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Infographic: The shrinking price of mobile

Those old enough will recall the days when a mobile phone really wasn’t that mobile at all, requiring a trolley to push the giant block around and a winch to lift it to your face. Thank goodness those days are long gone, and with every new mobile device comes a slew of new features, with each model better value for money than the last.

A neat little infographic, which first appeared on the savings.com blog, gives some great examples of just how much technology has progressed in the last three decades.

Called The Shrinking Price of Mobile, it focuses on how consumers get more features for their buck with the passing of time, beginning with the foot-long $3,995 Motorola DynaTAC 8000X that could do little more than make calls (with its one-hour talk time). Oh, you could store up to 30 numbers on it, too. Weighing in at two pounds, you could also give your arm a workout every time you wanted to use it.

The infographic ends with the mobile phone of 2020. Priced at around $200, it expects that the device of tomorrow will come with even longer battery life, e-payment support and better graphics, together with all of the other features we enjoy today. But as savings.com points out, it’s not all good news for our wallet, as while the cost of phones comes down, the increasing number of features on the phones helps to ensure that the monthly bills stay high.

The Shrinking Cost of Mobile Phone Technology

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Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
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