I have a 2002 SL55 with Keyless entry and go. It's a credit card-sized plastic thing about 3mm thick that you can stick in your wallet. I don't need to press a button on the 'fob'. As I touch the door handle to open it, a sensor unlocks the car for me, and when I'm seated I just press a button on the gearknob and the engine fires up. I believe that the SL from 2004 onwards got rid of the credit card thing altogether and it was completely in the key. The SL is the marque's flagship 2-seater, and generally gets technology at the same time as or just after the S Class, so I would imagine the 1998 S Class has an identical system to my SL. By the way, if you have £15k to spend and don't mind high maintenance costs, I reckon the SL55 is the best value for money. Open top when you want it, proper steel roof in the winter. 500BHP on tap, and delimited does 201mph (as tested on a non-modified SL55 by Autocar I seem to recall). Love the look on the face of Porsche/Maserati/Anything owners (under about £150k) when you put your foot down. Insanely fast for its age. Apart from app functionality (which wasn't a 'thing' in 2002) what does the Tesla system do that mine doesn't? Oh, and this credit-card-sized thing is smaller and lighter than my phone...

Do you mind if I ask you in which country you're making these calls? I'm in England. A few weeks ago I spoke to my mother, with me having given her my old iPhone 7 Plus, and me on the X (yeah yeah, Apple, I know...) - it was the first time we'd spoken using this device configuration. I couldn't believe just how clearly I could hear her voice... it was so clear I could hear those nuances and whatnot that one normally only experiences face-to-face. I actually made a point of saying how clearly I could hear her, and she said the same to me. Did we get lucky? Is it more to do with the quality of the equipment (e.g. microphone/speaker) than the compression technology on the 'line'? Essentially, what IS it that makes a difference to the quality of a mobile call versus a landline (or face-to-face) and does anyone with experience of the industry know if there are encoding/quality differences between various countries? I find the difference in our experiences fascinating and am simply wondering why they are opposite!