Hey everybody, just joined the forum to ask some advice.
Basically, I got my first smartphone almost two years ago. It was a Droid 2 Global which I received as a gift. It was part of an unlimited talk/text/data family plan on Verizon. While I loved the phone, a few months back it bought the farm. Fortunately, it was a few weeks after my contract expired so I checked out the phones that Verizon had available. I ended up settling on the Samsung Galaxy Nexus for a variety of reasons, primarily the excellent reviews from reputable sources such as Cnet, and an attractive price of about $50 on Amazon.com. As a point of reference, this was back in September.
Needless to say, going from the Droid 2 running Android Gingerbread with Motoblur to the GNex with the bone-stock Ice Cream Sandwich was incredible, and overwhelming. A little bit too overwhelming, in fact. While it was an excellent device, some of the features, particularly just the size of it (I've got pretty large hands and all, but a 4.65" AMOLED display is a pretty daunting prospect for one-handed use.) were a bit off putting at first, and my concern about becoming contractually obligated to a phone I was unhappy with lead me to return it before the 2-week grace period expired. I figured I'd switch back to my brother's old Droid 2, and see what phones came out in the next couple of months.
And that brings us to where I am today. Rocking a janky Droid 2 with a busted touchscreen and a giant skull sticker on the back, and scoping out the available phones. I've gotten over my hangups about large phone sizes, and accepted that that's just one aspect of the current generation of mobile technology, and have definitely come around to seeing the appeal of the Nexus line of devices, and the pure Google experience they offer. The Galaxy Nexus is available for like, a penny on Amazon which is an attractive price and the Nexus 4 has just been released so those are really the two phones I'm interested in.
The issue with the GNex, of course, is that now it's 2 months older and 2 months more out of date than it was when I was initially considering it, and so my concerns about being contracted to an out-of-date phone are even more real now. I mean, does it really make sense to buy the previous model of something when the next iteration is already out?
On the other hand, the Nexus 4 is not currently available on Verizon, so I'd have to leave my family plan to get it. Given the price that I'm paying right now, I think buying the unlocked Nexus and going to another carrier such as T-Mobile will cost me more in the long run than just sticking with Verizon. Verizon also has the best service in my area (north-eastern United States) by a pretty generous margin.
If the Nexus 4 was potentially going to become available to Verizon customers in the next couple of months, I'd definitely consider waiting around for it, but it seems like kind of a gamble.
So I guess my question boils down to: What are the odds that an LTE version of he Nexus 4 is going to come to Verizon? And is the Gnex a good enough phone that I should consider contracting myself to it for the foreseeable future, given the subsidized price currently available, even considering it's age? If the answer to both of these is no, is there another phone/option I should consider?
Thanks so much for reading this and helping me out, it seems like a great community you've got going here. I really look forward to your responses.
EDIT: Proofread, fixed a couple of typos.
Basically, I got my first smartphone almost two years ago. It was a Droid 2 Global which I received as a gift. It was part of an unlimited talk/text/data family plan on Verizon. While I loved the phone, a few months back it bought the farm. Fortunately, it was a few weeks after my contract expired so I checked out the phones that Verizon had available. I ended up settling on the Samsung Galaxy Nexus for a variety of reasons, primarily the excellent reviews from reputable sources such as Cnet, and an attractive price of about $50 on Amazon.com. As a point of reference, this was back in September.
Needless to say, going from the Droid 2 running Android Gingerbread with Motoblur to the GNex with the bone-stock Ice Cream Sandwich was incredible, and overwhelming. A little bit too overwhelming, in fact. While it was an excellent device, some of the features, particularly just the size of it (I've got pretty large hands and all, but a 4.65" AMOLED display is a pretty daunting prospect for one-handed use.) were a bit off putting at first, and my concern about becoming contractually obligated to a phone I was unhappy with lead me to return it before the 2-week grace period expired. I figured I'd switch back to my brother's old Droid 2, and see what phones came out in the next couple of months.
And that brings us to where I am today. Rocking a janky Droid 2 with a busted touchscreen and a giant skull sticker on the back, and scoping out the available phones. I've gotten over my hangups about large phone sizes, and accepted that that's just one aspect of the current generation of mobile technology, and have definitely come around to seeing the appeal of the Nexus line of devices, and the pure Google experience they offer. The Galaxy Nexus is available for like, a penny on Amazon which is an attractive price and the Nexus 4 has just been released so those are really the two phones I'm interested in.
The issue with the GNex, of course, is that now it's 2 months older and 2 months more out of date than it was when I was initially considering it, and so my concerns about being contracted to an out-of-date phone are even more real now. I mean, does it really make sense to buy the previous model of something when the next iteration is already out?
On the other hand, the Nexus 4 is not currently available on Verizon, so I'd have to leave my family plan to get it. Given the price that I'm paying right now, I think buying the unlocked Nexus and going to another carrier such as T-Mobile will cost me more in the long run than just sticking with Verizon. Verizon also has the best service in my area (north-eastern United States) by a pretty generous margin.
If the Nexus 4 was potentially going to become available to Verizon customers in the next couple of months, I'd definitely consider waiting around for it, but it seems like kind of a gamble.
So I guess my question boils down to: What are the odds that an LTE version of he Nexus 4 is going to come to Verizon? And is the Gnex a good enough phone that I should consider contracting myself to it for the foreseeable future, given the subsidized price currently available, even considering it's age? If the answer to both of these is no, is there another phone/option I should consider?
Thanks so much for reading this and helping me out, it seems like a great community you've got going here. I really look forward to your responses.
EDIT: Proofread, fixed a couple of typos.
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