I've come to a decision.

[Progenitor42]

This is getting difficult

The waiting is getting a bit unbearable. I simply cannot use my Storm2 to actually make phone calls without resorting to using the speakerphone anymore. The browser is super slow and loading a standard web page takes forever. I can't even load pics to my laptop without emailing them to myself. My BB has got to go!

Less than three weeks remaining...

By the way. I did call 611 and ask about upgrading early. No dice. I cannot even get a price match for the lower prices found on other 3rd party sites. I guess I may have to go to the mall and see the folks at the kiosk to see if they can help me get the lower price and get the phone in my hand faster. It's that or Amazon, Newegg, or something else.

It doesn't help that lately it seems that I'm having a technological breakdown. My laptop is nearly dead. My phone is even closer to the end.

One upgrade at a time...

Vista > 7

BB > DInc2

 

[SuzieFromPittsburgh]

Charge or Incredible2?

I posted this in another area, but this seems like a better place.

I am hoping to buy my first smartphone today or tomorrow, after over a month of reading, learning. I considered waiting a bit longer for some of the things that I hear are coming soon, but now with Verizon's unlimited data plans going extinct by July, I think I should get my new phone now.

Sticking with Verizon. I am considering HTC Incredible 2 and Charge.
The 4G thing doesn't matter, since it's a non-factor, really. I'm sure it will be a must-have in about 1- 1/2 yrs, so I'll wait until my next contract runs out for that.
I've heard HTC's system is better than Charge. I really like the Charge (since I won't get the hyped up phones of the near future, the Charge seems like a great phone to settle on) HTC Incredible 2 is a bit older now, and Charge is new. But I've heard even with that, HTC system (operating system, maybe?) is a better system.

Some additional info:
I'm not a gamer. I will add music. YouTube and other videos, yes. Full length movies, probably not. Perhaps live streaming of Big Brother this summer (they have a mobile app now.)

I'm hoping for some quick responses, as I'm itching to get the phone tonight or tomorrow. (almost 5pm EST now) My last contract ending May 11th, and I've been patient long enough!
(PS: for Big Brother fans, email me for a good spoiler blog. I don't know if I can post it here, and I don't want to break any rules.)
PS: Is this the correct place for this post, or should I post this in another area? Thanks!

Thanks in advance!
Suzie

 

[mgftp]

I hear ya guys, I am just on the fence of if I should crack and get the Dinc2 or wait for the SGS2. I have an original Storm and it's killing me.

 

[Blauman]

Seems like a good enough place to post this question. I was in a similar situation as you. I have yet to buy the Inc 2 but that will be happening this Saturday to be exact. Since you mentioned that 4G does not really matter to you, then get the Inc 2 over the Charge and save yourself some money. I personally like HTC phones over Samsung and I admit I like the Sense UI. The biggest thing now is locking in the unlimited data plan. And in the next 2 years 4G should be a much more mature tech. Another big reason I am not getting a 4G capable phone is battery life. I am not always near a source of power an dont want to have to carry around batteries just get through a full day of usage.

 

[Blauman]

I hear ya guys, I am just on the fence of if I should crack and get the Dinc2 or wait for the SGS2. I have an original Storm and it's killing me.

The gadget nerd in me says wait to get the SGS2 but seeing as how I do not have a smartphone at the moment, hence no unlimited plan I am buying the phone.

 

[SuzieFromPittsburgh]

^^^ actually, about the price.....

Sam's Club has both phones:

Charge - $179 (much better than Verizon's $300)
Inc 2 - Free!

Usually, when stores give phones a way fro free, it's an old phone they are trying to move, perhaps to make way for newer phones. Or, it's not a good phone. In this case, I think the Inc2 is still a good phone. My question is more about... is the older phone still better than the newer phone, comparing all key features (speed, smoothness, OS, reliability, other key features) or, is the newer phone better in those key area because it's newer? Also, I'd like to hear what people have to say about each of the phones, such as, things I may need to consider in a big way, and their own experiences and knowledge.

I'm really torn on this. All reviews say Charge is great! But I hear great things about HTC too, but it's older. Could the older phone still be better than a newer phone?

I have the Envy 2 - and as mentioned above, I've never had a smartphone.
Thanks!

 

[Vudumedic]

OK, coming from a original incredible and being pushed onto the Inc 2 due to insurance replacement. Here's what I can tell you the sense user interface on the HTC phone is going to make it much easier for your transition. You will love the way it brings everything together. The stability in the Inc 2 is based off about 9 months of nightmares on the original Inc. So that is a major plus. The charge I don't know much about the charge. The downside is there isn't permanent root access for the Inc 2 but it seems as though it is coming. Eventually you will want to root almost certainly just for the extra access it gives. The updates will come and the Inc 2 will get gingerbread for sure and should even, if HTC stays true to form, make ice cream sandwich plus it should probably get an unlocked boot loader which will make root even easier and I don't think Samsung has any plans to unlock theirs. I could be mistaken on that however. The charge is 4g and that could be goood or bad. It'll be fast but there are still a lot of issues with it and that can make for headaches. The battery issues the original Inc had have been fixed in the new one. In the end I am going to have to say go to the store play with them both for a few minutes and buy the one you like more with them in your hand.

 

[tack]

^^^ actually, about the price.....

Sam's Club has both phones:

Charge - $179 (much better than Verizon's $300)
Inc 2 - Free!

Usually, when stores give phones a way fro free, it's an old phone they are trying to move, perhaps to make way for newer phones. Or, it's not a good phone. In this case, I think the Inc2 is still a good phone. My question is more about... is the older phone still better than the newer phone, comparing all key features (speed, smoothness, OS, reliability, other key features) or, is the newer phone better in those key area because it's newer? Also, I'd like to hear what people have to say about each of the phones, such as, things I may need to consider in a big way, and their own experiences and knowledge.

I'm really torn on this. All reviews say Charge is great! But I hear great things about HTC too, but it's older. Could the older phone still be better than a newer phone?

I have the Envy 2 - and as mentioned above, I've never had a smartphone.
Thanks!

It is like 30 to 45 days older? lol

 

[SuzieFromPittsburgh]

Update...
Just bought inc2 a few hrs ago. Using it now for this message.
Price was right with my Verizon credit and $50 rebate... About $100 total. Also got package with blue tooth, car charge, and case for extra $60. Much to learn. LOL. Info and feedback from this forum helped.
More later.
Suzie

 

[valorian]

Update...
Just bought inc2 a few hrs ago. Using it now for this message.
Price was right with my Verizon credit and $50 rebate... About $100 total. Also got package with blue tooth, car charge, and case for extra $60. Much to learn. LOL. Info and feedback from this forum helped.
More later.
Suzie

Glad to hear. I think you will be pleased with your choice. We just upgraded my wife from an Ally to the Inc2 last nite. So far she is loving it.

 

[SuzieFromPittsburgh]

ok, back home... (long, busy day!)

I went with Inc2, even though it's not 4G, and even thought the Charge has a beautiful display!
But I think I liked the fact that the HTC may be a "best kept secret" kind of thing, low key excellence. They have a tagline that says "quietly brilliant" I got that impression from the info I gathered along the way, so that seemed to be perfectly accurate. I'll take quiet excellence over loud bragging every time. (not that Charge was bragging, but it was getting a lot of attention, and rightly so, but that causes excellence like HTC to be "quietly brilliant".)

I'm part way thru my transition with phones/service, etc.
I have 2 cell phones, 2 diff. numbers - one for personal use, one for home-based party biz.
I have used a family plan for these phones up to now. But I have a plan for something different now.
Oddly enough, I think some weird things have ultimately worked out for the best - read on.

At one point close to a year ago, I put one of my phones on "suspension" and only kept the biz phone active, to save on the bill for a while. Up till today, I thought my 2 year contract was fullfilled on May 11th. Today, I found out the phone that was active fullfilled contract in May, the suspended phone (personal phone) still had more time left to fullfil contract, so it hasn't expired yet - it will expire on July 12th.

What I did today was "upgrade & renew" my two phones, still under the family plan for now. My personal phone is the new Inc2. I plan to port my biz number to Google Voice, forward that to my Inc2, change my voice plan to single, unlimited use before July 7th, and be grandfathered on this plan and locked in for the next 2 years. I keep my biz #, have 1 phone, and the smartphone can handle everything I need.

So, while I got the new phone today, I still have to port my biz # and officially change my voice plan before July 7th. I'll be doing all of that ASAP, and it should be complete before the end of next week. (I believe it takes about 3 days for the porting to be complete)

Now the work (and the fun!) begins, trying to learn about what I have, set up emails, get some apps, learning how to use it, etc.

Really, I want to thank everyone here, just for being here! I've been lurking for a few months, reading, learning. Not just here, but other places too. I've been patiently doing my homework. The changing of the data plans info made me make a move now, or I might still be waiting for the Bionic! But the info I gained here, from the staffers, to all of the posts, helped me a great deal. This is the only forum I joined and made a post, as I was close to a decision.

I hope this all helps someone else too.
If it's ok, I'll post an update or two as I learn more, in case that may be helpful as well.
Suzie

 

[mgftp]

Update...
Just bought inc2 a few hrs ago. Using it now for this message.
Price was right with my Verizon credit and $50 rebate... About $100 total. Also got package with blue tooth, car charge, and case for extra $60. Much to learn. LOL. Info and feedback from this forum helped.
More later.
Suzie

50$ rebate?

 

[SuzieFromPittsburgh]

Verizon store price for Inc2 was $199. Then the store had a $50 rebate (mail in), and I had a $50 upgrade credit. So my total (after I get a $50 gift card from Verizon) is $99.
The Samsung "Charge" was $299, no rebate, so with my $50 credit it would have been $249.
The phones are so similar, and I believe the price difference was for the 4G selling point, which isn't a big factor at this point, realistically. I think in another 1 yr - 1 1/2 yrs from now, 4G will be great, but not now. So I will be close to upgrading again by then.
I think I got a great phone for $99.

I could have gone to WalMart or someplace else for about the same store price, but I wouldn't have gotten my $50 upgrade credit from anyone other than Verizon.
WalMart/Sams' Club has Inc2 for FREE when you order it online. I considered that. But I'm ok with paying $99 and having it NOW! But, for those who are interested, free is good too!

Edit update: I forgot to mention that the Inc2 is free for new contracts, not existing/upgrading. (and only online, as I already mentioned)
Suzie

 

[SuzieFromPittsburgh]

I thought I'd post an update. I see there may be other threads for people like me, who just got this phone, so I may share in those threads now.

So far, so good, but I had a little glitch that cost me hours. I couldn't get Yahoo mail to work right. I could send, but not receive mail. I spent about 1 1/2 hrs on the phone between Level 1 and Level 2 techs and it was still not resolved. The last tech wanted to re-set to factory defaults. I didn't have a lot on hee yet, but I didn't want to loose all the time & work I invested in tweaks, so I said no, I'd take it to the store. At that point, if things continued to not go welll, I would have seen this as an omen, and I was ready to try another phone. But there was one particular guy at the store who had this same problem and knew what to do, and hooked it all up in about 1 min. I think he added an app.

My other 2 things that I noticed pretty qwuickly as a "minus" was:
1. The volume up/down rocker bar is in a bad place, IMO. It si in the place that my thumb wants to naturally go to hold the phone. I'm trying to find a new way to hold the phone, a new place for my thumb.
2. This may be silly, but I miss buttons that I can click. like keyboard buttons that work mechanically. It's partly the sound, but it's mostly the feeling on pushing a button.

These 2 things are not enough to make me give up the phone, I'm just noting these as things I noticed quickly.

I've been reading up on the battery life and "training" the battery by draining, then fully charge, repeat several times for a new battery. Yesterday, after a full charge, I unplugged at 10am, and it went to very low (red, and getting message to charge) after about 27 hrs with minimial use. I'll post more about this in the battery thread. But at least I know I can get thru a work day with no problems. This is excellent, since I've heard of all the problems of the recent past phones and short battery life.

I'm just learning how to turn the phone sideways for a larger keyboard for texting - that is helping!
(I keep forgeting I can do that, turn it sideways!)

Suzie

 

[zlee67]

How did you get yahoo to work? My yahoo email stopped working on the mail app so I had to download the yahoo mail app.

 

[Progenitor42]

So, I just got back from a VZW "store", it was actually a kiosk in the local mall, where I asked many questions regarding the upcoming switch to tiered data plans. Turns out if I upgrade on the 10th when it comes available I will not be able to retain the unlimited plan because the BlackBerry unlimited data plan is different than the Android unlimited. :-\ I know. I'm confused too. However, the rep said I could actually upgrade a week early on the 3rd and keep the unlimited data plan.

While there I was looking at both the 3G DInc2 and the 4G Tbolt. I have to say I was actually pulled toward the Tbolt. Sorry, I know I said I have made a decision and was going to get the DInc2 but with the 4G now in my area and the speed comparisons I made at the store I'm now back in a quandary as to which to buy.

Two years of unlimited 4G data is simply too difficult to resist. While I typically average well less than 1G of data usage per month you have to realize I'm living with a super slow limited BlackBerry Storm2. The Thunderbolt simply blows it away. Now if I can get past the size difference I might be able to pull the trigger.

I'll let you all know what happens after the holiday.

 

[SuzieFromPittsburgh]

How did you get yahoo to work? My yahoo email stopped working on the mail app so I had to download the yahoo mail app.

I'll have to ask the tech guy at the Verizon store that got my Yahoo set up. There was just this one guy who heard what I needed and knew what to do, took my phone, and then I think he installed something and now it works. It's user-friendly - it looks much like the Yahoo I use online, where I can see the list of folders I made too. I can see one page for inbox, folders, etc, then flip to a side page for my mail. But, I also think I still have the first one I tried to install, because I think I have 2 different notification icons that appear when I have new email.

I'm still learning, tweaking, and suspect I will be for quite a while. I am attending a one-hour class they have at the store tomorrow (Sunday) after the store closes.

I had all my pics transferred from one phone to other using an SD card, and I could see all of my pics in the "gallery" app for a while (days), then all of a sudden, they are all gone, and I don't know why. And I don't know what to do now. So I'm going to the store to ask a tech about this, and one more thing... today, I reactivated my old Envy2 (deactivate new DInc2 temporarily) to be able to get some texts and some photos from there, then I will re-activate DInc2 again in a few hrs.

I had 2 phones, one for personal, one for home-based biz. I did port my biz number to Google Voice, and have that forwarded to my personal number, assigned it a special name and ringtone, so that I can tell which calls are coming in for the biz. Now I can have just 1 phone with effectively 2 phone numbers, and use a single voice plan of unlimeted everything, rather than have to have a family plan for two phones.

This has been a great move for me!

I'll update with Yahoo info soon.

UPDATE: RE: Yahoo email..... There are 2 apps already loaded on the phone (DInc2): one that says "mail" and one that says "Yahoo mail" I think I set the "mail" settings to yahoo in the beginning. Then, when I had problems with it, the guy at the store set up the "Yahoo mail" from the app that was already there. Then, I guess the first one started working ok, because every time I got mail to that one account, I got 2 notifications, one from each of the mail set-ups. Today at class, the "teacher" removed one (the generic "mail"one) and kept the Yahoo email app. The yahoo mail app looks like the version we use from home computer, very user friendly. I'm not sure how or why the original. generic "mail" app didn't work, then worked later, so I couldn't answer any questions about how to get it to work. That all happened when I was very new to all of this and a lot of changes were happening, so I couldn't expalin any of it! (still new, I've only had it for a week now!)
Hope that helps!

 

[SuzieFromPittsburgh]

So, I just got back from a VZW "store", it was actually a kiosk in the local mall, where I asked many questions regarding the upcoming switch to tiered data plans. Turns out if I upgrade on the 10th when it comes available I will not be able to retain the unlimited plan because the BlackBerry unlimited data plan is different than the Android unlimited. :-\ I know. I'm confused too. However, the rep said I could actually upgrade a week early on the 3rd and keep the unlimited data plan.

While there I was looking at both the 3G DInc2 and the 4G Tbolt. I have to say I was actually pulled toward the Tbolt. Sorry, I know I said I have made a decision and was going to get the DInc2 but with the 4G now in my area and the speed comparisons I made at the store I'm now back in a quandary as to which to buy.

Two years of unlimited 4G data is simply too difficult to resist. While I typically average well less than 1G of data usage per month you have to realize I'm living with a super slow limited BlackBerry Storm2. The Thunderbolt simply blows it away. Now if I can get past the size difference I might be able to pull the trigger.

I'll let you all know what happens after the holiday.

Have you viewed other threads in this forum about this? I noticed a thread called "DInc2 over TBolt", but there is likely other threads with further info too.
I'm not trying to sway your choice - to each his own - but while you are gathering info, I wanted to point out these other sources. Like many have said, I also didn't consider the TBolt for much the same reasons. IMHO, TBolt was one of the first new phones (or maybe THE first) to come out in the Spring, and I think it may not have been well thought out, maybe rushed out too soon, because the battery life is aweful, from what I've read in all reviews from every source. Of course, most bought the extended life battery, which adds to over all cost. At first glance, I liked the features, until I read reviews from multiple sources. I never considered after that. It seems the phones that came out a little later may have corrected some of the issues of earlier release phones.

RE: 4G - If I understand correctly, even if it is available in your area, it may not really be a fully realized feature for about 1 - 1 1/2 yrs from now, which is about time for a new contract anyway, so I didn't put much weight in the 4G feature for this time around. When I checked Verizon's website and checked if 4G was avail in my area, the answer came back "yes", but as I talked with others in this area, including Verizon sales reps, they agreed with what I said above - that's it's not a serious thing now, but will be in another 1 - 1/2 yrs from now. Plus, in many cases, the 4G phones keeps searching for 4G, and that drains the battery.

You mentioned how you liked the TBolt after seeing it a kiosk. The skeptic in me wonders how much influence was the sales pitch, if salespeople are trying to sell the TBolt, as if, maybe they have an incentive to push that phone? I even wonder if they can set it up so that the one they want to sell runs faster, looks better, etc. I would go by what customer reviews, and reviews from multiple, reputable sources say before a salesperson. That's just skeptical me!
Good Luck!

 

[Progenitor42]

This weekend solidified my situation. I was weighing the pros/cons regarding each phone and I'm even more convinced the Incredible 2 is the phone for me. What clinched it was the size, initial cost, and battery life. I'm not that interested in shelling out more money for an extended or extra battery just so I can get through a full day's use. I'm back on board with the Dinc2. Sunday's the day!

 

[experiment 626]

So, I just got back from a VZW "store", it was actually a kiosk in the local mall, where I asked many questions regarding the upcoming switch to tiered data plans. Turns out if I upgrade on the 10th when it comes available I will not be able to retain the unlimited plan because the BlackBerry unlimited data plan is different than the Android unlimited. :-\ I know. I'm confused too. However, the rep said I could actually upgrade a week early on the 3rd and keep the unlimited data plan..

I'm in a similar position(using a BB 8330) but I've read in several places that Verizon is currently restructuring all their smartphone data plans to be under one code.So when 7/7 comes no matter which smartphone you're using(BB,iPhone,WP7,Palm,Android) you'll be grandfathered in under a "Unlimited Smartphone Data Plan".After 7/7 new customers and current non-smartphone VZW users will only be able to choose one of the "Tiered Data for Smartphones" plans. So the most important thing is be on a smartphone,any smartphone,before 7/7! The only dislaimer I have to say about this advice is that Verizon has not OFFICIALLY announced and explained their new data plan policies yet but I'm passing on what responsible insiders have posted.