It only feels like minutes ago I was writing that I was looking for a new phone. Then today my Wizard started turning itself off every 10 minutes. Opened it up and noticed the battery was a little warped and probably about to turn into a lump of toxic goo - not sometime I wanted in my pocket, or on a plane with me tomorrow.

So, on the way home I popped into my local T-Mobile store and (thanks mostly to FrankArrs glowing recommendation) picked up a shiny new sage Shadow.

It's very strange not having a touch screen after all these years, and not only is there no "full" keyboard the letters are not arranged as on a normal phone but spaced out over the 20 keys ... so I'm having to re-learn the old T9 style tapping out of emails as well.

That said, it took maybe 20 mins once I got home to get the phone set up, connecting to the WiFi at home, syncing with Exchange, GMail and my Live account.

I then turned to the AllShadow site for some background reading which pointed me at the modaco forums for some more hard core tweaks. TinyTwitter was the first app loaded (expect to see some funny tweets from me until I get used to the keyboard). The best bit was having a conversation with one of the folks responsible for the Neo interface - every day I'm reminded just how many smart people I'm lucky enough to work with.

The coming days are going to be a learning experience. Like any new toy I don't expect to be proficient straight away, but I think this is going to be something I become very happy with in a week.

Going back to my wish list the camera is lower spec that I'd like, there's no GPS and music means I'll need to buy a Micro-SD card and an adapter if I want a 3.5mm jack for headphones... but bang for the buck it's one sweet little phone...

Of course, much as I like the interface I'll have to try PointUI out on it now ;)