered, rushed back to see, finished, has disappeared. The phone was turned off and could not be reached, I do not know who took it away.
I can't help it, this year the cell phone is already a necessity, so a temporary replacement for a cell phone number, a moment and no preferred new machine, thought about it, why not buy back a V998 use it. This machine has been upgraded to V998+, a new licensed machine, as long as 1500 yuan.
At that time, the three giants of the cell phone brand, Nokia's share has been the largest, but I have not used, because at that time did not like the built-in antenna phone, and Nokia's style, all built-in.
But at the end of 2002, another epoch-making new machine appeared. The Nokia 7650, the first phone with a built-in camera that could take pictures. Although the pixels were not high at that time, with this feature, this machine could already be sealed. In early 2003, I finally bought this phone for 4800 RMB. Still far above the average monthly wage level at the time.
At that time, another concept emerged, that is, business cell phones. The business phone has a greater feature compared to other feature phones, which is that it is equipped with a touch screen that can be handwritten, and the phone will be equipped with a stylus. I slowly got hooked on the handwriting model.
However, the price of business phones is even higher, so I gave myself a breakdown of the positioning, I am actually hooked on the handwritten models? Or am I hooked on the business model? In the end, I think I should be addicted to the handwriting model, to have a hand. So, my eyes were locked on another machine, NEC's N610, and I bought it at the end of 2004 for 3,200 yuan.
This machine is stylish, compared with the general touch screen phone, the body is petite, someone put on the phone cord to hang it around the neck, but also quite fashionable.
But my sense of use, but it is in the look, not in the use, flashy but not real. The experience of the stylus is very poor.
However, after this, my habits, I started to lean towards touch screen phones.
In 2005, smartphones began to make their first appearance. The prices of domestic machines also began to rise slowly, led by Lenovo. At that stage, Lenovo changed its trademark LGOG and created a 2.8-inch screen smartphone with Windows system, the Lenovo ET960, which was very popular among IT professionals at that time. Because of its appearance, it was nicknamed "chopper". From the back, this phone does look like a chopper.
I spent 6,500 yuan in June '05 to own this "kitchen knife". It was from this phone that I got the concept of putting a film on the phone screen.
However, the price/performance ratio of this phone is really not good. And, once it automatically shuts down due to lack of power, after a few minutes, it automatically restores the factory settings and all the data on the phone is cleared. This bug really makes people regret. And, after more than a year of use, the phone's battery has become extremely less durable, no way, and have to think about changing the phone.
In September 2006, Nokia launched a new model, the N95, with a 5 megapixel camera and an initial price of 8600 RMB. The N95 has a dual slider technology, push up for the buttons, push down for the music controls, and the back is a card machine. But the official standard leather case for this machine is very cumbersome. At that time, the price of the new machine did not last long to drop significantly, to early 08, I bought the phone at a price of 4,000 yuan. The arrival of the new year will also open the history of Nokia's demise, from feature phones to smartphones the night before, Nokia's last glory.
Of course, the N95 didn't dampen my preference for touchscreen handwriting, so a year later, I switched to a touchscreen smartphone.
At that time, a Chinese brand from Taiwan rose to prominence in the mainland, named "Dopod". And its name in Taiwan, called "HTC".
This company's smartphone was very bullish and very popular at the time, but this company's tawdry operations were also endless. The same model with a different brand name, HTC is much cheaper than Dopod, although HTC was not yet sold in the country, but where to stop the surge of the parallel market. And not long after, HTC and officially in the mainland to take the license, their own brother Dopod to extinguish.
After the Beijing Olympics in 2008, I went to the parallel market and exchanged it for the twin of Dopod P860: the Hong Kong version of HTC Cruis heart with Windows Mobile 6.0 system. The promotion slogan of this machine that year was: it is recommended for business people who have a certain financial base to get it. But the Hong Kong version of the machine not only has a licensed machine does not have Wi-Fi, the price is also much cheaper, selling 3800 yuan.
This machine only used a year, the boot button is not too bright, and HTC this stage of the new machine is endless, what diamond cut class, look itchy. So while there was a problem with the boot button, I convinced myself to trade in the old one for a new one, and went to the Hong Kong market to buy back an HTC Touch HD.
This is a great machine, with a huge 3.8-inch display, the end is huge. The publicity said that the resolution reached a shocking 480 x 800 pixels. This pixel, if a phone is launched today, I think it will also play a very shocking effect, ha ha.
Now, to 6 inch, 7 inch, 8 inch folding screen, has not imagined, 3.8 inch can actually be called panoramic, can actually bring shocking sensation, in the end 3.8 giant screen is how to bring out the shocking feeling? I recalled with all my heart, but no longer experience a star and a half.
HTC and China Telecom jointly launched a customized version of the HTC Dual Engine 9199 phone for 5,800 yuan. However, as this is a special section of the telecom, can only use the telecom card to open 3G function Internet access, mobile card is only 2G function, a phone call to send a text message.
The HTC DualShock 9199 is still paired with Windows Mobile. And this year, it has almost reached the age when Android and Apple machines are prevalent. Although I was enjoying myself with the 9199, people around me were installing WeChat in their phones, shaking to search for the opposite sex nearby, and playing Angry Birds, but I could only watch because I couldn't download these apps on the W system.
In 2012, most of my friends around me didn't use QQ and switched to WeChat, while my phone didn't have the WeChat function, which was too out of place. I had to give up my 9199 and spend 4700 RMB to replace it with an Android HTC one S, which is also a customized model of Telecom.
Since then, I have officially used Android and used WeChat. However, Angry Birds seems to be not so popular na 。。。。。
HTC one S until 2014, because the company in these two years and LG Group deep cooperation, the Korean side of the personnel met, all use LG cell phones. I borrowed it and played with it, and I thought it was good. I thought it was time to change the phone again, so I might as well change the LG. So I bought a LG G3 with internal connections for 3000 yuan, a few hundred dollars cheaper than the market price. The phone's boot key on the back, the front black screen standby, just need to finger tap the screen two times, you can open the interface, many people do not know. So I was very proud to have introduced this feature to many people. At the same time, this will be the last phone I use that has a removable battery.
In 2016, the national brand Huawei phones have become greatly famous. This year Huawei released the P9 phone in London, which opened the time of multi-camera popularity. This new structure has always been quite attractive to me, so I did not hesitate to take the plunge and purchase a P9 Plus for 3,688 yuan.
After this, even with Huawei, and then did not change the other brands, although also had pain Huawei cell phone prices are getting higher, but the phone is not a luxury after all, but increasingly popular necessities of life.
In 2017, replaced with Huawei Mate9 Pro for $5,488.
In 2018, replaced with Huawei's Mate10 Pro for $5,688.
2019. Changed Huawei's Mate30 Pro for 6299 yuan.
In 2020, the era of folding screen came, Huawei Mate XS appeared, and immediately amazed the whole world. Of course, the selling price is also considerable 16,999 yuan price. The official website can not grab. In August, by chance, shopping malls, see a Huawei store, the clerk at the door warm reception, so casually asked, there is actually no price increase of the spot, so immediately shot to buy, but also with the pick up a big bargain.
However, the XS screen is folded outward, the folded side with the camera, the screen is very small, if the self-timer, or after the driver's license points, the need to learn traffic laws online video, capture the learning image at any time, it is very inconvenient.
In 2021, Huawei Mate X2 came out with a starting price of 18,999 yuan for 512G, up another 2,000 compared to XS. The secondary screen is a 6.5-inch screen, folded inward, open is the perfect 8-inch screen, to meet all my imagination on the folding phone. However, the XS has only been in use for less than a year, so expensive phone, and change, is not too fast a little? But every day when I see the corresponding publicity on the Internet, I can't help but feel itchy, strike that, after the X2 arrives, I must use it for a few more years. With such a convincing mentality, I bought the X2 on the official website, and this was the first time I bought a phone online.
This is the history of my cell phone letters between two Tiger years, from 1998 to 2022. Interestingly, I have never used Apple and Samsung, the two mainstream cell phones, it is also a small alternative.
