you know I have heard so much bad things from people in other parts of the country besides Texas and Louisiana but in those two states if you want good reception at&t is the way to go. Me and my wife just switched to at&t yesterday with 2 iphone 3gses and she loves them so far because she can get reception in the house witch verizon cannot do for some reason.
the signal strength is fair at best. My nokia never dropped a call and my first gen iphone did on occasion but my 3gs drops call consistently in the same low spot by my house every time. the low spot also happens to be a convergence point of three towers if that gives you any idea of how linear some of the towers are.
bases on your area (I have no idea the coverage in NY) you may or may not get away with an iphone. but if you are already in low coverage I would suggest looking else ware. if you have no signal strength issues i would say that it is a nice phone with goo capabilities.
the best phones I have ever had for signal strength have always been nokia brick style phones for those with low service.
Court: Out here in the hills and valleys of TN with my Razr or 8925 (Tilt) or Moto Q9h I would drop calls all the time in certain areas. With the 3Gs, I have only one area where I drop a call. From riding with friends and such with V or S they drop calls there too. Just the Bermuda triangle of no service.
Two weeks after I got my 3Gs I had a friend in the truck riding home from work. Both of us were talking to our significant others for most of the ride home. He had to call her back 3 times and I talked to mine all the way home. His is on Verizon. YRMV, and it really will but, IMHO my 3Gs iPhone is the best phone I've had since the cell providers went digital, many moons ago.
Hmm, not sure how missed this when it was first posted?
My Apps: TheWeatherChannel: free, has hourly, 36 hr and 10 day forecasts, moving radar, warnings etc. I can also watch my local video forecast on my phone,instead of waiting on the "8's on TV
Clinometer: was free when I got it, but now I think its $2-$3, well worth it goes from bubble level to angle finder with a "lock" feature for the times when the screen is out of view
Facebook
Navigon GPS: I got it when it was $69.99, I think it's $99.99 now. I like it. I just downloaded an update, but haven't had reason to use it since. I think it now has spoken street names. My old windshield mounted GPS was badly outdated, so I figured it was worth the $70 try, an update on my old GPS was $125. Really accurate positioning, but doesn't work in a jet plane like my old windshield mounted GPS did. yeah yeah, I know turn off all electronic devices while in the air.....whatever. You can "import" addresses from your phones contact list addresses so you don't have to enter them manually etc. You can save a bunch of favorite places etc. It also shows different restaurants, stores etc on the map screen when approaching an exit so you know what's there before you get there. It has little "golden arches" for McD's, burgers for BK, yellow tags for BestBuy etc. I was waiting on the TomTom App, but when it came out at $100 and you still had to buy the car/window mount (that wasn't available at the time) I went for the Navigon App. Happy that I did.
Pandora, nice
FedEx Mobile: I ship FedEx with my business and I can find/track my pkgs faster on my iphone than I can on my desktop computer.
White Pages: Just that a phone book on your phone. I think its free. Has a reverse directory for when you have a number and want to know who's it is, regular name directory, and business search.
Flashlight eBay Google Earth Choice Hotels
Mango and iFound, both about the same for finding restaurants, or other stores close by when traveling out of town.
Fandango: movie theater search and time listings
I've bought a few games such as Tetris, StoneLoops, Brick3D, Bejeweled and iBowl.
I've had mine for about a year. I have a leather belt holster for it, but I am considering one of the gel "sleeves" and keep it in my pocket. I also use the cling on heavy plastic film screen protectors. Best place to buy them is Wallyworld, you get 3 for around $5, instead of 3 for $20 from Apple.
Watch BestBuy, every now and then the iTunes cards go on sale you can get three $10 cards for $25
I'm going to buy some kind of iPhone mount and adapt it to my 1125R so I can have my GPS, iTunes and bluetooth comm. That's one of the reasons I choose the R over the CR, I can hide it out of the wind/weather a little easier.
My Blackberry has 95% of the functionality of an Iphone without any of the useless "bling" and at a quarter of the price.
Plus I get to push buttons instead of poking at a perfectly smooth screen.
In a few months when I'm ready for my upgrade I'll be getting the BB Storm. It's touchscreen but still has the "clicky" button feel instead of an unresponsive flat piece of plastic. I know it's a weird OCD thing to dislike about a phone, but I just can't stand no buttons thing.
Posted on Wednesday, November 18, 2009 - 05:47 am:
Hmm, no BWB app required and it run fast. Darn Froggy guess that burst you bubble ;+}.
Buttons, yeah they are nice until one decides not to cooperate, usually one of those pesky a or e keys. Of yeah, pudgy fingers don't play well with chicklet sized keys. I thought I needed tactile feedback too until I tried it for awhile.
Posted on Wednesday, November 18, 2009 - 12:57 pm:
I'm just a little miffed that the Droid gets version 2.0 which has Flash capability
No Flash just yet... suppose to be an update for that in Jan..
hey Phil, have you played with the Storm 2 yet? If you don't like not having real keys, you may not like the phantom click of the Storm 2. A friend has that phone and i had a HELLAVA time trying to use it..
My last phone came down to Storm 2 and Droid which has 3 ways to type.. So i went with Droid because of REAL keys...
Funny thing is, now i do almost all my typing on full keyboard....onscreen!! LOL.
IMHO, the onscreen typing is MUCH better on the Droid then the Storm
Posted on Wednesday, November 18, 2009 - 04:10 pm:
I have been with Verizon for 8 years. Back in the college days, I enlisted to join the army and terminated my cellular service with Cingular. They decided it would be a good idea to continue my service and a year later I finally had a collections company track me down in the Army.
Long story short, we almost went to court over the mess. I had the proof on paper I had terminated service. They refused to let the issue go so we hired a lawyer. Then the issue went away and my credit was ammended.
My wife enjoyed her iPhone. But I became tiresome of the additional charges to just USE the thing. So we went in a shopped both Verizon and AT&T. The only thing attractive that AT&T had was the iPhone. Verizon had better service plans and they gave us two free LG Dares. We both really like them and they even come with their own USB cable and driver so you can upload music/wall papers/ring tones/ etc all for free instead of buying through Verizon.
This past year I have been on TDY numerous times to numerous locations across the USA. Each time we go out for testing in remote locations. The techs and other contractors who have AT&T usually end up asking me if they can borrow my phone to make a quick call because they have no signal. If it were just a rare occurance I wouldn't have mentioned it. It has happened noteably the last 6 times I have been on TDY in remote sites. This could very well be the Dare as well. As one time we laid several phones next to one another and measured signal strengths during a break. Mine always had 1-2 more bars than any other phone on the table. Even with other Verizon phones.
I like the droid, but I will wait for it to get better. Besides... I kinda like my touch feedback from my Dare.
