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2009-05-22 3:42 PM

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Champion
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The Green Between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh
Subject: Cell phone and plan upgarde...wireless thoughts?

Dear friends and family,

The Fish is looking at an upgrade from the razor phone. I use Verizon, but I am not married to it. Here's what I want....I think.

I use about 400-500 minutes yakking on the phone these days, but that might go up a bit (can't imagine more than 750).

I'd like to check e-mail via my phone. My business does not support getting e-mail on a Blackberry, but I do some business on hotmail. That being said, there is some talk about getting work e-mail pushed to such devices. I've looked at the Pearl...meh. 8830 looks sweet, but again, I am not married to it. Not sure if the iPhone is all hype or if it's as cool as it seems.

Wait? I can surf Teh Intarwebz and poast to Cup of Joe from a phone-like device. That could be nice to pop in and see what you're up to. While not critical, it sure looks like fun.

So, my questions are these:
What plan can I get to meet these needs without breaking teh bank?
What device is going to get this done, and like that?
What do you have and what do you love/hate about it?



2009-05-22 4:42 PM
in reply to: #2168790

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Regular
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Bay City, MI
Subject: RE: Cell phone and plan upgarde...wireless thoughts?
Verizon and ATT plans are almost identical so your looking minumum $70 a month for 450 minutes  and the data plan. To go up to 900 minutes will cost $20 extra. both Verizon and ATT have live demos at their corporate stores so check them out.  The 8830 is very slow even compared to other blackberry devices. The Iphone is really all that especially when you start adding all the apps to it. I have one and I love it even some training apps available for it.
2009-05-22 5:28 PM
in reply to: #2168790

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Master
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Cypress, CA
Subject: RE: Cell phone and plan upgarde...wireless thoughts?

I've been with Verizon for years, and just this year upgraded to my first smart phone, a Samsung Omnia.  It runs Windows Mobile (which was OK with me as I've had a few WinMo PDAs before).  It can access the net through either broadband or WiFi.

I thought about Blackberry, but my company requires partner approval to get mail pushed to a BB, and doesn't require any approval to push to WinMo--I think it syncs through Outlook Web Access if your company is using MS Exchange, not sure how it would work for other services.  But it was also very easy to set up to pull my personal email via POP3.

I love having email & internet on the phone, it's incredibly convenient.

Couple of drawbacks:

1.  Omnia seems to have really crappy battery life, even compared to other touchscreen smart phones.  Pretty much needs to be charged every night, and I don't talk on it all that much.

2.  Verizon requires a data plan with the phone, $30 above your voice plan.  You can't opt out of the broadband service and just use phone & WiFi.

3.  Omnia (and other smart phones) have GPS, but Verizon has chosen to deny access to third party apps like Google Maps.  If you want navigation features, you have to subscribe to their VZNavigator services, which is OK but costs $10/mo.  Google Maps works on the phone (and I love having the real-time traffic status), just won't show you your present location or do turn-by-turn directions.

There's supposedly an updated ROM in the works (may be mythical) that may fix #1 and #3.  And #2 is totally worth it, in my opinion.

2009-05-22 5:43 PM
in reply to: #2168790

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Extreme Veteran
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Kansas City, MO
Subject: RE: Cell phone and plan upgarde...wireless thoughts?
Maybe one of the Simply Everything plans from Sprint - my phone of choice is the HTC Touch Pro, a WinMo phone with all the bells and whistles.

They have several flavors depending on how many voice minutes you'd use (the top end plan is unlimited voice too), and they all include unlimited data (web, email, GPS, NFL Mobile Live, Sprint TV, etc),  unlimited texting, and unlimited mobile to mobile, no roaming, long distance included, etc.

Disclaimer:  I do work for Sprint, so I can't claim I'm totally unbiased. 
2009-05-22 11:41 PM
in reply to: #2168790

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Lafayette, CO
Subject: RE: Cell phone and plan upgarde...wireless thoughts?
I love my iPhone!  I love the phone, the services (google maps on it has gotten me out of lost situations on my bike!) and have had no problem with customer service.

Sprint made me so mad I still have dreams about going into their service center about 1 block down the road and throwing my old phone at them.  I battled with them for months because when people would call me they would sometimes get a fax line randomly.  They tried to blame everything from a hurricane (when I told one of them I was so mad because my mother was in the middle of hurricane Ike, would get moments to get a call out to me and and get a f'ing fax machine even though I'd told them it started WEEKS before Ike hit) to call forwarding (claimed I set it but couldn't explain to me how sometimes it would go through and other times it wouldn't and it continued after they supposedly turned it off).  I will NEVER pay Sprint any more money of my own. 
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