Panasonic G50

Discontinued
9th November 2003

The Panasonic G50 is a tiny phone that was due for worldwide release way back in July of 2003, but it never seemed to turn up for general worldwide release, and has now sneaked onto the market in the pay-as-you-go market, which is never a good sign.

What went wrong? Well, on paper the G50 looks quite interesting, measuring only 80 x 43 x 18 mm (ignoring the antenna - photo is roughly actual size on a 72 dpi monitor) and weighing only 75 grams. The display measures 128x96 pixels in 400 colours.

Initial reviews though were not good, mostly concentrating on poor battery life and audio quality which could have been better, but since all phones are a compromise in one way or another, it wasn't wholly surprising that the phone should suffer a little in this way.

The phone features WAP over GPRS, polyphonic ring tones, has tri-band capabilities and a couple of games, so there seems to be nothing wrong with the phone at all, other than the quoted talktime of just 150 minutes.

However, the big networks didn't seem to be interested and some months later the G50 found its way onto the pay-as-you-go market where the end of life or really cheap phones end up, which is a shame because the phone has a lot to offer to someone who is looking for something very compact for occasional use. Prices seem to be about €180/£120 in Europe, $220 for a SIM free handset in the US.

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