Motorola DEXT: Free On Orange UK
| by Rob Jackson on September 16th, 2009 |
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The price of the Motorola DEXT for Orange UK has been announced… and their is none. As in it is FREE if you do two little things: (1) Sign a 2-year contract, and (2) Contract is £34.26+/month. This pricing is a cold hard fact as the pricing was announced by Orange themselves. Actually forget cold – it makes us feel kind of warm and fuzzy:
Orange is offering the DEXT free to customers who take out a £34.26 per month, 24 month contract. The package includes 900 any network call minutes, unlimited texts, Orange Maps as well as inclusive anytime internet browsing so users can make the most from their mobile experience.
FYI the Motorola DEXT and the Motorola CLIQ are the same phone – just different names for different countries. We did a Motorola CLIQ Review last week when the phone was first announced – check it out for details on what you’re getting or missing depending on what you decide. But with the phone being FREE you can hardly go wrong.
1. John wrote on September 16, 2009
While not definitive proof by any means, this does make the prospect of the CLIQ being free with a t-mobile contract far more plausible.
2. Jerry wrote on September 16, 2009
Wasn’t the Hero Free as well?
3. Nate wrote on September 16, 2009
Of course its going to be free on T-Mobile if they get it in the UK, but I doubt it will be in the US. You can get any and every phone in the UK for free, it all depends the price of the tariff (monthly charge). I’m sure you can get this phone on a cheaper contract, but it will then cost you some money up front, just like the US.
On another note, I’d still rather have my Hero I think over this phone. Still not sold on Motorola’s interface, but I’m excited to learn more.
4. Matthew Gaunt wrote on September 16, 2009
That is a steep price tag IMO.
First off, I haven’t owned a phone that can last longer than a year and half apart from my old nokia 3210, so a 2 year contract for a phone is asking alot of the device to start off with, but £35 on a “Budget” phone is really expensive.
I’m hoping that Orange will release the phone to buy as just the handset, but this is wishful thinking and doubt it’ll ever happen.
p.s. On Oranges contracts for the Hero, they neglect to mention anything in the way of internet on most of their tariffs, which is pretty important for any smartphone
5. Wilko wrote on September 16, 2009
“But with the phone being FREE you can hardly go wrong”, errm you can if you sign on to a contract of £34.26/month. Bit of perspective I picked up my hero for £25/mouth with unlimited data shortly after release.
6. Matt Jones wrote on September 16, 2009
24 month contract? Not a chance Orange. I’ll stay out of contract and pick up my phones sim free thanks.
7. Matthew Gaunt wrote on September 16, 2009
Wilko – That is the sorta thing I am comfortable with, £25 a month for 18 months, with enough minutes and texts and unlimited internet.
But it seems like this is asking for too much :-(
8. BackInAction wrote on September 16, 2009
@Wilko — Nice to see that is an option elsewhere, but that isn’t an option in the US. The price of the phone does not affect the monthly rate plan.
I could buy a stupid flip-phone for “free” and an android phone for $200 (both with 2 year contact) and my monthly plan cost would be identical (assuming I purchased a data plan for the flip-phone).
9. Crypto wrote on September 16, 2009
@Nate, Motorola DOES NOT HAVE A NEW INTERFACE.
On the CLIQ they use the standard Android UI.
MotoBlur is a service on its servers that you sign up for with an account and tell them what social media and internet accounts you use. It will then push only the changes to this data to you.
On the CLIQ you see four new Android Application Widgets for Blur. These take the Blur data feed and present it to you in various categories.
In this way you can update your status on all social media services. It only contacts the Blur server.
A great feature of all this is that the battery drain on devices using BLUR is much less.
10. Wilko wrote on September 16, 2009
@BackInAction – Yeah I see that a phone being free in the US is a big factor, I was just pointing out the price plan above is not good value and the word Free should not insinuate other.
11. Ken wrote on September 17, 2009
Asking Orange for unlimited Internet on any plan in the UK is asking too much – 500MB is the max they offer, which given that Android is all web based would worry me, so T-Mobile is likely to keep my business, unless of course someone else offers something similar.
12. Secret Orange Man wrote on October 18, 2009
Time to put you ALL straight:
# The Dext wont be on T-mobile until (if) the merger goes ahead with Orange…
#Ken: Orange do offer totally unlimited mobile browsing, its about £7 a month. for all the time i’ve been dealing with Orange, I’ve not seen anyone use more than the 500mb…
# Matthew What about £30? 200 mins, unlimited texts, and free internet? on 18 months. But the trade off is you pay towards the handset. You’ll even get free pizza’s and cinema tickets.
13. Kirsty wrote on March 10, 2010
I have thiss new phone and on purchase was told that the internet was free as part of the phone package. however i hve since contacted orange and they tell me internet is not free?! back into shop and they gave me link to set this up however account already set up so how do a get free internet?