Vodafone VF830 comes to pay as you talk

Vodafone has added a new phone to it’s roster for Pay As You Go customers to choose from – the VF830.

Though aimed at perhaps more cost-conscious PAYG consumers, the phone seems to be powered up to do all sorts of tasks that are fast becoming basic necessities for mobile phones – it has a 3.2 megapixel camera and will play your MP3s, and supports HSDPA (3G to you and me), meaning that internet access is available. Suggested uses of the internet connection in the press release are YouTube, Facebook and Google Maps.

What’s uncertain at the moment though is just how locked-down and restricted the handset will be. As the handset is Vodafone branded they’ve had complete control throughout the production of the phone, and in the past, phone networks have been known for removing certain features in phones that could halm their revenue – for example, I’ve seen phones in the past that have arbitrarily disabled sending pictures via bluetooth to a computer, because obviously the network would prefer you to send them as an MMS, so that they make some money out of it.

The other uncertainty is about the cost of bandwidth. Because it is a pay-as-you-talk phone (which is Vodafone being difficult and refusing to call it pay-as-you-go like everyone else), presumably data access will be charged by the kilobyte… and if you’re downloading videos from YouTube on it, that could be pretty costly.

The VF830 will retail at about £80.