Back in 2003, the camera phone was still a relatively new concept and for the majority of handsets the camera was something you had to attach via a cable.

These cameras where basically of the same specification as the camera’s built into handsets at the time, which was 640X480 which is just 0.3 megapixels.

Now in 2009 the Vga camera phone still exists even though it is rumored that Samsung are due to release a 12-megapixel camera phone later this year.

Last week I was reading a thread on a forum I frequent and someone asked the question, why do manufacturers still bother to release phones with a Vga camera? At the time, I did not give it much thought.

Since then I’ve been updating pre-pay-as-you-go with new handsets and it struck me that a large part of current manufactures handsets are still sold with Vga cameras built in. This then reminded me of the question I read on the forum last week.

So why do manufacturers bother doing this? I suppose the answer is a simple one and is that there must be a market for them. However, I do not really understand why as mobiles containing a Vga camera are the most basic of handsets available.

For example, the LG KP130 is currently available on T-Mobile and is priced at £14.67, whilst this is a great price for a mobile phone if someone is willing to spend £10.33 pence more Vodafone have the 533, which has a 1.3 megapixel camera available. In laymen’s terms the camera is able to take pictures at 4 times the quality of the LG KP130 for little extra expense.
So I remain pondering the question, why bother with a Vga camera phone.