[gammmmo]

Had my Sharp GX30 for over 2 years now and was surprised at how much things had moved on (particularly web-surfing) when I went into a few shops yesterday to find out about new phones/contracts. Thinking of going for a MDA Comp III with T-Mobile. Questions:

1. How secure is WM? I mean, when web surfing, do you still ideally need some sort of personal firewall and/or spyware protector?

2. Are these phones not more susceptible to blue-jacking type attacks and rogue software? The way I see it, the more complex phones get the more susceptible people are.

3. Can you install alternative browsers from IE like Mozilla?

4. Where is a good place to look for 3rd party shareware?

[itsamac]

1. It is easy to develop spyware and rogue programs for the Windows Mobile platform but I do not believe it is that common. If you don't visit sites on the device that you don't really know then you are less likely to need an antivirus/antispyware solution. Having said that, Macfee is about to release a solution for the Windows Mobile platform though I think it will only slow the thing down. If worst comes to worst, hard boot the device and it will revert back to a fresh install (you will loose your settings and documents though you can quickly get this back by backing up the device once you have it setup just the way you want it).

2. The risk is the same as other Bluetooth enabled phones. My advice is if you don't need Bluetooth on, turn it off. It drains your battery anyways. If you do need it on, turn off discoverable.

3. Opera Mini is available and free. There are a couple of others whose names escape me. Microsoft is going to release a new version of IE called Deep Fish (currently in a private beta) that will load the whole page in the window as you would see it on a desktop and allow you to zoom in on a particular part (in a similar way to the Apple iPhone and the Nokia browser).

4. There are heaps of sites for Windows Mobile software. Some suggested pieces of software include Metro (gives you tube and bus directions for most major cities in the world), pRSSreader, Google Maps and Skype for Windows Mobile (it will drain your battery though). As for sites, try Handago and PocketGear for paid software and shareware.

If possible, try and get a phone with Windows Mobile 6. WM5 is no slouch but WM6 is faster.

One other recommendation is to join T-Mobile or 3 for their data packages. Both offer 1Gb data usage for £7.50 and £5 respectively. Three also offers free MSN messaging (limit 10000 messages per month, battery killer because it keeps polling).

[gammmmo]

Thanks for the reply. I was going to go for the £7.50 Web 'N Walk package from T-Mobile...it seems like good value even if the download amount is capped at 1GB. I just got off the phone from my existing supplier who offer 128MB for the same price roughly and told me this is "more than enough". I told them why not offer 1GB as well then if its not going to be used...cue some waffle about that's the package they've decided to provide. :-))