Star Trek Communicator Cellphone (functional) - Nokia prototype

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RapidNadion

New Member
Hi, everyone!

First post here at the RPF, but a long-time lurker. Finally I have something worth sharing enough to post here! To those of you who've already seen this at the TPZ and TrekBBS, sorry for the saturation.

I recently won an eBay auction for this working Star Trek communicator prototype, an internal evaluation unit (one of 12 or 14) built at Nokia in 2008 or 2009. It's a fully-functional GSM cellphone (really, it's just a heavily-modified Nokia N76).

They could have gone quite a bit farther in making this device more closely resemble the "real McCoy," but I think it's interesting that a major telecom hardware manufacturer did anything like this at all. Anyway, enjoy the video, and it's nice to finally join you all as a member!

IMAG0080.jpg


YouTube Video:

YouTube - Star Trek Communicator Cellphone - Rare Prototype
 
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sweet. thanks for sharing. would have bought one of these had they ever been released to general public.
 
MooCriket said:
Welcome to the forum! Man, I love that thing! :cool
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Thanks very much! Great to be here. I'm a big fan of it too.


DrMcoy said:
sweet. thanks for sharing. would have bought one of these had they ever been released to general public.
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You and me both! I'd also like to have seen Nokia's sales figures for a commercially-available version of this, next to a list of sales figures for their Nokia 5800 re-brand.
 
czechplastik said:
This is ace, how much did you pay for it if you don't mind me asking?
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Thanks! I'm afraid I paid enough for it to be ... hesitant about sharing the price. I don't make purchases like this often, and I *knew* I had to have this one when I was faced with the opportunity. But I don't regret it for a second.

In other news: Anthony Pascale at TrekMovie.com contacted me today about doing a story on this comm/phone, and here it is:

Check Out Prototype of Never-made Nokia Star Trek Phone [VIDEO + Pix] | TrekMovie.com
 
I didn't know about this cell. I bet some suit probably stopped this...I would have purchased it easily. The phones they advertised with the film weren't that interesting. I wish cell designs were more creative.
 
You and me both, Wakeem. The sweet spot for this kind of phone to have been successful would have been 2003 or so, I think, before flip phones went out of style and smartphones took over.
 
I saw the video over at engadget. Are you Vlad? Very cool! I would have picked this up as my personal phone as well if it had ever made it to market. Bummer it didn't.
 
Not Vlad, no ... I believe he was the author of the engadget story, but I'm the owner! Yeah most people who've commented on the trek movie and engadget stories say they'd buy one of these. Shame Nokia didn't go this route!
 
I would have bought it! However, I can still see why they didnt go with it.


Shame. Its probably as close as we will ever get.
A TREK Cell phone just isnt marketable.

Think about it, it didnt DO much. Unless you have an ENTERPRISE that can lock on to you and beam you up. It's basically a walkie talkie.

Modern cell phones are expected to do SO much more, and it just "fit" in the Trek Communicator.

I think someone should just design em as BLUE TOOTH units thats JUST talk to each other for small landing parties. ;-)
 
BrundelFly said:
I would have bought it! However, I can still see why they didnt go with it.


Shame. Its probably as close as we will ever get.
A TREK Cell phone just isnt marketable.

Think about it, it didnt DO much. Unless you have an ENTERPRISE that can lock on to you and beam you up. It's basically a walkie talkie.

Modern cell phones are expected to do SO much more, and it just "fit" in the Trek Communicator.

I think someone should just design em as BLUE TOOTH units thats JUST talk to each other for small landing parties. ;-)
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It was a functional phone, albeit a prototype that needed more refining. In the video he calls customer service I believe and it has a working keypad, viewscreen and center pad. They could do away with the outside viewscreen and fix the hard to access side buttons, battery issues, and charging issue. Really, most fans would be happy with that if it was developed more and with the features they cram into phones now a days it wouldn't be that hard. Its TOS heritage is obvious but it has enough of a new high tech look that the average person would think it looked good even if they weren't a Trek fan. I will also add that not everyone wants or needs an Iphone or its equivalent. While they are popular with the young crowd and I'm sure a lot of older people as well, quite a few still use nice but basic in comparison phones that have the standard features like text, music, & camera.
 
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I think Nokia would have been smart enough to realise the kind of hot potato they had on their hands. If they pushed out a polished version of the device into the consumer market, most trek fans would eat it up. So i'm guessing there must be some other reason or internal dispute as to why this never went into production.
 
RapidNadion said:
You and me both, Wakeem. The sweet spot for this kind of phone to have been successful would have been 2003 or so, I think, before flip phones went out of style and smartphones took over.
Click to expand...

I still use a flip phone. I didn't know they were out of style. There are a few interesting Japanese flip phone designs. One that flips with the push of a button. Also, Motorola has a Chinese touch screen flip phone (I can't recall the name right now) with smartphone elements. Maybe Nokia will finish this design for the Star Trek sequel.
 
This phone / Communicator would look great along side one of these... If only we could get one of each in the same place at the same time! 1399261_750751888284928_652353669_o.jpg
 
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