[luckman212]

can someone briefly tell me

1) the main differences (besides the case color) between the 8700c and 8700g ... i.e, 8700g comes w. built-in OZ instant msngr (AIM), etc

2) the differences in pricing between the Cingular & T-Mo bb plans..

I tried making sense of the plans on the Cing & T-mo site but I couldn't sift through the buzzwords and marketing hype to understand what the real charges were. I am worried that I got totally screwed on my new 8700c....... i.e. paying like $110-120 /month for basically the same thing that T-mo customers are getting for like $60/mo, and getting charged for things like SMS etc..

Doesn't Cing give like 30 days to return the phone/plan if you arent happy? I thought I heard that somewhere......

[LunkHead]

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry 8700g: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.0) BlackBerry8700/4.1.0 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/100)

I have T-Mo and am seriously thinking about changing over to Cingular. I have 3 phones on a family paln with the BB add on. Compared to each other for my needs they are pretty comparable. I will gladly pay a little more a month to get away from T-Mo's horrible customer service.

[lgreenberg]

Yes Cingular has a thirty day no questions asked trial period. You can return the phone and cancel your service within the thirty days. You just pay for the service you used during the trial.

There is no denying T-Mobile's Blackberry plans are cheaper. But it's about coverage. T-Mobile could offer free service. But if they don't have the coverage you need what good what it be?

Do you know how T-Mobile's service is in your area?

You could always sign up for both. Carry both devices around for the trial periods each offers and see which one works best. Then cancel the one that doesn't work best before its trial period expires.

[luckman212]

hmmm... decisions decisions... can anyone in NYC Manhattan speak to the quality of T-mo's coverage here? I rarely leave NYC so thats my primary concern... and I hate getting ripped off by Cingular.

to LunkHead: could you elaborate a bit on why you think Cingular has better customer service? in my experience they are both nothing short of "horrific"

[lgreenberg]

Check out the T-Mobile forums at www.howardforums.com for information on coverage in NYC.

[luckman212]

I checked on the Howardforums... read some stuff but honestly most of the T-mo coverage threads about NYC were outdated by at least 6 months. In general the opinion seems to be that within Manhattan T-mo is on par with Cing & VZ but outside (NJ, Long Island, etc) it gets spotty. But, looking for some up-to-date opinions on this and thought I'd ask here. Maybe I will start another thread over there.....

any difference in data speeds (EDGE) with Cing vs. T-mo?

[luckman212]

f--- this... I'm just gonna buy a 8700g, use them both, and compare.

[deezmfnutz]

Originally Posted by luckman212

hmmm... decisions decisions... can anyone in NYC Manhattan speak to the quality of T-mo's coverage here? I rarely leave NYC so thats my primary concern... and I hate getting ripped off by Cingular.

to LunkHead: could you elaborate a bit on why you think Cingular has better customer service? in my experience they are both nothing short of "horrific"

I live in manhattan and I have had good luck with mobile. It works great in most of the city. I get poor in building signal in the curry hill/gramercy area on low floors but that is no big deal for me since I only go there once in a while. I have gotten great service everywhere else in the city. The 8700 series phone has pretty good rf, better than the 7100 series. The only way to know for sure is to give it a try yourself. There is no doubt that cingular and verizon have better coverage but it is no worth the price difference IMHO. EDGE works good on tmobo and is available just about everywhere in the city.

[tprime]

Funny how people always make comparisons and say one companies coverage is better than another. Some of my friends have Sprint, Verizon, Cingular and Nextel. I have tmobile.

There is always sometime when one has better reception. But honestly I would only know if I'm with my friend and they tell me they have reception and I dont. Sometimes it depends on the phone. My wife has a tmobile MDA and somtimes I have reception and she doesn't.

My phone works every in NYC I expect to work. Since I work for the MTA as a train operator I even know which subway stations I can get service as I'm always doing tests. I think unless your regularly somwhere and can't get reception go with the cheaper plan at Tmobile. As for customer service my buddy has an 8700c on cingular and says their cust serv stinks.

[r.poseidon]

I live on the Jersey shore, just got T-Mobile, and have no problems whatsoever. My office manager had a Treo 650, and just got the MDA, both w/ T-Mobile. He travels up to Long Island every weekend, and never has a problem w/ service. Before I moved here, about 4 months ago, I used to live in Kansas City, where I worked for Cingular. Their plans are HORRIBLY overpriced, and their customer service is terrible. T-Mobile has much better plans and customer service. My fiancee has travelled all over the US w/ T-Mobile, and has never had a problem w/ bad service except once. Obviously, I say go w/ T-Mobile.

[luckman212]

thanks for the feedback guys. Yeah that's pretty much what I expected. I ordered the 8700g and should have it by wednesday/thursday hopefully. T-mo gives 14-days to return while Cingular gives 30. So one of these puppies will be going back. I will post back here with my results.

[nosidam]

Originally Posted by luckman212

can anyone in NYC Manhattan speak to the quality of T-mo's coverage here? I rarely leave NYC so thats my primary concern... and I hate getting ripped off by Cingular.

I live and work in Manhattan and am an IT manager at a law firm so I've seen just about every device/carrier combo there is.

When walking around the city, all carriers have pretty much the same coverage. On my walk to work, T-Mo will drop on two specific blocks, but Cingular will go down to one bar on two different blocks (it rarely drops an in -progress call on those blocks, but you can't make a new call until the next block). Verizon does not seem to have any issues on my walk to work.

T-Mo will get good reception in my office, which is a 20th floor windowed office, but I will not get any reception in the computer room (toward center of building), while Cingular, Sprint, and Verizon will work in there.

Home is a different story. I live on the upper east side, in the back of a building, and I get T-Mo in two very specific spots in my apt...on the toilet and on the left side of my sofa...everywhere else is no reception. I get pretty good Cingular and Sprint reception everywhere in my apt. I get no Verizon coverage at all, anywhere in my apt. One time Verizon had to come and fix my landline, and he whipped out his Verizon cell phone to test it...when he saw he had no reception, I asked him to send the "Can you hear me now?" guy to my apt.

Being able to use my cell in my apt is the main reason I have stayed with Cingular. Besides, my company reimburses my data plan so I don't care what it costs.

Most of the attorney's stick with T-Mobile for their BB's because it is cheaper. Go figure...they make a $400 an hour and they go with T-Mobile only because it is the cheapest.

[tfaz1]

I've traveled lots of places (SF, NY, DC, Bos, LA, SD, KY, Chi, Vegas...) and found T-Mo's coverage to be fantastic.

As a former Cingular customer, I can't help but think that all this, "It's the network" stuff is all a bunch of hype to justify their disproportionate rate plans. Especially when it comes to the BlackBerry and getting dinged for extra data charges with 3rd party apps. Can anyone really explain why Cingular charges extra for something that T-Mobile includes for free? Is their network really that much better, because I'm not seeing a dial-up vs. DSL difference. It's really more of a Coke vs. Pepsi thing, except you're paying $3 for a can of Coke.

So, if you live in a rural area or a place where (for some reason) you can only get Cingular service, then I guess you don't have a choice. But for the majority of people out there, it really makes little difference who you go with (except the cost). I know a lot of my friends are Cingular customers because they wanted to get the latest phones (RAZR, SLVR, 8700c, etc.) and Cingular is always the first to get them. And because people want these phones, they get locked into a 1 or 2 year agreement at ridiculous rates.

[saa001]

How good of a signal I consistantly get is my primary factor. I bought a T mobile prepaid SIM card and put it in my unlocked 8700c. The signal strength was consistantly less than with my Cingular card in the exact same location.

I had looked into going to T Mobile due to the money I could save but since I no longer have a landline and my cell phone is my ONLY phone, the strength and clarity are of importance to me. There were times when the T Mobile dropped to unacceptable levels (but would correct itself about 30 seconds later). I never have a problem with Cingular and have on a few occasions received a usable signal where my friend who has T Mobile was unable to connect on his cell phone.

Yes the carrier sometimes makes a difference. It depends on what you are looking to receive from your carrier. I will be sticking with Cingular because of the better signal I get where I need it.

[KChung54]

T-Mobile's unlimited data roaming plan is what has kept me with them. With the amount of int'l travel, I love the fact that my monthly data bill remains the same.

[takeshi]

Originally Posted by luckman212

can someone briefly tell me

2) the differences in pricing between the Cingular & T-Mo bb plans..

Cingular's Blackberry data plan is equivalent to TMO's Blackberry BES Add-On for $29.99. However, with TMO you get tethering included where Cingular requires that you subscribe to a $30 tethering plan on top of the $45 for Blackberry Data.

If you don't need BES you can use TMO's BIS-only add-on for $19.99 in addition to whatever voice plan you choose. Only TMO's minutes and mail plans offer Blackberry data, voice, and SMS. In all other cases you need to pay per message or purchase a bundle of SMS messages.

[BBRaffey]

Reading this thread, it seems to me that the whole issue is coverage, coverage, coverage. 1) Find out which companies have good coverage where you usually need the phone such as at the office and home then 2) find the most reasonable price you can. Unfortunately for me, that means Cingular since TMO has 0 coverage in my house.

[nlk10010]

Originally Posted by luckman212

hmmm... decisions decisions... can anyone in NYC Manhattan speak to the quality of T-mo's coverage here? I rarely leave NYC so thats my primary concern... and I hate getting ripped off by Cingular.

-snip-

More information is better, no?

I work in Manhattan, live on the North Shore of LI and travel almost exclusively in the 5 Boros, Nassau/Suffolk and occasionally Northern NJ. I have had almost no problems with coverage (and everywhere I've went have had EDGE). My wife has Verizon and, while there are certain spots where she has coverage and I don't, and vice versa, the coverage is about the same. I have also tried Cingular in the same areas and, again, coverage was about the same. No coverage indoors, in some spots? True, but the same held for Cingular and Verizon. On average I got about the same coverage with all three, except that Verizon will work in the LIRR East River tunnels (that's the only noticeable, consistent difference). Coupled with Cingular's russian roulette method of charging for data I am thrilled with the T-Mo 8700g.

Naturally, you may find that there are certain spots you visit frequently and in which one or more of the carriers won't work. That's what trial periods are for. But I don't think coverage is correlated with how much you pay, period.

Once you try T-Mo and Cingular and see if one offers you an important advantage in coverage you'll need to decide (if Cingular is better) if the data charges are worth it.

Bottom line: I am one (and I'm sure there are many) T-Mo users who have coverage as good as, if not better than, I would with Verizon or Cingular.

=NLK=

[luckman212]

thanks for the additional posts guys, very informative. I should receive the phone on wed. so I am eager to test it out.

[hf1khal]

Well having had the 2 side by side for 2 weeks. The C seemed to be the choice over the G for NYCas T mobile was hit and miss in a few areas we were at for meetings. Also in some areas in LI, T mobile had some coverage issues and in some it actualy roamed on Cingular. Plues it has been having a lot of network busy issues lately and T mobile can't fess up to the issue. Any way, as a result the G went back to T Mobile today and a second C will be purchased.