Cell Phone/Provider Recommendation
September 28, 2010 2:08 PM Subscribe
Complex cell phone recommendation question...
My girlfriend and I, both residents of New York City, need new cell phones. Both of our current contracts (mine with T-Mobile, hers with Verizon) are due to expire in the next few months, and we're interested in trying to work some kind of "family plan" magic to save money and get cooler phones. But neither of us has any idea A) what phones we should be looking at (or avoiding altogether), and B) what provider we should be signing up with. And so we turn to AskMetafilter for help.
We each have different requirements for phones based on anticipated/ideal usage. I'll start with hers, as they're more complex.
She's a clinical psychologist with a hellish commute, so she needs some sort of smartphone that will allow her to both read journal articles in PDF format and watch TV shows with relative clarity. GPS would be a definite plus. She's also clumsy as all hell, so whatever phone she gets will need to be relatively durable (or come with cheap insurance). Camera/music player/wifi are all total non-priorities.
For myself, I just want a damned phone that is actually competent at sending and receiving calls (my current phone is a godawful little plastic Nokia brick from like 1997 with no volume adjustment and a cheap plastic body that creaks so loudly that it sometimes drowns out the sound of the person you're trying to talk to) and text messages. A smartphone would be cool, and if I could get one for a great deal I'd be happy to have one, but it's far from necessary. Likewise, I'm not too concerned with camera/music player type functionality either.
As far as the plan terms go, neither of us makes a ton of calls or texts. Even if I got a smartphone too, I wouldn't anticipate particularly high combined data usage.
And that's that. What phones and providers should we be looking at?
My girlfriend and I, both residents of New York City, need new cell phones. Both of our current contracts (mine with T-Mobile, hers with Verizon) are due to expire in the next few months, and we're interested in trying to work some kind of "family plan" magic to save money and get cooler phones. But neither of us has any idea A) what phones we should be looking at (or avoiding altogether), and B) what provider we should be signing up with. And so we turn to AskMetafilter for help.
We each have different requirements for phones based on anticipated/ideal usage. I'll start with hers, as they're more complex.
She's a clinical psychologist with a hellish commute, so she needs some sort of smartphone that will allow her to both read journal articles in PDF format and watch TV shows with relative clarity. GPS would be a definite plus. She's also clumsy as all hell, so whatever phone she gets will need to be relatively durable (or come with cheap insurance). Camera/music player/wifi are all total non-priorities.
For myself, I just want a damned phone that is actually competent at sending and receiving calls (my current phone is a godawful little plastic Nokia brick from like 1997 with no volume adjustment and a cheap plastic body that creaks so loudly that it sometimes drowns out the sound of the person you're trying to talk to) and text messages. A smartphone would be cool, and if I could get one for a great deal I'd be happy to have one, but it's far from necessary. Likewise, I'm not too concerned with camera/music player type functionality either.
As far as the plan terms go, neither of us makes a ton of calls or texts. Even if I got a smartphone too, I wouldn't anticipate particularly high combined data usage.
And that's that. What phones and providers should we be looking at?
Look at all of 'em. And go into the stores and explain to the salesperson what exactly you need. Chances are if you play them off each other, you and your girlfriend could get a great deal, especially for the first few months.
posted by custard heart at 2:27 PM on September 28, 2010
posted by custard heart at 2:27 PM on September 28, 2010
Best answer: Here's a rate comparison chart for Family Plans. You can also select Pre-Paid.
posted by muddgirl at 2:30 PM on September 28, 2010
posted by muddgirl at 2:30 PM on September 28, 2010
Also, it's really hard to estimate how much you'll text until you have a phone/plan that can actually send text messages.
posted by muddgirl at 2:32 PM on September 28, 2010
posted by muddgirl at 2:32 PM on September 28, 2010
Agreed with muddgirl. I never sent text messages before I had a smartphone, and now I send a ton.
We recently got a HTC Incredible on Verizon and have been happy with the call quality and the phone. If you go with an Android phone make sure to get one with Android 2.2 rather than one of the old 1.x phones that will never be upgraded. The turn-by-turn narrated GPS on the Android phones is great, which was the main reason we went with Android vs. Iphone. Used to have an iphone on AT&T, and calls dropped all the time.
posted by benzenedream at 2:44 PM on September 28, 2010
We recently got a HTC Incredible on Verizon and have been happy with the call quality and the phone. If you go with an Android phone make sure to get one with Android 2.2 rather than one of the old 1.x phones that will never be upgraded. The turn-by-turn narrated GPS on the Android phones is great, which was the main reason we went with Android vs. Iphone. Used to have an iphone on AT&T, and calls dropped all the time.
posted by benzenedream at 2:44 PM on September 28, 2010
For reading PDFs I would recommend something with a big screen like Samsung's Galaxy-S line. They're some of the most expensive phones you can buy, but well worth it for the fast CPU and super-high-res screen.
posted by shponglespore at 3:04 PM on September 28, 2010
posted by shponglespore at 3:04 PM on September 28, 2010
I can tell you I'm pretty happy with my Rumor Touch thus far, but its GPS capability is fairly rudimentary and as far as video, it only takes a couple of YouTube songs to impact my battery (and Hulu, and anything else requiring newer Flash, doesn't work). It's more a souped-up multimedia phone than a real smartphone, although having Opera Mini makes a lot of the internet accessible -- and data is unmetered, so have at it.
This might actually work fine for you, but your gf should probably be looking more at a pad/tablet device.
posted by dhartung at 3:33 PM on September 28, 2010
This might actually work fine for you, but your gf should probably be looking more at a pad/tablet device.
posted by dhartung at 3:33 PM on September 28, 2010
Yeah, I wouldn't want to rely on my phone for a commute - maybe she should consider a phone and a separate device for pdfs and videos.
posted by muddgirl at 4:43 PM on September 28, 2010
posted by muddgirl at 4:43 PM on September 28, 2010
Sprint and Virgin don't have "truly unlimited" plans, AFAIK. There's no listed cap, but they reserve the right to institute one for heavy users.
posted by muddgirl at 7:07 AM on September 29, 2010
posted by muddgirl at 7:07 AM on September 29, 2010
This thread is closed to new comments.
We did the math and even though we pay full-price for the phones, we're going to "pay them off" in 5 months compared to getting subsidized with a Sprint Family Plan contract - the cheapest voice/text/data plan is $130 a month with 1000 minutes we never use.
posted by muddgirl at 2:26 PM on September 28, 2010 [1 favorite]