Motorola Droid

[Nightfall]

I've started mucking about with the android SDK.  Mmm.. Java.

I've got a few plans of things I want to write. 

I want a Droid, bad, because of this. In fact, over spring break I might get the SDK too, and start messing around, even without the phone.

Wife's Sprint contract doesn't expire for several months, though, so no Droid for me anytime soon.

[Nightfall]

Ended up costing me $49 for the hardware, plus $63/month for the plan. 

$63 a month for the plan? I thought the cheapest talk-only plan was $40 a month, plus $30 for data plan. Do you get super-secret APS mod discounts or something? 

[erictank]

$63 a month for the plan? I thought the cheapest talk-only plan was $40 a month, plus $30 for data plan. Do you get super-secret APS mod discounts or something? 

Lotta people get discounts through their employers - I get 20% off my voice and data plans.  Perhaps he gets something similar?

My phone cost $100, 3 months ago, though.    Bummer.

Congrats on the new smartphone, Nick - I'm sure you'll enjoy it.

[BryanP]

I really wanted a Droid as well, but VZ won't sell a smartphone without a data plan.  Oh well.

Chris

Neither will Sprint (I have a Palm Pre with them.)  I guess they figure a smartphone without a data plan is pretty useless.

Also, they're expensive.  The data plan helps them subsidize the cost.

[Nick1911]

$63 a month for the plan? I thought the cheapest talk-only plan was $40 a month, plus $30 for data plan. Do you get super-secret APS mod discounts or something? 

Here's the breakdown.

Nationwide 450 Talk
$39.99 - (15% Employer discount) = $33.99

Unlimited personal data plan
$29.99 - (20% Employer discount) = $23.99

250 Text messages
$5

33.99+23.99+5 = $62.98 pre tax.

[Nightfall]

Employer discount

Ah, didn't think of that. Wish I could get a student discount, but it doesn't look likely. Oh well, maybe once I'm at EWU instead of a community college.

[Balog]

What carrier is that with Nick? Good pricing.

[Nick1911]

What carrier is that with Nick? Good pricing.

Verizon Wireless.

I've only ever had sprint before, but my wife has Verizon and gets better coverage around here, it seems.

You'd think living in the city where sprint is headquartered, I wouldn't have problems with dropped calls. 

[sanglant]

Ah, didn't think of that. Wish I could get a student discount, but it doesn't look likely. Oh well, maybe once I'm at EWU instead of a community college.

might pay to check.

CELL PHONE SERVICE DISCOUNT – Community College of Philadelphia employees can
receive up to an 18% discount on monthly cell phone service with Verizon, 15% with
Sprint/Nextel, 15% with AT&T, and 10% with T-Mobile. For more information contact the
Benefits Office.

go go gadget google.

[Snowdog]

I was perfectly happy with my simple Katana LX, but my wife and I switched over from Sprint to Verizon (20% discount for hospital employees).  Through Sam's Club, my wife was able to get 2 Droid Eris for something crazy, like $50 for both with contract.  

I must say I love the thing, as does my wife.  I just watched an episode of Star Trek a few minutes ago. Before that, I downloaded a English/Spanish medical-terms application that will speak in Spanish (this after downloading a "fart" app that allows me to choose from dozens of different farts for my phone to chirp).  All free, of course.  Oh the fun/horror!

HTC sure does makes some slick phones.

[mtnbkr]

Neither will Sprint (I have a Palm Pre with them.)  I guess they figure a smartphone without a data plan is pretty useless.

Also, they're expensive.  The data plan helps them subsidize the cost.

I've owned a smartphone for the past 5 years and haven't had a data plan.  These weren't even phones with wifi.  I found them quite useful.  Having Wifi would be that much better.  I simply don't feel the need to pay the fees they want to charge for 3g based plan (2.5g when I got my first one).

Oh well, I got an Ipod Touch instead.  Does everything I need and isn't tied to a data plan.  When my Palm Centro is replaced, it will be with a cheap phone. 

Chris

[BrokenPaw]

250 Text messages
$5

Nick, word to the wise:  You may wish to up your text-message limit.

Having a Droid completely changed the way I thought about text messages; on my previous phone, they were a PITA to send, and it had really limited capacity to store them, but deleting them was an exercise in byzantine numeric menus, so I never sent any, and hated receiving them.

The Droid's native SMS app threads your texts for you, so it's like having a conversation (it's more like IM than SMS, really), and with the hard keyboard (or the soft keyboard + swype) sending them is trivially easy.  Unless you pay attention, it's easier than you might think to blow through that 250 in a month.

One way to avoid that is to use an IM client on the phone (Google Talk is native, but there are AIM and (presumably; I don't use it) YIM clients as well) instead of SMS; IM uses your dataplan, not SMS, so it's unlimited. 

-BP

[AZRedhawk44]

Does the droid phone have a master-side USB port on it?

Most phones, the USB port is a slave-side port for interfacing with a computer.

I'm itching for a phone that I can plug USB accessories INTO it.

(Or, is my understanding of USB flawed, and the shape of the port has no bearing on potential master/slave device status...?)

[Brad Johnson]

'Nuther vote for upping your text limit.  Like BP I didn't text on the old phone unless I had to because it was so horribly inconvenient, yet I still managed to rack up 175-200 per month.  On the new phone, an LG EnV with a "real" keypad, I began texting with abandon.  Now I regularly hit the 450-500 mark.

Brad

[Nick1911]

That's pretty interesting, BrokenPaw.

On verizon, how do you check the status of your minutes/text messages?

[CNYCacher]

The Droid's native SMS app threads your texts for you, so it's like having a conversation (it's more like IM than SMS, really), and with the hard keyboard (or the soft keyboard + swype) sending them is trivially easy.  Unless you pay attention, it's easier than you might think to blow through that 250 in a month.

It's kinda like that on the Pre, except with pre's Synergy contact system.  your conversations to the same person across multiple channels all get threaded together.  You choose if you are going to send the message via text, IM, Gtalk, whatever via a dropdown.

[Nick1911]

Wonder if I can convince it to use my google voice account to send text messages?   

That would be free, as it would be data over the net.

[BrokenPaw]

Wonder if I can convince it to use my google voice account to send text messages?   

I don't know about Google Voice, but you can use Google Talk, which is their IM service.  That'll go over the data link for free.

On verizon, how do you check the status of your minutes/text messages?

Can't help you there; between me, BrokenMa, and associated urchinry (including a teenage girl), we opted for the unlimited-texting family plan.  So if we ever run out, we have bigger problems.

Does the droid phone have a master-side USB port on it?

Not by default.  However, there is a boot-time hack that allows one to put the Droid into USB host mode (without needing to root the phone, IIRC).  It's not fully fleshed out, yet, but they're making progress on turning it into an actual useful hack.

[Vodka7]

I check my Verizon text usage through their website, but I'm pretty sure you can call #TXT to find out.  And yeah, I went from maybe 80 texts a month on a dumbphone to 800-1000/mo on a smartphone.  Especially if a friend or loved one has a smartphone, the IM-type threaded messaging can make it pretty easy to blow through 30 texts on a single conversation.

I've been sticking with my BlackBerry for now, but I've come to really, really hate the web browser.  I'll be switching to a Droid or Nexus One when my new every two hits later this year.  Well, hopefully I'll be switching to something faster than both with a hardware keyboard

[Balog]

I have a blackberry from work. Good amount of minutes, unlimited data, but no text plan. They encourage us to use it as a private phone, and I could theoretically just pay for a texting addition and have an almost free smartphone. Problem is, company can request logs of all texts sent, apparently. Only thing keeping me from ditching my current cell, honestly. Be nice to save that money every month.

[RaspberrySurprise]

I think my record for one month is around 4000 texts sent.

[Nick1911]

So, I've had this droid for a while now... and I LOVE IT.

Just FYI. 

[BrokenPaw]

So, I've had this droid for a while now... and I LOVE IT.

Told you.   

[Nick1911]

Told you.   

That you did.  I'm not sure how I can go without this thing ever again!

I looked at my plan utilization.  2497 minutes, 147 megs this month.

Man, I'm glad I opted for the unlimited data plan when all the stuff started coming unglued in my personal life.  Costs more, but for $92/month after taxes and fees... I can deal with it.

[taurusowner]

My MyTouch, which also runs Android, was the first phone I've own where I got a data plan with it.  Now I can't imagine having one without it.  Having my email automatically update on my phone, Facebook statuses, the weather graphic on my home-screen updating in real time, etc.  Not to mention having a true web browser (not the crappy mobile internet of a few years ago) but real web browser that can show pages completely and formatted just like on a computer.  Adobe is even releasing Flash for Android in a few months, something unheard of on any mobile device until now.