Looking For Advice on Which Phone to Get

I'm not a Verizon user yet - but my contract with Sprint ends in less than a
month and I am considering switching to Verizon. My wife and I live out in
a rural community in Toledo, OH and her brother has Verizon and gets decent
reception when visiting our house - whereas we're lucky to get even one bar
on our Sprint phones. This means we have to invest in a landline and means
extra costs we'd rather not have.

So we are looking for a phone that Verizon offers that is known to have
great reception. We did the same thing with Sprint 2 years ago, but their
towers just are not in the right places for even one of their better phones.

I am also looking to get a phone, with great reception, that is a camera
phone. I want to get something that is easy-to-use, offers very clear and
high-resolution pics, and does not require a "service" to transfer photos
from phone to PC. I've heard from some users of camera phones that certain
phones require you to transfer via a "pay-per-use" service while others just
require a USB-cable.

I've tried to look on Consumer Reports website for help, but most of the
phones they are listing are out of date. So I'm hoping for either a website
that is similar to CR in its unbiased reporting - or for some testimonials
from actual users that have good luck with their own phones. Any help you
can give myself and my wife would be greatly appreciated!

--
Kyle )

Reply address is fake. Don't ask for the real one, a troll named Lookout
sent enough spam and viruses that I shut it down.

"Kyle wrote:

> I've tried to look on Consumer Reports website for help, but most of
> the phones they are listing are out of date. So I'm hoping for either
> a website that is similar to CR in its unbiased reporting - or for
> some testimonials from actual users that have good luck with their own
> phones. Any help you can give myself and my wife would be greatly
> appreciated!
>
> --
> Kyle


http://www.howardforums.com

--

Kyle ) wrote:
> I'm not a Verizon user yet -

> I am also looking to get a phone, with great reception, that is a
> camera phone. I want to get something that is easy-to-use, offers
> very clear and high-resolution pics, and does not require a "service"
> to transfer photos from phone to PC. I've heard from some users of
> camera phones that certain phones require you to transfer via a
> "pay-per-use" service while others just require a USB-cable.
>

Maybe you should consider listening to the people that have a solution,
rather than the po'd minority, that have no solution, and just want to
*****...

Obviously, you have a computer (you post here), if it has a usb port,
consider a Motorola e815, a TF memory card (TF=Trans Flash, you can store
pictures/movies/ringtones/mp3's/etc on it about $30), and with a memory card
reader (about $10), you can transfer files (pics/sounds/etc) for free
between your phone and computer....

I live in a marginal area, and with my previous phone, couldn't get a signal
at all inside.. When I went with the E815, it went to full bars outside and
only lost one bar under the metal snow roof.

I have the Moto e815, which was top-rated by CR.

It's not without faults, but the reception is excellent, the camera is very
good, and I bought the little "MicroSD" memory card, and have transferred
many photos from the phone to my PC without a problem. Overall, I'm quite
happy with the phone. You'll see many posts about "hacking" the phone to
enable features, all I've done to mine is disable EVDO in order to improve
battery life. This was done completely with the keypad, no USB cables or
software, and worked exactly as advertised. It's not a "hack", just a
setting change.

It's a balance thing. The Motorolas of late have the best reputations for
reception, but they also seem to have more software/firmware issues, ie; the
e815 is known to have a rebooting problem when sending text messages. The
camera occasionally freezes the phone up. Most of the issues are annoying,
but not fatal. The LG's have a poorer general reputation for reception, but
I've seen few if any SW/FW issues reported. The Samsungs seem to fall in
between. These three brands appear to make up the majority of phone reviews
I found when researching for my last phone.

I found the Moto v325 very appealing, especially since it still has analog,
but after trying out a friends 815 with Bluetooth, I had to have BT for use
in the car. I'm not sorry, so far. I don't recall the camera resolution of
the 325, but if BT isn't an issue, give it a good long look.

HTH,
Dean
_______________________________________
"Kyle )" <GoSensGo@BringHomeTheCup.com> wrote in message
news:17idnXme0cKCHO3Z4p2dnA@adelphia.com...
> I'm not a Verizon user yet - but my contract with Sprint ends in less than
> a month and I am considering switching to Verizon. My wife and I live out
> in a rural community in Toledo, OH and her brother has Verizon and gets
> decent reception when visiting our house - whereas we're lucky to get even
> one bar on our Sprint phones. This means we have to invest in a landline
> and means extra costs we'd rather not have.
>
> So we are looking for a phone that Verizon offers that is known to have
> great reception. We did the same thing with Sprint 2 years ago, but their
> towers just are not in the right places for even one of their better
> phones.
>
> I am also looking to get a phone, with great reception, that is a camera
> phone. I want to get something that is easy-to-use, offers very clear and
> high-resolution pics, and does not require a "service" to transfer photos
> from phone to PC. I've heard from some users of camera phones that
> certain phones require you to transfer via a "pay-per-use" service while
> others just require a USB-cable.
>
> I've tried to look on Consumer Reports website for help, but most of the
> phones they are listing are out of date. So I'm hoping for either a
> website that is similar to CR in its unbiased reporting - or for some
> testimonials from actual users that have good luck with their own phones.
> Any help you can give myself and my wife would be greatly appreciated!
>
> --
> Kyle )
>
> Reply address is fake. Don't ask for the real one, a troll named Lookout
> sent enough spam and viruses that I shut it down.
>

I am a VZW franchise agent and am very familiar with both the 325 and
lg5200. I just got my wife a 325 and she sends me pix from Hawaii,
where he company is forcing he to be for the next 2 month (yeah!). The
325 has the best camera of the latest series of Moto phones. AFAIK
there is no current software to get the pix from the phone to the pc,
you have to send it. But the package you can get with the service will
include sending the pics. I have a 5200 and there is software to
transfer from the phone to the pc. It is called bitpim. Get a cable and
transfer the pix to the pc, put different ringtone on the phone, I have
my great grandaughters picture for my wallpaper. The rez on the 5200
is about 640x480 and the 325 is about the same. If you want to set up a
dummy email, I can send you about 10 pix my wife has taken in Hawaii
with the 325, so you can see what they look like. My addy is kc7mwp at
yahoo.com.

I'm no expert but to get started:

Ttalk with a couple Verizon reps to get an idea of what features you
want. Some are knowledgable and honest, some not... as knowledgable.

Then go to Phonescoop.com and do the 'Find a Phone' thing. That's a
very cool site.

Then use PhoneScoop's 'compare' function to line up all features to
lend some additional perspective.