160 TXT, Does any1 know how 2 get more

its a limitation at the service providers end i think and not on the phone, so you just have to live with it and send long messages via link txts.

On the N80, like on all other phones made by Nokia during the last 6-7 years, you can just keep typing past the limit of a single SMS and that way enter more letters.

The phone will automatically send the long message as multiple SMS.

In the same way, when you receive a long message in many parts, it is automatically reassembled and shown as a single message in the Messaging app.

Some background info: A single SMS can have 140 bytes of data sent. When the default 7-bit SMS alphabet is used, those 140 bytes can store 160 characters. When Unicode is used (with characters outside the 7-bit SMS alphabet), then each character takes two bytes, so you get 70 characters per message.

Have you asked your network operator whether they have put some limits for long messages to your subscription or their whole network?

yes thank you all for the reply and information

i will ask vodafone about the 160 txt limit.

i get free txt weekends if i spend �2.50, and if i spend another �2.50
i get free calls over the weekend.
i am on pay as you go
i do buy �5. txt packs, with that i get 70 txt for a month

so thank you once again

THANK YOU.

6six6 wrote:
i will ask vodafone about the 160 txt limit.

I'm with Vodafone, their limit is definitely 160 characters.

Try going to Messaging > Settings > Text Message > Character encoding...

...and make sure it's set to 'Reduced support'.

im with Vodafone and i can write until my thumbs drop off

he means he wants to add more characters to a single text without it going into multiple txts, which is just not possible.

N/A wrote:Some background info: A single SMS can have 140 bytes of data sent. When the default 7-bit SMS alphabet is used, those 140 bytes can store 160 characters. When Unicode is used (with characters outside the 7-bit SMS alphabet), then each character takes two bytes, so you get 70 characters per message.

I know this is a dead thread but I saw something that interested me...

Almost all the texts I write are in my native language of Welsh, but it has many special characters, the most common of which are:

� � � � � ŵ ŷ (I can't create the last two at all on my phone)

I'm one of these anal people that try to keep a high(ish) standard of language when texting (sorry!), mainly to preserve the corrosion of my language, but when writing these characters I noticed that it took a massive chunk off my remaining characters (then I found the above explanation - thanks N/A)

Does this situation have any signs of changing any time soon in the mobile phone world? Why should I be only be able to fit 70 characters per text just because I want to make sure my recipient knows I mean "m�r" and not "mor" (two different words).

I don't expect that anyone will be able to give me a solution to my particular problem, but I still felt it was worthy of a rant, and I'd still like some more background info on the matter.

Thanks

P.S. Even if I do persevere and continue to use these characters, will they even look right on the recipient's phone, or will they just look like: a, e, i etc.

The background info is already there as I explained. The control channel protocol for GSM fixed the data payload size to 140 bytes/octets, and using a 2-byte Unicode encoding, 70 characters is all you get in a single SMS (but you can still send longer messages as they are disassembled and reassembled automagically by modern phones). And Unicode is the character set encoding that includes all known writing languages (and most dead languages, too).

If the Unicode character is sent, and the recipients device does not have a suitable Unicode font, with the correct glyphs, then they will display a default glyph instead (usually a blank box/square).

To second N/A, it is a limitation of the GSM system. A full text message is 256 characters minus 96 characters for overheads (256-96=160). Each character is sent as an 8bit binary number, which gives just enough room for all upper and lower case characters, numbers (0-9), symbols ({}[]-+£$&#37😉 and some control characters (null, space, new line) specified in the ASCII standard.

For those of you keeping count that is 2048 bits sent (256 * 8). GSM runs at 9600bps meaning a text with no protocol overheads takes 0.2 (1/5th) of a second to send.

Extra-special characters used in languages such as Welsh, Swahili, Flemish, whatever, use one of those control characters to specify that the next character is gonna be a bit weird and treat it as such. Therefore using those extra-special characters will take up double the room of a normal character.

Same goes for return too, I noticed on my 6600 that if you are close to your character limit and you use a lot of returns, it will tell you when you send the message that it is going to have to take 2 messages because it falsely counted returns as 1 character (or maybe no characters, I don't remember).

SMS messages weren't originally expected to be a popular communication medium and were originally designed to be used as control messages for your phone case in point: WAP Settings. They figured 256 characters was enough. The reason it won't change because GSM is so prevalent and so many things would need to be updated, phones, SIM cards, SMS message centers. It is expensive, and will never happen, which is why MMS was invented. I know on my plan one MMS costs 3x SMS so if I want to send a message of 4x SMS, it is cheaper as an MMS.

I apologise I got a bit carried away with the advice, but it is something that interests me greatly. Hope this is a good enough explanation for you all and I hope this dead topic is not dredged up again! :tongue:

knuckleskin wrote:

Extra-special characters such as in Welsh, Swahili, Flemish, whatever, use one of those control characters to specify that the next character is gonna be a bit weird and treat it as such. Therefore using those extra-special characters will take up double the room of a normal character.

Haha ..I like the idea of Welsh being wierd 😊 😊 😊

Cash wrote:Haha ..I like the idea of Welsh being wierd 😊 😊 😊

I'm English, they are weird! :tongue:

knuckleskin wrote:I'm English, they are weird! :tongue:

haha..yea thought I would just change this...dont want to annoy the welsh 😊..

Sounds like you have some issues cash :tongue:

I blogged that write up I did, its a bit easier for to understand for the technically challenged.
http://knuckleskin.blogspot.com/2007/02/why-sms-are-limited-to-160-characters.html

Now lets never speak of this again! 😃

Hey thanks for all your explanations - much appreciated. I guess I'll just have to get some bulk text deals so that my texts don't keep swallowing all my credit.

P.S. I think it's ok to be different. The world would be very boring if we were all the same. Heck, it would be even more boring if we were all English. 😊

meirionwyllt wrote:Hey thanks for all your explanations - much appreciated. I guess I'll just have to get some bulk text deals so that my texts don't keep swallowing all my credit.

P.S. I think it's ok to be different. The world would be very boring if we were all the same. Heck, it would be even more boring if we were all English. 😊

😊...touch�...(don't have a word for it in English so will have to be French):tongue: