Lets talk cell phones.

I'm anti cell phones.

But apparently I need one. Ugh.

We're wanting 2 phones, with an absurd number of minutes, that we can somehow access the internet on our laptop with, and that whole "5" thing is neat, being that my mama has verizon (which we can't get down here) and my best friend has t-mobile (which doesn't offer the net thing we need.)

Soooo... any suggestions?

starlight said:

I'm anti cell phones.

But apparently I need one. Ugh.

We're wanting 2 phones, with an absurd number of minutes, that we can somehow access the internet on our laptop with, and that whole "5" thing is neat, being that my mama has verizon (which we can't get down here) and my best friend has t-mobile (which doesn't offer the net thing we need.)

Soooo... any suggestions?

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We have sprint and I love it.We get signal even when we are in the boonies.
If you go to a sprint store and tell them what you want on your phone they will show you lots of differnt ones.

We've had Sprint for 5.5 yrs now w/ no problems. We get free sprint to sprint minutes and nights starting at 7.

I also have Sprint and have had it for almost two years now with no problems and I live in the middle of nowhere. I HATE Verizon. It dropped calls all the time and the Customer Service Dept. made the worst seat manufacturer customer service look great.
I also have had the Nextel walkie-talkie and have been happy with that as well. Just last week I got the new Sprint/Nextel hybrid phone and it has been great. All the neat features of regular phones, but with the walkie talkie feature.

i am against recommending any one carrier to people who don't live where i do. the fact is, the coverage and signal quality of different carriers is dependent on where you live. for me, cingular is pretty good, although i have friends who swear by verizon. but those could be crappy where you live, i don't kow. you should really ask which carriers your nearby friends use and like.

as for phones, if you're into gadgets or trendy design, get a motorola. if you only care about signal quality and sound quality, get a nokia.

southpawboston said:

i am against recommending any one carrier to people who don't live where i do. the fact is, the coverage and signal quality of different carriers is dependent on where you live. for me, cingular is pretty good, although i have friends who swear by verizon. but those could be crappy where you live, i don't kow. you should really ask which carriers your nearby friends use and like.

as for phones, if you're into gadgets or trendy design, get a motorola. if you only care about signal quality and sound quality, get a nokia.

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:yeahthat:

We have had Nextel, and it works when we are walking out our front door, but in the house it didnt work. We now have verizon, and its great. We are about to switch to AT&T because DH wants the new iPhone.

We have Nextel/Sprint, we havent had any issues with them and they have a lot of great features. I dont think we have ever gone over our minutes, our nights start at 7 pm, we also have free incomming calls as well as free mobile to mobile. DH also gets a military discount on our account. I think the thing that sold him on it the most was that he was able to get a military spec phone. With him being in the military and both of us working in EMS this has been a realy good thing for us.

Definately go with the Nokia model phone, as for th eother, I have no fancy options, but I can top off my phone and access my account online as needed. I use Virgin Mobile (http://www.virginmobile.com), which allows me to only pay for minutes I need - those other options are great if you talk a LOT, but can end up costing you more than it's worth.

I think they all pretty much suck the same I have had them all and have always wondered why they don't upgrade the technology so we can all have a phone that works. The only recommendation I have, which is almost impossible to do, is do not sign a contract. I know most will not sign you on unless you do, but try to get one year instead of two or something. I was completely surprized when my Nextel service came due and I told them I didn't want a contract. They said I had to do a two year contract. I said no, I wouldn't! They said too bad, you have to! I said cancel my phone. They said okay. Their loss I figure. Sorry, but I would only recommend some good walkie talkies:thumbsup:

If you want a phone and no contract - go with Virgin Mobile. That's one of the reasons we chose them.

I can top up as little as $10 every 90 days :2thumbsup: to keep my phone active, but we usually end up doing $10 every week-two weeks since the school uses the cell number as my primary contact.

starlight said:

I'm anti cell phones.

But apparently I need one. Ugh.

We're wanting 2 phones, with an absurd number of minutes, that we can somehow access the internet on our laptop with, and that whole "5" thing is neat, being that my mama has verizon (which we can't get down here) and my best friend has t-mobile (which doesn't offer the net thing we need.)

Soooo... any suggestions?

Click to expand...

It truly depends on the area in which you live. While Sprint might be great in one area, it might be the worst in another area. While Cingular might be terrible in one area, it might be great in another.

I have had TONS of different services and phones. I have not found perfection yet, but have also learned A LOT about how these companies work. I wouldn't base your decision on what people say about their providers unless they live in your immediate (I mean within 5-10 miles!!!) area.

southpawboston said:

i am against recommending any one carrier to people who don't live where i do. the fact is, the coverage and signal quality of different carriers is dependent on where you live. for me, cingular is pretty good, although i have friends who swear by verizon. but those could be crappy where you live, i don't kow. you should really ask which carriers your nearby friends use and like.

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:yeahthat: Exactly!!!! I had absolutely horrible, atrocious, ghastly no-good, very bad service with Cingular, but my family in the south LOVES Cingular. I had nothing but bad luck with them. I could only make calls in a very small area (about a ten square mile area) and about 50% of my calls were dropped within about 2 minutes. BUT, people in other areas swear by Cingular, saying it is the best. It truly depends.

as for phones, if you're into gadgets or trendy design, get a motorola. if you only care about signal quality and sound quality, get a nokia.

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I have had phones by Motorola (two different phones), Nokia (two different phones), and LG (three different phones). Of those three companies, I would, without a doubt, go with LG. One of my Motorola phones was recalled some unbelievable number of times in the year I had it and the other was very UN-user-friendly. Both of my Nokia phones had issues with turning themselves on and off. One of my LG phones lost battery power quickly, but was a good phone. I have been very happy with my other two LG phones.

I found the most affordable program & phone was through Net 10. No monthly fee & 10 cents a minute no matter where you are in the US. Texting, I think, is 5cents. Doesn't matter because it's useless for me.

Last month they implemented more payment options. The cheapest is 150 minutes & 30 days for $15. I liked the 600 minutes & 120 days of service for $60. When I buy airtime early, it's added to the original expiration date so I don't lose any accumulated time or minutes.

I bought my first Net 10 phone last July. When the Motorola refused to acknowledge service at 3 months old, Net10 happily sent me an upgraded new phone + credited the unused time of 600 minutes AND added 300 minutes for my 'inconvience'. :thumbsup:

I purchased a Nokia phone 2 months ago for dh at Walmart. For $40 he got the phone, 300 minutes & 60 days use. He's happy & so is his work to not always contact me. He also has clear reception.

After using very reasonable prepayment cards in Germany for around $15 for 4 hours, I refuse to commit to the ridiculous US monthly fee of $40+ for telephone service! It's outrageous, especially since we're all on analogue, not clear digital phones. All those bells & whistles don't make up for poor audio reception and a considerably lighter wallet.


Net10 is through the same company as TracFone. It's a little more money, but has more variety in phones & payment programs. Both have greatly improved their customer service in the last year. No more echo when I talk with India

Reason why I'm explaining in detail is that I've surprised a lot of people, including salesclerks, about how little my excellent service costs. I've been in the boonies of TX and still I get reception. So for someone who doesn't yak a huge amount of time on the phone and wants to pay $15 monthly for cell phone access, it's the best bargain around (Even better than Virgin. I checked them out too )

Ugh.

We're still looking.

The absurd amount of minutes is because we're going to be using these as our house phone. Yes, our only phone.

And the net has to come from the phone. Has to. No other option.

So, I'm looking at Sprint and T-Mobile. I know local people who use them, and they say they're good.

I hate cell phones. (Did I say that earlier?) But I do like talking on the phone. So, I'm going to have a cell phone that is only going to stay in the house. I can almost guarantee I'll forget it everytime.

I hate cell phones.

starlight said:

The absurd amount of minutes is because we're going to be using these as our house phone. Yes, our only phone.

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that's what we do--our cells are our only phones. we have 550 rollover minutes per month through cingular, but cingular mobile-to-mobile minutes are free. since most of the time spent on the phone are between me and DW, or DW and her family (who have cingular), we rarely use more than 200-300 minutes per month, and have 1000s of free minutes racked up at the end of the year.

starlight said:

I hate cell phones.

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seeing as you've mentioned that three times in one post, i take it you hate cell phones. why? is it the phones themselves you hate? the concept? or the annoying *people* who use them in ways that violate common courtesy and goold old fashioned etiquette? :question:

southpawboston said:

seeing as you've mentioned that three times in one post, i take it you hate cell phones. why? is it the phones themselves you hate? the concept? or the annoying *people* who use them in ways that violate common courtesy and goold old fashioned etiquette? :question:

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YES.

why would you hate the concept?