MetaChat - Looking for anecdotes.

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03 April 2007

Looking for anecdotes. I'm considering making the jump to an all-in-one device but am having trouble getting over the $300-500 for a phone (and a lovely 2-year contract) hurdle. Unnecessarily long, rambly story inside.→[More:]

I currently have a phone with Alltel. It's just the cheap-ass POS phone you get for free. I'm out of contract. They have good rates, as far as cell phone companies go. Lately I've been wanting to make the step up to a full-on "device". Alltel sells the PPC-6700 for $250 after rebates with 2-year contract and has a $69.99 unlimited data plan (which is only $20 more than I pay now). The reviews on this device are almost universally positive, which I find to be rather unusual and a really good sign. The thing is sitting in my shopping cart right now and I just haven't been able to bring myself to pull the trigger.

My worry is that my current phone with Alltel has horrible reception in the office and at home. Lost calls abound, and I constantly get voice mails when my phone never rang at all. I wonder if this is just because of my cheap phone. Of course, reception reports on the internet don't help much because all the providers have numerous reviews on both ends of the reception spectrum. There is another guy in the office with Alltel that says he gets great reception here. Anyway, I'm worried to spend so much money on a phone that I still won't be able to use in the two places I spend most of my time.

I won't go to Verizon. Too expensive and I used to work for them and have somewhat of a grudge.

I'm also very interested in the upcoming iPhone. But the things I've heard about Cingular are enough to make me want to wait till kinks are ironed out, prices have come down, and other providers are offering it.

The point of all this? I'm just looking for your anecdotes about when you made the jump, your thought process, the device and provider you ended up with, and whether you think it was worth it.

200th post!

post by: mike9322 at: 07:35 | 13 comments

I have a Cingular 8525, which is made by HTC (their TyTN model, IIRC). It works pretty well as a phone and I send email from it ALL THE TIME. It allegedly has 802.11 wireless, but I've yet to see it work especially well and the Windows Mobile interface into it suck-diddly-ucks. Bluetooth works just fine. The web browser is eh.

I wrote a Flickr gadget for it that lets you upload pictures with tags, etc, directly to your account. That works very well.

I upgraded to this phone from a Palm 600, which was a great organizer but a lousy phone.

My wife has the Cingular 3125, which is a very good phone, also running Windows Mobile, but more limited by the "Smartphone" edition. She's extremely happy with it. Two people I work with also have this phone and are quite happy with it.

Quite honestly, though, I would wait for devices the run Windows Mobile 6. Neither Cingular nor HTC have announced any kind of upgrade path, even though both of these devices will run WM6 quite well.

posted by plinth 03 April | 09:16

I got the Treo 680 from Cingular about six weeks ago and other than a few soft-resets and a hard reset, I love it. Especially the touchscreen. That said, if it fucks up again, it's going back.

posted by YouCanCallMeAl 03 April | 09:16

I got a used Treo 650 on ebay and used it for about a month. I probably would have been OK if I got a bluetooth headset, but I ended up selling it because I hated using the damn thing as a phone. It just felt big and bulky, and I'm happier with my old, trusty Motorola.

posted by ferociouskitty 03 April | 09:51

I love my Treo 600. Between SnapperMail (IMAP email), Google Maps (turn-by-turn driving directions), pssh (SSH2 client), PDANet (use your cellphone as a modem), CardExport (use your Treo as an SD card reader), and MemoSafe (encrypted memos), it's saved my ass personally and professionally hundreds of times. Plus, PocketTunes and TCPMP rock. I've said it a million times before: it's not the phone-- it's the apps that run on it.

posted by eamondaly 03 April | 11:47

Big fan of my Treo 650. In fact, I just bought a portable wireless keyboard for it. With the word processor on the phone, it's now like having a laptop that fits in my pocket. I use it for email and minor web surfing, and I've even found the camera to be useful from time to time. I have had to hard reboot it by popping out the battery a few too many times, but all-in-all, it's by far the best phone and service I've ever had. Not cheap, though, and I eat through the allotted data transfer totals on my plan way too fast.

posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson 03 April | 11:56

ARGH!

I decided to go ahead and give it a go. They have a 15 day money-back guarantee so if the reception was poor I could go ahead and send it back and try another provider.

Then I got to the screen where I told it I was a current Alltel customer and it told me they can't do equipment transfers online! WTF? I have to actually go into a store? And why did they let me get almost all the way through the checkout process before telling me that? They would save their customers a lot of time by just asking that question up front.

Days of rumination, and I finally decide to go through with it, and am shot down. Poopie caca.

posted by mike9322 03 April | 12:07

Guess you're just gonna have to get an iphone, eh?

posted by ethylene 03 April | 12:31

So this all-in-one device, it. . .

posted by rainbaby 03 April | 12:37

It better! But there are special attachments.

posted by ethylene 03 April | 12:43

Part of my reason for wanting to buy now, ethylene, is that I do not want to be an early adopter on the iPhone. The longer I wait, the more tempted I'm going to be. It looks incredible, but I'd rather wait on it.

posted by mike9322 03 April | 12:50

I can't imagine an iPhone has any value to power users. The lack of a keyboard is a non-starter for those who email or type a lot.

posted by eamondaly 03 April | 13:00

i just want someone else to get it so we can hear about it and all its "glad not to have one aspects".

posted by ethylene 03 April | 15:35

It's a slippery slope, mike9322.

Compare cell phones and services—Canadian. There has to be a USA version, for sure...

I could tell you a story though. Call it a forewarning one.

Watching a hockey game on tv before going to my own game...home team was struggling. They switch goalies in the 2nd period, it's looking grimmer.
After my own game, I just ask casually, I wonder if the home team won or got slaughtered. Did the back up goalie save the day or was he the goat¿
A buddy pipes up with the score. Huh¿ How'd you know. He pulls out his Blackberry. Logs on, it shows the score and all kinds of stats, including photos....the photos, woooHooo.
I said, OMG, if I had that, I'd become addicted.

That's the slope. I'm loving it, but the Crackberry is an expensive 'toy' in my case. Now, if it was a business 'need', I could easily see dropping the $$$ on that. Right handy and once you get used to it...well, you know the story.
For sure it's all about the bells and whistles and which ones you'll use on a daily basis. Sure hate the idea of 2-3 year contracts, when Canada is so way behind the technology available Now in Japan, that it's really almost obsolete from day 1. Isn't that what they say about driving a new car off the lot and its value has dropped, substantially. Argh.

If Verizon is offering a good deal, you may have to bury that grudge, after all, it's all about the money. Or service. or...

posted by alicesshoe 03 April | 19:09

← This is a worrying thread... || Hey ImageShack: →

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