TubeNet

Greetings all,

Thought I would get some feedback from the TNFJ.... My wife and I are ditching our Sprint phones, and thinking about getting Verizon. That being said, we are contemplating the acquisition of two Blackberry Storms. Thoughts???????

TO

My BlackBerry Pearl recently stopped working for no apparent reason. I kept it in my back pocket, but so do many people.

It has only been used for a little less than half a year so my feelings on BlackBerry's phones are mixed.

Thought this might help in your decision.

While I cannot vouch for the Blackberry storm, as someone who does spend a lot of time in the area you do I cannot say enough good things about Verizon service. I often find I have access when folks with Sprint or At&t don't. I did play around with a Storm a friend of mine has and didnt care for it. It didnt seem very sturdy. I am probably going to try the LG Dare. YMMV.

My brother recently got a Blackberry Storm, and he's been very happy with it. It is probably the best phone Verizon has available right now. If you're willing to pay for the data service, it's worth getting.

a friend has one, and the landscape to portrait is slow and sometimes inoperable. It looks really cool, but the initial reviews I saw of it were complaining about it having a slow interface.

I go back and forth on this level of connected-ness. I don't need it, but my bosses boss and our director are never, NEVER in their offices (I work for the county public works dept). They are, as they should be either meeting the public, meeting with other county folks, or working with other folks in our dept. the crackberry allows them to get my bosses, and my short emails focused on the decisions we need and either reply with a yes or no, or reply that they need either more info, or to come talk to us about it.

so they have application, but not the way that many people use them (blokes model).

bloke wrote:OK...

I'll bite.

We have about the cheapest cell phone service (combined with phones with just about the best receiving capabilities...due to our rural locale) that we could find. We had a limited choice of providers due to coverage, but the one we use has a bare-bones plan that is just about as cheap as anyone else's bare-bones plan...and we always have plenty of "minutes".

I understand about being able to surf the internet and answer emails on the fly...but *IF* you're out-and-about, is stopping to answer emails your primary objective (again, when you're out trying to get things done)? To me, the objective of being "out" is to get the thing, kill it, drag it home (or back to work) and get on with work...and not (necessarily) to stop several times for elaborate two-way or one-way communications.

Admittedly there are quite types of jobs were being able to receive/reply to emails on the fly can be profitable, competitive, and convenient...and even - arguably - to be able to surf the web to look up information and data...

When I first got my job I moved to Nebraska and my wife stayed in Iowa, since my first year was interim/not a guaranteed re-hire. We decided that since our primary form of communication would be cellphone/texting/email we would get really nice phones, and I figured having email on the go would be more-or-less a necessity since I had a career now.

We signed a contract with AT&T and each got a 1st gen. iPhone, me the 4GB and her the 8 GB.

- I prefer doing email on the computer because the interface is much better/faster.
- surfing the web is OK, but the Safari browser has issues (no java/flash capability, doesn't remember logins, for TubeNet for example, while navigating the site)
- AT&T, while having good customer service, has TERRIBLE reception where I'm living

Our contract expires this summer and we're moving to Verizon (best reception in this area) and getting "normal" phones - whichever models have the best reception for the least $$$

bloke wrote: ...but (can we talk...??) what percentage of people with these luxurious "computer phones" probably are

- in serious debt - and -

Just mortgage and school loans here, but the data phones are still a waste of $$$

bloke wrote: - paying hundreds of dollars a month to "play around" with texting, emails, hobby-related websites, youtube, and tubenet?

Actually, the data plan for the iPhone isn't in the hundreds, even for two of them. IIRC, we're paying under $100/mo. for both data plans, but we decided that money could be better spent playing golf, or sitting in the bank in case of emergency.

The coolest feature that I use is the map/search function, but I can get that on a portable GPS should I need it. I know my little area pretty well now, and what I don't know Google or asking actual people (gasp!) can tell me.

Some folks may *need* a superphone, but for us it turned out to be more of a fun thing. Other things are more fun for less money. Especially when so much of what a fancy phone offers is basically a redundancy of what we can do in other ways.

I've had zero problems with Sprint. Of course, being in their backyard, I'd better not.

I happen to LOVE the Palm Centro. Not as flipping pages fancy as the iPhone, but it does everything I could possibly need and more. It is available from other companies too.

Thanks everyone!

My wife and I did get our Storms today. My biggest thing with wanting it is the connectivity, as I do not have regular email access at my various schools (without resorting to libraries, which unfortunately can be rather inconvenient). So far so good with them. I do appreciate all the various feedback, and will keep you appraised as things go.

TO

I have been using a Palm device for years to take advantage of computer based calendar/address book functions. I can synchronize my handheld device to our home computer and my wife and I can check schedule conflicts and contact information at home or on the road. When she came due for another cell phone, we looked at the Centro (also by Palm). She liked it and found it would not be too difficult for her to operate. Now I have one too. We can sync our phones remotely and better plan events around our schedules (she is a physician) and my performances/rehearsals/teaching commitments. We know who can pick up the kids and get them where they need to be. She can send me a short text while I am in class and I can see it when I get to my desk. I can reply and send a message back that she can see it after she finishes with a patient. This setup has made our busy lives somewhat easier to navigate.

Sure... we could call, leave messages with others, and hope the word got to our spouse correctly. Then we could call back, leave our response with others, and hope they got it right. Then we could call back and confirm.

Or we could send smoke signals.

well...I just got a crackberry curve. I'm not a texter, but have a fair bit of email and phone communication for personal stuff that needs to go on during the work day. I found I was not getting to emails until 9 pm, or later and not every day either. it's already helped me be more in touch with the office of the kids school (I'm on the board), without taking away time from work or using work equipment to read email through a web based utility.

My contract with Verizon runs out next week. I have been a loyal customer of theirs for about 6 years now, and have never had any issues with service. Their customer service, on the other hand, has been awful, at times. Recently, the outer screen on my phone broke, and I decided to wait to replace it, because my contract was running out, and I could use my "new every two" discount to buy a new one. When I called and asked about this, I found out that I wasn't eligible for NET, because I had had my phone replaced. I bought a phone, and it didn't work properly. After replacing it three times with refurbs (all under warrantee), it turned out that there was a defect in the model, so the switched me to another model...because I got a new phone then, they said I can't get one with a discount now.

after researching my options, I realized it will only cost me about $10 more a month to switch to AT&T and get an iPhone (and I currently have NO internet or extra features on my phone, save for text messaging). So, as soon as my contract runs out, I'm doing exactly that.