Motorola Razr V3: The iPhone of Yesteryear

I had a friend that carried around a "Michael Douglas cell phone" like the one used in that movie
(Wall Street) from 1987. The looks he got that day was priceless.

My first cell phone, our boss bought for us was the "Motorola Brick" (Dynatac). MY first cell phone was the first star-tac. When the digital Star-Tac came along I got one of those, disassembled it and airbrushed the case into a camouflage pattern. Put it all back together and took it by the Altel place where I bought it. (model builder buddy of mine worked there). LOL, he wanted me to airbrush a bunch of them. I said nope, it's a one of a kind. I've still got it. Wonder if it would even fire up today. Probably not.
Once candy bar phones came along, I gave up on flip phones.

mbk34 said:

I remember when mobile phones first came out. The boss of the company I worked had one fitted in his car. On the first day of getting it his chauffer rang every one his mates to tell them about it. Sadly those calls cost the same as his monthly salary and he got was severely reprimanded.

I have an early 1980's phone at home that requires a shoulder strap to carry and has a heavy coiled wire between the handset and the main body. The leather container it comes in looks fantastic even now. I have no idea if the phone still works.

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I believe the bag phone was a Uniden model, actually a car phone made portable using a cigarette lighter plug for power and I think you can get a battery for it too. I think they put out ~5 watts to 10 watts? Now that's power. Mines got stolen.

I had a first-gen one in 2004. It's hard to overstate how cool and modern they were compared to what was available at the time. The software was absolutely terrible, but the style factor almost made that an afterthought.

My first movil was a Nokia brick, the 1110i. Literally I could throw it anywhere, then put it all together and continued to use with no problem. It fell from the second floor 2 times, and survived.

When I worked at Radioshack 20 years ago this was by far the phone we sold the most.

I still miss this form factor. I had a v3, and then a v3xx when the BIOS of the v3 crapped itself. The battery would last about a week before needing recharging. It fit in nearly any pocket, and I eventually got a belt-loop holder for it so I wouldn't deform my pockets with the tell-tale cellphone denim fade marks...and then too many people switched to smartphones and were sending text all the time. I eventually had to switch. Went with a Microsoft phone first just to be an outlier. Not a bad phone in all honesty (if you got a good model with a decent processor). Then replaced that with another Windows phone. Now I'm using a Google Pixel. I don't like spending a lot of money on my phones.

I was so tempted to get the new Motorola RAZR, but two major things (and a few minor things) prevented that:
1. High cost
2. Concern over the foldable screen tech (breakage)

The specs for the price weren't terribly impressive either. I do understand why, but as a consumer it was still hard to justify that to my wallet.

I detest pocketing the equivalent of a kid's size cereal box in my pants' pocket. Screen sizes are only getting larger. If I can pinch and zoom, do I really need an 8" screen? (No.)

I sure loved my RAZR. It was sleek and pretty but it was also a quality phone. Today I am still rocking a Motorola but it's a pretty ordinary Android at this point. And now after reading this article, I am aware that my "Motorola phone" is actually a Lenovo. That's a little disappointing.

This was the ultimate mobile phone for a Star Trek fan, as it was the "communicator" of its day.
I still have at least 6 of these, in various forms and colours, they were always kept in a leather case, with a belt clip(another star trek throwback), so everyone of them STILL looks 'brand new'. I also still have some of the original boxes.
I would really love to revive one of these phones for my every day use as my 'personal' phone, as they still look better than some of the current phones. Especially as all I need a phone for is to... "make and receive calls".

I also have a number of the very early phones, starting from the 'brick' and the very first Samsung 'bar phone' which had a larger 'clip on battery' to give you longer usage. Once again, as new in its box, with 2 standard batteries and 2 larger batteries.
We owe so much of today's technology to the great mind of Gene Roddenberry, even a 3D printer is the start of a "replicator", and so much more. However, I am not sure if the 'transporter' will be readily available in my lifetime. "Beam me up Scotty".

LIVE LONG AND PROSPER