I am strongly considering getting a BB when my VZW contract expires at the end of this year. I am mostly a phone user, who might browse the web here and there, and ssh in to read mail via Pine.

For the web and ssh connections, I'd prefer to use existing minutes of use on my plan instead of EVDO/1x. Is there a way to disable the high-speed options and configure the BB to use only minutes of use (aka voice minutes)?

Thanks.

Scott

To use you blackberry for ANY data, you will need to get one of the BB plans. They come in two different flavors, 5mb and unlimited. You can not use voice minutes in liew of data minutes. They are two separate plans. You would have no data unless you bought a plan. This data plan would be needed for ANY web and reading ANY mail.

I suggest strongly in getting the unlimited plan as EV-DO will use data at an alarming rate!

As a verizon customer who just went from a standard phone to a blackberry, I should add that the EVDO is $15 above the dataplan. I have to agree with Greg that you want to go unlimited. However, as he also said (and I called verizon this morning to confirm because I wasn't 100% sure) your data use does not burn any airtime minutes.

EVDO is NOT 15 dollars extra per month, the laptop tethering option is...

Yes, you're right...I was misinformed by the original CSR I spoke with. I spoke to another gentleman this afternoon (another question I had) and he clarified it. In fact, when I went upstairs I saw the EVDO indicator for the first time...I can't pick up EVDO downstairs.