Go to eBay and order one of those universal wall chargers with moveable contact arms.
They cost less than USD$10 and can charge the battery outside of the phone.

I have been using the phone now whith only 1 sim activated and the other one switched off.

Theoretically this should increase battery life as 1 sender/receiver is not working. In reallity it looks like it does not make a difference. After 2 days battery is dead.

Phone died while I was in the USA. I still had an old nokia phone with me.

Could not charge anymore and it would not go back on. Will try to sent it back to dealextrme and see what they say or if they give any guarentee at all.

Read an ominous message on UseNet which referenced a Vodafone (UK?) support board. Seems that some no-name Chinese dual-SIM phones have stopped working after a couple of weeks, due to the network barring them. The issue is that many of these phones have indecipherable IMEI numbers (or worse, numbers stolen from or mimicking other manufacturers models). Vodafone, in their wisdom, has chosen to mark these phones as "stolen" and, in their support board, simply and categorically state that they do not support this type of hardware - period. Don't know how widespread this has become, or whether it represents a permanent situation.

It's known longer than today... And why wouldn't Vodafone (or any other operator) not deny service to these devices?

If these IMEI numbers are indeed stolen, or used over and over again, how do you think their logfiles would look like? Just try to track down problems when numerous phones with the same number logon to you system.

I had some chinees phones too, and when I tried to add 2 cards from the same operator to it (but with a different plan), the first card that tried to register was successfull, the other wasn't. Never found the reason for 100% sure, but this was probable a comparable situation.

Yves

Yeah that is something that had me wondering how them phones with two transceivers & two SIMs in them work. I would expect them to have two IMEIs as they are technically two phones in one, unlike the ones have have only more than one SIM but can use only one at a time.

Have been using an MFU V200 dual sim quad band phone I picked up on ebay from a Hong Kong dealer for US$53 including registered airmail. Decent audio quality. It's a sturdy, if somewhat basic, phone. It's a dual active sim and a bluetooth headset can run off either sim card.
In US, I use an AT&T/Jolt prepaid and a T-Mobile/Tuyo prepaid sim card in it.
When I go to Nevis at the end of February probably will use my Digicel Bermuda card, and will likely use up the last of my airtime on my MaxRoam card as the second sim (probably in St. Marteen en route to Nevis).
It's nice having two active cards in case I'm nearer to a network tower for one carrier than another, or the rate is cheaper on one sim card than another. Also can access the directories on either sim card to dial a number.
One glitch I've found is if the second sim card defaults to the same carrier as the first sim, and a call is rejected on the second sim (no roaming agreement other than emergency calls), then the first sim will not be able to make calls until the phone is turned off and back on again. Happens when I use the T-Mo/Tuyo card in rural areas only covered by AT&T. Easiest way to avoid this is just to not dial with the sim that says "emergency only" instead of a network carrier name.