So I bought an iphone today while waiting for the Bolt to be released

[durangojim#AC]

I had to satiate my tech fix, so I went out and bought an iphone from BB today. I bought the OG Droid on day 1, and the DINC when it was released. I really like the efficiency of the Android OS and sense, and have been looking forward to the Bolt, but thought I'd give the iOS thing a try after I bought my wife an iphone last week on VZW.

First thing I noticed: I was the only one at Best Buy at 8:30am, they told me they had sold a few iphones but not that many, might be because they were charging a $100 premium over what Apple sells the phone off contract for at Apple stores ($699 vs $599 for a 16GB version). I then went over to VZW to get a case because I get a 25% discount there on accessories. There were more people in the store but it was not busy by any means. I did see quite a few people switch from AT&T who owned iphones and BBs. The reason I bring this up is because I think the main rush or demand was last week, with all the current subscribers picking up the phone they've lusted for already. This might bode well for the Bolt because if demand isn't as great for the iphone as they thought it would be, they might try to get the Bolt out to market sooner.

Some quick observations about the iphone from a non-fanboy: The hardware is excellent and feels like a fine watch with extremely tight tolerances. The retina display is superior to any screen I've seen in the past including super amoled and slcd. It makes my DINC feel cheap somehow. I miss not typing my gmail account it and having everything automatically pop up. There are much more steps to accomplish the same thing on iOS compared to Android. I used a widget for my calendar on Android, on iOS I have to go into the App, it's a very pop in/pop out type of experience.
I really like skype and facetime. I'm a physician who works pretty long hours at times, and it's really nice to see and talk to my kids rather than just on the phone. I miss the android google maps app. Games are superior on the iphone as is the camera (I own a Canon 5D Mark II so I know a little about photography). The vibrate is weaker on the iphone.

I'll probably wind up switching to the bolt once it's released because I'm in a LTE area, but I'll play around with the iphone to give it a fair shot until then.

 

[sandoff]

Im doing the same thing today when i get to work

 

[pnicho]

I will probably be doing this as well. I figured I might as well play with it since I enjoyed the iphone 3g when I was with AT&T except for the no signal and dropped calls. I don't care for their new form factor though at all. And I could never go back to their os...Android is way too superior at this point.

 

[JManangan]

Any of you guys planning on utilizing the new BB buy-back program? I wanna jump ship to Verizon already (from att) was thinking of just getting the DroidX to hold me over till the Bolt comes around...

 

[irishleo]

Me too. There really is no reason not to. We can return the IPhone with no penalty with the 30 day window. I have never owned anything Apple so this helped a lot. Please post more about your thoughts when you can

 

[durangojim#AC]

Any of you guys planning on utilizing the new BB buy-back program? I wanna jump ship to Verizon already (from att) was thinking of just getting the DroidX to hold me over till the Bolt comes around...

Me too. There really is no reason not to. We can return the IPhone with no penalty with the 30 day window. I have never owned anything Apple so this helped a lot. Please post more about your thoughts when you can

I bought it at BB because they are offering the buyback program free right now. BB did say that they would only allow returns within 14 days because that's what VZW is doing, but I think we could get around that because Apple allows 30 day returns especially if you're buying off contract.

 

[66dude]

I would buy a "gateway" smartphone to satisfy my techie fix, but several potential roadblocks/questions exist:

1) I have a $30 NE2 credit I want to use. This would most likely apply to whatever phone I buy before the TB.
2) Do I have to pay any fees for the next phone, and re-pay them for the TB?
3) Would returning the next phone and getting the TB re-start the 2-year contract clock?
4) I don't know what the pricing for the data plan will be once the TB comes out. There is a small chance that the $30 plan would be different if I were to return the next phone and get the TB.

I'll just wait it out until it is somewhat official from VZW.

 

[JeromeTurner5]

This is why verizon is stupid. If the Tbolt was out people wouldn't be doing this. I'm thinking about picking up and Iphone next week, just to play with... Then return it for the Tbolt. If the Tbolt was out, I woudn't even consider doing that. I just get my thunderbolt.

 

[htowngator]

Any of you guys planning on utilizing the new BB buy-back program? I wanna jump ship to Verizon already (from att) was thinking of just getting the DroidX to hold me over till the Bolt comes around...

IMO the buy back program is if you don't want to spend the effort using eBay. They will give you $325 back for your Bolt (50% off retail) towards another phone of retail price in their store. BB regularly marks up retail higher than a VZW store on these phones so you're losing money there too. Not to mention if you sold your Bolt in two months for the Bionic (the example they gave me) that you'd likely get $400-$500 easy on eBay. It really all depends if you want convenience or not. Personally I don't plan on using the BBP and would just sell on eBay instead.

 

[Jude526]

There is no more 30 day window unless they are giving it to the iphone specifically. Verizon has returned to the 14 day trial and that began Jan 16th. If the Verizon reps are not telling customers this, there are going to be very many irritated people. Customer Care is certainly telling customers about this.

 

[Mustang7303]

This this news here, about stores not being sold out this late in the day, I decided to go ahead and get the iPhone for my wife now. I had to call into the customer service department, get transfered around a few times, wait on hold for 20 minutes but they finally got my online order cancelled. I then went over to the local store and was out with the new iPhone in about 15 minutes.

So she won the race for who gets their new phone first, but I am still very hopeful BB will have the TB on Monday.

 

[bmcclure937]

No point in dealing with the iPOS for 14 days... why take a step back from Android and deal with transferring contacts and all that headache just because you are not patient enough to wait until 2/24

 

[durangojim#AC]

No point in dealing with the iPOS for 14 days... why take a step back from Android and deal with transferring contacts and all that headache just because you are not patient enough to wait until 2/24

Spoken like a true fanboi. No headaches here, and I have enough disposable income to play with a new toy.

 

[AlpineM3#AC]

So everybody in here is getting the TBolt right?

At least we can all agree on one thing, it looks to be an amazing phone, but this waiting game is ridiculous. Soo bad its making people go buy iPhone's........that's pretty bad

Sent from my ADR6300 using Tapatalk

 

[Joelist]

IMO the buy back program is if you don't want to spend the effort using eBay. They will give you $325 back for your Bolt (50% off retail) towards another phone of retail price in their store. BB regularly marks up retail higher than a VZW store on these phones so you're losing money there too. Not to mention if you sold your Bolt in two months for the Bionic (the example they gave me) that you'd likely get $400-$500 easy on eBay. It really all depends if you want convenience or not. Personally I don't plan on using the BBP and would just sell on eBay instead.

This is not an accurate description of how the BB buy back program works.

Best Buy buys back based on the retail price of the phone, and pays with a Best Buy Gift Card. BB Gift Cards are good forever and don't necessarily have to go towards a new phone, you use them on whatever you like. And you are not required to buy at retail price.

 

[Target#AC]

Unfortunately, it looks like I'll be getting an iphone for little under 2 weeks as well. We've been on a family plan with att that had to wait for my line to hit 2 years on Feb 5. I was getting them to put off moving to Verizon until the TBolt came out. I've been suffering with a 7 year old Nokia, and my mom's phone is starting to bug, so if we switch this weekend, I'll get to try out an iphone for a bit and have to eat the $35 restocking fee for the TBolt just before the 2 weeks return is up. Happy now, Steve Jobs?

 

[rigorx]

Thank you to the OP for the few paragraphs of a non-biased point of view on Apple's phone.

 

[irishleo]

WTF!! Ok, I just got home from BB. I was going to go ahead and get 2 32gb Iphones just for SG's. It would at least give me something to do for the next few weeks until the TB comes out. We are getting ready to complete the deal, until this came up. We began talking about GPS, due to my job my wife and I use it pretty much on a daily basis. The manager of BB told me that you CAN NOT use GPS (considered data) and recieve phone calls at the same time!!!! You have to chose one or the other. So if I answer an incoming call, it kicks me off GPS/Nav!! Like I have stated before, I have never owned an Iphone before. He told me that you could do it with AT&T, but not Verizon!! Are you frick'n kidding me! A TOTAL deal breaker for us. Can anyone confirm this that owns one right now please? That is just stupid! Thank you

 

[pnicho]

WTF!! Ok, I just got home from BB. I was going to go ahead and get 2 32gb Iphones just for SG's. It would at least give me something to do for the next few weeks until the TB comes out. We are getting ready to complete the deal, until this came up. We began talking about GPS, due to my job my wife and I use it pretty much on a daily basis. The manager of BB told me that you CAN NOT use GPS (considered data) and recieve phone calls at the same time!!!! You have to chose one or the other. So if I answer an incoming call, it kicks me off GPS/Nav!! Like I have stated before, I have never owned an Iphone before. He told me that you could do it with AT&T, but not Verizon!! Are you frick'n kidding me! A TOTAL deal breaker for us. Can anyone confirm this that owns one right now please? That is just stupid! Thank you

Are you new to verizon? You've never been able to do voice/data at the same time on any of their phones on their 3g network(which the iphone runs on). You can only do it with their 4g phones on their LTE network.

 

[SpaceHippie]

Verizon phones are not capable of voice and data at the same time. The TB will be the first phone to do so, and it will do so sluggishly im sad to say.