I don't think it's possible to get a phone on a CDMA carrier that's not sold directly by the carrier. Well, maybe it is possible, but it would require a helluva lot of
effort. And GSM is just inferior, so no matter how you look at it, you're getting screwed!
Or you could just go the Sprint route, which I'm seriously considering. CDMA and phones that aren't locked down pieces of crap? Sounds good to me. Plus, it's cheaper than Verizon and their coverage is pretty good.
I could go the Sprint route, but that would mean:
- A new contract
- A new phone and setup
- Losing my corporate discount with VZW
- Limited access to tech support
My university has a 25% discount b/c all of the administrative bigwigs (from deans on up the chain) have Blackberry's through VZW, so that means that faculty and staff (and grad students like me are paid by the university, so we're technically considered staff) get a huge discount, even larger than the normal 20% IIRC. For a family plan with 2 smart phones (Blackberry and my DROID) plus a dumbphone, including everything we pay only $135 / month.
Even better, when I buy accessories through VZW, I get the same corp discount applied to them as well....Even when I bought the phones, IIRC, I got the discount on the new plans (although I think the subsidized phones themselves were not discounted).
It's just a win-win situation for me, as I live far from a
major metropolitan area, and VZW also happens to have the best coverage at the university, bar none. All my friends on AT&T lost coverage inside buildings, and my friends on Sprint are hit and miss due to a variety of reasons - me, I chug along all the time, listening to Pandora indoors all day (as an example).
I used to have Cingular myself, and we always lost connections in buildings on campus. Now, I am hard pressed to lose a connection even in an elevator...
I'm also very tempted to leave Verizon at the end of my contract. I've been with them for nearly 8 years, and now having two smartphones on a fam contract (with the fiance), I'm getting a little tired of paying $170 a month. Plus, living in DC, and even if we move it'll likely be to as big a city, I have great coverage from all the carriers. I just wish Google would make a dev. phone for Verizon, but that'll never happen.
sounds about right, with the discount that I have 20% of $170 would be $34, making my cost about $136, whereas m actual bill is ~$135.
It's to each his own - gotta do what you gotta do.
My sentiments exactly. In fact, I've already done that. Bought a new Incredible on eBay, got it last week and rooted it - EXTREMELY easy to do on a Mac - and I put CyanogenMod 6.1 on it. This version of CyanogenMod comes with a kernel that is clocked at over 1.1 Ghz. I have SetCPU set to boot up maxed out on Performance and just leave it there. My average benchmarks in Quadrant range from 1500 to 1600 mostly.
The look and feel of course, due to CyanogenMod, is identical to my OG, except that it is fast and smooth ALL THE TIME instead of just when I have enough memory free to make it so on my OG.
I used Sense for a few days and just couldn't deal with it anymore. I hated it. It does have some cool aspects, such as Facebook integration, but its not worth all the extra trouble. By that I mean to do what would require one or two screens with CyanogenMod would at times require 3 or 4 screens with Sense. Way too trouble for me.
But the Incredible is an awesome phone. It has enough memory that you can stream TV episodes from ABC.com, etc... with no lag or stutter, you can game with amazing graphics and no lag or stutter, etc.... That is, of course, being rooted, overclocked, and bloatware-free.
That might be my other alternative - find a good used one online that is in like-brand-new condition. Not sure if I would trust eBay anymore though, too many people selling BS on there, but there are plenty of other sources as well.
Gotta respectfully disagree with you on this one. Verizon is expensive - yes. Are they worth it? YES. Is Sprint worth the difference? Not in my judgement. Their network is way smaller than Big Red, and the coverage you get off the Sprint network is because of Verizon. What this means is that your coverage is much less contiguous than if you were on Verizon exclusively. Reason: due to Sprint's inferior network size, you will leave and re-enter their network frequently, which means you will have to register onto one network, then the other, frequently (if you travel or are in an area they simply don't cover very well). All this registering can wreak havoc on being able to use your phone.
Now if you stay in town, or if you stay well within Sprint's borders most of the time, you could be okay on coverage, but their customer service sucks big time. And that's they truth.
And... eventually we will all be using 4G, and there's no comparison between LTE and WiMax, which is what you get on Sprint.
Stick with Verizon and be happy.
I agree with that, but for certain users like me, who live in a metropolis, as dreadnatty said, coverage from all 4 carriers is virtually the same; you'll have 3G almost everywhere. And personally, I'm not concerned with 4G at all right now. Coverage will be minimal wherever you go for the next two years, at which point I can jump ship to another carrier!
Can't say anything about Sprint's customer service, though. I've never used any other carrier.
Well said... I'm not at all concerned with 4G either - I just meant that eventually, attrition as well as obsolescence will take us all to 4G sooner or later...
And you're right - if you are elsewhere at that time, you can always come back.
I have sold commercial business accounts for both Verizon and AT&T (the earlier incarnations of those companies) as well as T-Mobile (when it first Powertel), and I have used Sprint/Nextel as a consumer after that. As an insider, I can say that once the consolidation began within the industry (when Verizon became *Verizon*) Verizon became the best wireless company on all fronts and it has been that way ever since.
Sprint has always had the *coolest* phones of any, but their network size and customer service has always been lacking. They have the best phone right now in my opinion - the Evo - but the fact that to get it requires Sprint service keeps me from getting one, just like AT&T has kept me from getting an iPhone for years.
At any rate, after getting my Incredible and being able to instantly root it and install my favorite ROM - CyanogenMod - right out of the box,
it would be hard for me to buy anything I could not immediately root and customize.
And that is the key for me as well. Having been rooted right around a year (give or take a few weeks) and having played with a variety of ROMs and themes, I could not handle being stuck using a stock ROM - and I certainly could not handle Sense, nor MotoBLAH (I know I sound like a broken record, but ffs, I hate
both of the - period).
