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NewChief
04-05-2008, 06:16 AM
My wife is looking to upgrade her phone. We have AT&T/Cingular Wireless. Her main functionality that she needs is to be able to check and reply to work email and text easily, so a qwerty keyboard would be nice.

She's not a high end user that's going to need a ton of frills and extras, though I might play around with her phone a little. She basically just needs something that she can check up on her workflow with when she's away from the house (she works from home as a graphic designer). I guess web browsing would be a nice, but unnecessary ability.

Anyone have suggestions? Of course, she wants an iPhone, but I'm putting the foot down on that as overkill.
NewChief
04-07-2008, 04:28 AM
Bump for the work week crew.
The Rick
04-07-2008, 08:58 AM
Be a good husband and get her the iPhone. :p

Sorry, that was the Apple homer in me. Before I got an iPhone, I had a Samsung BlackJack and it worked pretty well.
NewChief
04-07-2008, 09:09 AM
Be a good husband and get her the iPhone. :p

Sorry, that was the Apple homer in me. Before I got an iPhone, I had a Samsung BlackJack and it worked pretty well.

I actually wouldn't mind the iPhone. The main concern I have with that is the monthly fees. We use AT&T already, so I'm not sure if there would even be any difference in the plan if she got something like a BlackJack on AT&T vs. an iPhone.
ChiefsFire
04-07-2008, 09:15 AM
Motorola Q
HC_Chief
04-07-2008, 09:34 AM
iPhone is NOT a good choice if she neds to check her work email!!!!!!

The Exchange support is crap, and there are no services/clients you can configure at this time. Hopefully the SDK will open it up a bit, but for now the iPhone is simply a cool iPod with phone & internet features.
irishjayhawk
04-07-2008, 09:43 AM
iPhone is NOT a good choice if she neds to check her work email!!!!!!

The Exchange support is crap, and there are no services/clients you can configure at this time. Hopefully the SDK will open it up a bit, but for now the iPhone is simply a cool iPod with phone & internet features.

Duh. It's not out yet. 2.0 is released in June.

However, an easy interim workaround is to route work mail to gmail and presto.
NewChief
04-07-2008, 09:50 AM
Duh. It's not out yet. 2.0 is released in June.

However, an easy interim workaround is to route work mail to gmail and presto.

She works at home, so her gmail account -is- her work email.

I'm curious what I can expect to pay monthly in bills for the iPhone.
HC_Chief
04-07-2008, 10:03 AM
She works at home, so her gmail account -is- her work email.

I'm curious what I can expect to pay monthly in bills for the iPhone.

An additional $20 per month for unlimited data & 200 text messages.
NewChief
04-07-2008, 10:08 AM
An additional $20 per month for unlimited data & 200 text messages.


How does it work if you have to connect to the 'net using the ATT network instead of wifi? Is that just figured as 'minutes' on a phone call?
irishjayhawk
04-07-2008, 02:09 PM
How does it work if you have to connect to the 'net using the ATT network instead of wifi? Is that just figured as 'minutes' on a phone call?

No. With the iPhone, the data plan is included, IIRC. Minutes are minutes - you must talk to use minutes up. Data on the ATT side is just data and isn't tabulated by amounts. Data on wifi is not counted at all because ATT isn't the one providing it most of the time.
NewChief
04-07-2008, 02:18 PM
No. With the iPhone, the data plan is included, IIRC. Minutes are minutes - you must talk to use minutes up. Data on the ATT side is just data and isn't tabulated by amounts. Data on wifi is not counted at all because ATT isn't the one providing it most of the time.

Hrm. That's not a bad plan then if it's only $20 more a month. Unfortunately, my wife would probably go way over 450 minutes a month. I'd be fine with that.
Valiant
04-07-2008, 02:20 PM
This is going to sound weird, but look into Sprints new completely unlimited plan.. I believe it is 100dollars and everything is unlimited.. Now depending on how well the phone works in your area is going to be the determining factor..

That is until other companies start matching Sprints unlimited packages at those cheap prices.. But their customer service still sucks right now..
irishjayhawk
04-07-2008, 05:03 PM
This is going to sound weird, but look into Sprints new completely unlimited plan.. I believe it is 100dollars and everything is unlimited.. Now depending on how well the phone works in your area is going to be the determining factor..

That is until other companies start matching Sprints unlimited packages at those cheap prices.. But their customer service still sucks right now..

And their service sucks too.
The Franchise
04-07-2008, 05:16 PM
And their service sucks too.

I've never had a complaint.
DenverChief
04-07-2008, 05:28 PM
Blackberry Pearl?

you can set up a @blackberry email account and you can add multiple email accounts to the phone so you can send and receive email from that account via the phone..kinda neat if you ask me.....all sorts of other neat things like a "mapquest" as an application on the phone rather than a website of course the internet, camera, games that actually entertain during long waits....